I love playing sports. I love watching sports. And I love reading about sports. One thing I do not love, is constantly reading about athletes making stupid and offensive comments on twitter. Sports fans used to be able to put on TSN, ESPN and Rogers Sportsnet to get real insight on how their favourite teams are doing. Unfortunately this is no longer the case, as more and more often we are forced to hear about another athlete putting their foot in their mouth in 140 characters or less. A great example of this is Tennessee Titans running back Chris Johnson.
Over the last 3 NFL seasons, CJ has established himself a one of the game's premiere running backs. So this past off season Johnson sat out of team workouts and training camp in an effort to renegotiate his contract (which was way below market value). As the season drew nearer fans started to become upset that he was still not suiting up for the Titans and began sending him messages over twitter stating their anger regarding his holdout. You would think that Johnson (being a professional athlete and all) would know enough not to engage in similar pettiness with the fans right? Wrong! In a move that I'm sure still makes his representatives queasy, Johnson responded to the fans with this twitter message:
Over the last 3 NFL seasons, CJ has established himself a one of the game's premiere running backs. So this past off season Johnson sat out of team workouts and training camp in an effort to renegotiate his contract (which was way below market value). As the season drew nearer fans started to become upset that he was still not suiting up for the Titans and began sending him messages over twitter stating their anger regarding his holdout. You would think that Johnson (being a professional athlete and all) would know enough not to engage in similar pettiness with the fans right? Wrong! In a move that I'm sure still makes his representatives queasy, Johnson responded to the fans with this twitter message:
By not thinking before he tweeted, Johnson joined other high profile athletes such as Rashard Mendenhall, Larry Johnson, Charlie Villaneuva and Chad Ochocinco. 
From my rant at the start you may believe that all athletes suck at using twitter. This is not the case though as some professional athletes have done an admirable job of using twitter as a way to not only connect with fans but to also do some good. The best example of a high profile athlete using twitter to truly connect with fans is Shaquille O'Neal. Shaq has had twitter contests where he will be at a mall and tell his followers that the first one to come up and tag him will get a prize. Instead of using twitter as an outlet to rip fans, coaches and other players, Shaq instead uses it to connect with fans in a way that would have never before been possible. Unlike Chris and Larry Johnson, Shaquille O'Neal clearly listened to the first 2 rules taught in Twitter 101 which are:
1) Once you press send, you can't take it back!
2) Think before you tweet!
This leads us to one final question which is: Do you think before you tweet?
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