Cam Newton and Shannon Sharpe are both former star athletes who use their outspokenness, experience from their NFL days and personality to drive very popular podcasts.
You never know what kind of shock jock stories you will hear from their football exploits.
The Pro Football Hall of Famer joined Newton on the “Funky Friday ” podcast and things got interesting when Sharpe, still single, but a father of three kids at age 56, explained why he doesn’t stay over at a woman’s house, even to this day.
Sharpe — who on his own podcast “Uncle Shay Shay” and his late night collaboration with former NFL star Chad “Ochocinco” Johnson provides a platform for celebrities to spill their guts, take shots at their enemies and reveal never told before stories — recalled two sticky situations in which he got caught up in the unwanted drama of dishonest women. One could have cost him his life.
Shannon Sharpe Recalls Sticky Situations Staying At Women’s Houses As Young NFL Player
The first instance, he told Newton, was during his rookie season, right after the Denver Broncos selected him in the seventh round out of HBCU Savannah State. He said he returned to Georgia after the draft and arrived late in town, so he didn’t want to startle his mother by showing up at the house late in the night, so he said he called a random woman in the rolodex and asked whether she was dating anyone and, if not, “would you mind if I stayed the night.”
She agreed, but the sleepover wasn’t smooth sailing.
“Cam, something told me, ‘Boy, keep your clothes on.’ So, I got on shorts and I got on a T-shirt,” Sharpe said, painting the scene. “Man, have you ever had sleep paralysis? You can hear things, but you can’t move … I can hear it and it’s getting louder, it’s getting louder, and they’re arguing. So, by this time – boom! The door flies off the hinges. … So, ya boy is 21, ready to do something. I’m jumping up like, ‘Hey what’s up, boy, what’s it about to be?’ I said, ‘Oh lord, he’s got some bodies on his résumé.’ Yeah, I’m talking about those kinds of bodies.”
We have heard plenty of incidents of jilted lovers, husbands and boyfriends catching their significant other under the covers with another companion and some of those situations have led to vicious assaults, even deaths.
Shannon’s potentially threatening situation, to his surprise, turned into a fanboy moment instead.
Sharpe tells Cam that when the man who entered the room where Sharpe was in his slumber turned out to be a huge fan of the tight end and told Sharpe that he always praises his play on the field to his other football fan friends.
Luckily, this was prior to the social media age, so the rare opportunity to converse one-on-one with an NFL star superseded his anger towards his unfaithful woman.
Sharpe said the man told him he didn’t have a problem with him but with the woman they were both dealing with.
“He said, Sharpe, I ain’t got no problem with you. I’m tired of this ‘B’ lying. I’m saying to myself, ‘Me, too.’ Cam, man, I put my shoes on and booked it out of there,” Sharpe said, adding that he didn’t learn his lesson.
If that situation wasn’t threatening enough to make Sharpe rethink his ways, an event in 1993 was the final straw when it came to staying at a woman’s house.
Sharpe said he returned to Savannah State for homecoming, as the big-time local hero with a Pro Bowl under his belt while the Broncos had a bye week. He said he called a woman to meet up with while he was in town. NFL players tended to have a different girlfriend available in every city back then.
Last time, the man whose relationship he violated was as much of a fan as his girl who Sharpe was laying up with, so Sharpe’s celebrity worked in his favor.
Shannon Sharpe Gets AK-47 Pulled On Him By Woman’s Boyfriend
This second situation was different and could have ended morbidly.
“I set my stuff down. And I’m looking at the door handle, it’s turning. … Dude come in. He got that [AK-47]. Oh lord, have mercy. I said, ‘Lord.’ And he looked at me, and he said, ‘My man.’ I said, ‘Yeah.’ He’s about to ask me if I’m Sharpe. I said, ‘Yeah.’ He said, ‘I thought so.’ I said, ‘My man, is this your people?’ He said, ‘Yeah. Two years,’” Sharpe explained.
Sharpe continued: “He got the chopper on me. His home boy got that sawed off shotty on my homeboy,” who was sitting on the couch, reading a Jet magazine, while Unc was in the room handling his business.
“I said, ‘My man, I ain’t know.’ I said, ‘You know who I am now.’ I said, ‘Man, my bad. You saved me.’ Because if I had not been [interrupted], I ain’t telling this story right now.”
Sharpe says he hopped in a car with his friend and peeled off, realizing he left his Rolex and $50K worth of jewels on the dresser. At the time, Sharp says he wasn’t making more than $50,000 after taxes on his rookie deal. So, he told his boy to turn around and the AK-47-toting scorned lover actually gave the jewelry back to him:
Cam was surprised by the entire story but was very confused as to why Unc was going to other women’s houses. Sharpe said that used to be the thing. Cam said, “Noooooo.”
Times have changed since the ’90s when Unc was moving and shaking under entirely different cultural playbooks. Shannon’s story sounds awfully similar to Biggie’s classic 1997 track, “I Got A Story To Tell,” where the Brooklyn rapper paints a picture of an incident where he was having relations with a New York Knicks player’s girl, the player comes home, and Biggie robs him at gunpoint.
All we can do is take Unc’s word for it. When it comes to Shannon Sharpe, he always has a story to tell or a couch and some cognac to let you tell yours.
“I have not closed my eyes at another woman’s house in 31 years,” Sharpe insisted.
Maybe it’s time for the three-time Super Bowl champ, eight-time Pro Bowl player and younger brother of legendary receiver Sterling Sharpe, to settle down.
