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In a postgame interview following the Kansas City Chiefs’ narrow 23-20 victory over the New York Jets on Sunday Night Football, Rodney Harrison made a couple of awkward attempts to goad Chris Jones into criticizing Jets’ quarterback Zach Wilson.
Harrison kicked things off by asking Jones, “Was Zach better tonight than what you anticipated, watching him on tape? You can be honest.”
Chris Jones instead started speaking positively about the Jets quarterback, who had nearly beaten the Super Bowl champions on SNF.
Harrison decided to try to bait Jones again: “But watching that tape, man, you gotta look at this dude and say oh he is garbage! We should really tear him apart.”
This is NOT the way to conduct an interview when talking about people.
NBC's Rodney Harrison called Zach Wilson "Garbage" in the post-game and tried to bait #Chiefs DT Chris Jones into agreeing with him.
Felt almost personal.
Thankfully Jones didn't take it and instead… https://t.co/q0uYGaZPEX pic.twitter.com/A9hAuE0MLm
— Dov Kleiman (@NFL_DovKleiman) October 2, 2023
Jones kept his composure, refusing to take the bait from Harrison.
Jones instead continued to praise Wilson, calling him “special” a few minutes later, prompting Harrison to double down on his skepticism.
“Wait, wait, wait, wait. Did you say Zach Wilson is special? I think he had a special night, but I don’t think he’s special.” This time, Dungy and Collinsworth chuckled, and Jones once again defended Wilson.
The situation was undeniably awkward and not how a media member, especially one who’s a former player, should conduct an interview. He’s talking about a young player and calling him “garbage”, that’s out of line.
Hopefully it doesn’t happen again.