Manti Te’o is about a month and a half from finding out what team will draft him, more importantly, who’s locker room will he frequent on a daily.
NFL locker rooms and professional locker rooms can be notorious for jokes, pranks and rookie hazing. Manti Te’o will most likely absorb a lot of all three of things.
Houston Texans defensive end Antonio Smith says his teams lockerroom is “brutal,” and told Pro Football Talk that Te’o would have to toughen up if he’s drafted by Houston.
“Our locker room is full of clowns and, oh, man people would kill him. I mean he would be the butt of every joke for at least two, three years,” Smith said.
Te’o of course has been the butt of jokes, parodies, and enormous scrutiny since word of him having a fake girlfriend came out.
Smith says Te’o would definitely need to be a good sport about it, and roll with the punches.
“You just got to be a good sport, man, it is what it is and you know it is out now, it’s out in the papers and on TV, so all you can do now, you can’t worry about it, you can’t change it, all you can do now is laugh — laugh with us while we’re laughing at you,” Smith said.