Check out the video of Bart Scott’s TNA wrestling debut. It appears that Bart Scott may be in some hot water over his TNA Impact appearance. Numerous reports suggest that Scott’s participation in a wrestling angle could violate his contract with the New York Jets.
In the interest of the few TNA wrestling fans that still avoid TNA spoilers, stop reading now if you don’t want to know what happens on TNA Impact Thursday March 10. Now that the spoiler alert is out of the way, New York Jets linebacker Bart Scott will make an appearance this Thursday on Impact. Scott was involved in a pro wrestling angle as Ric Flair and Hulk Hogan’s bodyguard. Reports suggest that Olympic gold medalist Kurt Angle applied an ankle lock to Scott as part of the angle. The physical involvement could be enough to breach Scott’s contract with the Jets and get him in some serious hot water.
[adinserter block=”2″]I have to admit that I was pretty stunned when I read reports of the angle. I blogged about Scott’s upcoming appearance in TNA prior to the tapings. I assumed that Scott wouldn’t be involved in any physical altercations since the Tennessee Titans prevented Adam Pac Man Jones from participating in anything physical during his TNA run due to his contract with the team. Reading reports of Scott’s involvement surprised me as it appears from everything I read that he wouldn’t be allowed to do anything at all other than cut an interview and say hello.
PWTorch.com reports, “After the (Jeff and Karen Jarrett ) ceremony ended, Kurt pulled out a fire axe that was hidden and chopped the decorations up. After the Jarretts left, Flair and Bart Scott came out. Scott got in the ring and faced off with Angle, but Angle took him down and got him in the ankle lock. Scott tapped out, then security came out to restrain Angle, and the show ended.”
Profootballtalk.com has this excerpt from the NFL Standard Players Contract. “Without prior written consent of the Club, Player will not play football or engage in activities related to football otherwise than for Club or engage in any activity other than football which may involve a significant risk of personal injury. Player represents that he has special, exceptional and unique knowledge, skill, ability, and experience as a football player, the loss of which cannot be estimated with any certainty and cannot be fairly or adequately compensated by damages. Player therefore agrees that Club will have the right, in addition to any other right which Club may possess, to enjoin Player by appropriate proceedings from playing football or engaging in football-related activities other than for Club or from engaging in any activity other than football which may involve a significant risk of personal injury.”
The whole thing gets a bit murky when you compare this to Green Bay Packers linebacker Clay Matthews recent cameo on WWE Friday Night SmackDown. Matthews ran into the ring with a referee’s shirt and counted a three count in a match between Edge vs. Dolph Ziggler. Now nobody touched Matthews, but there is still inherit risk in running into the ring. What if he tripped, twisted a knee, tore a muscle, etc? I haven’t read about any complaints that the Packers had with the appearance, but it seems just as risky as Scott taking an ankle lock which would involve nothing more than Scott just laying on the ground and acting hurt.
[adinserter block=”1″] At the end of the day I don’t know what if any action the New York Jets will take against Bart Scott. I can’t imagine the Jets releasing Scott so in the worst case scenario, maybe Scott gets a fine.
Scott is a big wrestling fan and with the door open, it will be interesting to see if Scott decides to make more appearances for TNA Wrestling. Who knows? With a long enough layoff, maybe we will see the debut of Bart “Cry Baby” Scott at the Impact Zone.
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