Jimmy Graham gets into pregame verbal fracas with Seahawks players

Jimmy Graham got things off to a contentious start Saturday. (Ted S. Warren/AP) SEATTLE -- Apparently, the 34-7 beatdown that the Seattle Seahawks put on the

Doug Farrar | Jan 11, 2014

Jimmy Graham gets into pregame verbal fracas with Seahawks players /

Jimmy Graham got things off to a contentious start Saturday. (Ted S. Warren/AP)

SEATTLE -- Apparently, the 34-7 beatdown that the Seattle Seahawks put on the New Orleans Saints on Dec. 1 still rubs at least one Saints player a bit raw. More than two hours before the kickoff of the divisional rematch between the two teams at CenturyLink Field, Saints tight end Jimmy Graham became involved in a verbal altercation with various Seahawks players on the field.

As you can see from the GIFs below, Graham got into it with Seahawks linebacker Bruce Irvin -- he was pointing and shouting at Irvin to get away from him. As Irvin moved closer to Graham, team officials broke it up before things could get serious. Linebacker Bobby Wagner was also involved in the near-fracas.

Various other Seahawks and Saints players talked a bit of trash again a few minutes later near the 50-yard line -- that included Graham and Seahawks cornerback Richard Sherman exchanging a few post-holiday greetings.

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Tempers flared right before kick off as well.

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Published Jan 11, 2014

DOUG FARRAR

SI.com contributing NFL writer and Seattle resident Doug Farrar started writing about football locally in 2002, and became Football Outsiders' West Coast NFL guy in 2006. He was fascinated by FO's idea to combine Bill James with Dr. Z, and wrote for the site for six years. He wrote a game-tape column called "Cover-2" for a number of years, and contributed to six editions of "Pro Football Prospectus" and the "Football Outsiders Almanac." In 2009, Doug was invited to join Yahoo Sports' NFL team, and covered Senior Bowls, scouting combines, Super Bowls, and all sorts of other things for Yahoo Sports and the Shutdown Corner blog through June, 2013. Doug received the proverbial offer he couldn't refuse from SI.com in 2013, and that was that. Doug has also written for the Seattle Times, the Washington Post, the New York Sun, FOX Sports, ESPN.com, and ESPN The Magazine. He also makes regular appearances on several local and national radio shows, and has hosted several podcasts over the years. He counts Dan Jenkins, Thomas Boswell, Frank Deford, Ralph Wiley, Peter King, and Bill Simmons as the writers who made him want to do this for a living. In his rare off-time, Doug can be found reading, hiking, working out, searching for new Hendrix, Who, and MC5 bootlegs, and wondering if the Mariners will ever be good again.