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Prominent Italian NFL Player Calls Out Baker Mayfield Over His Tommy DeVito Celebration

#Baker Mayfield
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Tampa Bay Buccaneers quarterback Baker Mayfield seemed to ruffle a few feathers with his Tommy DeVito-themed celebration against the New York Giants on Sunday in which he enthusiastically mimic’d the Italian pinched fingers cele that DeVito was doing last night.

After scoring a rushing touchdown in the second quarter to extend the Bucs’ lead to 23-0, Baker Mayfield hopped up off the ground and began enthusiastically copying Tommy DeVito’s celebration, which is essentially just that hand motion Italians do when we’re complaining about something or arguing with someone.

Following the game, Detroit Lions linebacker Alex Anzalone — probably one of the most prominent Italian players in the league giving his starting role on the Lions’ defense and his God of Thunder-esque hair — responded to Mayfield on Twitter, saying his DeVito celebration was a little “too aggressive.”

Watching it live, I’m kind of with Anzalone on this one: Mayfield was ripping it so hard that I actually couldn’t even tell he was doing the DeVito thing at first — I thought it was more a Spider-Man web-shooting motion. To also be clear — given that my last name is Italiano and I live about 20 minutes from MetLife and my high school buddy is actually one of Tommy DeVito’s managers, I can speak on this — I didn’t find Mayfield’s celebration offensive in the slightest. If anything, it just further underlined how disastrous the current state of the Giants is, as an opposing quarterback literally clowned on your starter in a WWE-like fashion.

As a New York sports fan, it’s difficult to determine which of our two NFL franchises is more of a joke right now: the Giants or the Jets? On one hand, Aaron Rodgers has infiltrated the organization like a sleeper cell and has torn it up from the inside out in just 11 games. On the other, the Giants just cut their former franchise QB, are on the verge of having to watching Saquon Barkley win an MVP award with the Eagles, and have Baker mocking them so ferociously his wrists look at risk of snapping. Real Sophie’s choice of pain there.

With Brian Daboll’s job, and therefore GM Joe Schoen’s job, hanging on by a thread, it’s likely both the Jets and Giants head into the offseason needing a new head coach, general manager, and quarterback.