Tiki Barber was a lightning rod in the country’s largest media market, never won a Super Bowl, criticized coaches and teammates who did, failed to conquer the world as a television personality and raised eyebrows with some questionable personal decisions.
So on the day his lower profile, more successful brother retired, Tiki took to the airwaves to ask Ronde “Why do so many people like you, but don’t like me?”
Self-awareness doesn’t appear to have been considered as an option.
Ronde was being interviewed by Tiki on CBS Sports Radio when the Smothers Brothers-style question came up, asking once before a commercial break and then giving Ronde a moment to think about it.
“That’s a great question,” Ronde said, via the New York Daily News. “[It’s] probably because you live in New York and I don’t know if New Yorkers like anything more than loving their stars than hating them.
“They look for faults and exploit them, or failures and exploit them and it’s a national story when it’s up there.”
We can now consider Ronde the more polite one, as well.
In case that’s not the answer you were seeking, perhaps it was Tiki calling Michael Strahan greedy during a contract negotiation. Perhaps it was ripping Eli Manning and Tom Coughlin after Tiki retired. Perhaps it was leaving his pregnant wife for an intern at an old job, or comparing his persecution to Anne Frank.
Or maybe it’s just that New Yorkers are big meanies.
That must be it.