It's not often that a former NFL coach has to come out and deny that he used to regularly skip team meetings, but that's exactly what former Packers coach Mike McCarthy did on Thursday.
In a story on Bleacher Report, multiple players anonymously told the website that McCarthy would sometimes skip the final weekly meeting on the Saturday before a game, and instead would be "up in his office getting a massage."
McCarthy staunchly denied that accusation during an interview with NFL Media on Thursday.
"I wouldn't even know where to start and stop with the article," McCarthy said. "But to say that I skipped a team meeting for a massage is utterly absurd. I have a massage scheduled tomorrow, and I can promise you I will not miss my primary responsibility of picking up my two kids from school."
Although McCarthy never directly said "no" to the accusation (you'll notice that he called the idea of it absurd versus actually saying no), he must have realized that, because he ended up giving a much more concise answer to ESPN.com.
"I've never missed a team meeting for a massage," McCarthy said.
So did McCarthy skip multiple meetings during his time in Green Bay?
The author of the Bleacher Report piece, Tyler Dunne, defended his work with a tweet on Thursday night after McCarthy denied the massage accusations.
And fwiw, here is one player's response to McCarthy's response on this: "It was talked about widely. Bizarre that he would deny that when it was widely known." https://t.co/myATfxXgE1
— Tyler Dunne (@TyDunne) April 4, 2019
Even if McCarthy didn't skip any meetings, the article still painted a very unflattering picture of his time in Green Bay. According to the story, Aaron Rodgers never really liked McCarthy after the 49ers passed over the quarterback for the No. 1 overall pick in the 2005 NFL Draft (McCarthy was the offensive coordinator in San Francisco at the time). The relationship started off sour when the Packers hired McCarthy in 2006 and things apparently only got worse from there.
After being fired by the Packers in December, McCarthy was hoping to get back into coaching, but he was only willing to do that with one team: the Jets. Although the Jets interviewed him, they ended up passing on McCarthy and hiring Adam Gase.
