Saints wideout Michael Thomas has vulgarly lashed out at a beat writer who reported that the team will release him soon.
Nola.com’s Jeff Duncan reported Thursday that the Saints will be cutting Thomas at some point before the start of the new league year on March 13.
Thomas, 31, caught wind of the report and fired back on Duncan on X.
“Jeff Duncan funny how they planning on releasing me if I was on a 1 year deal,” Thomas tweeted, adding three laughing emojis.
“Don’t fall for it he the same dude that tried to be my friend in season after saying I wasn’t the same player in training camp. #nexttopic.”
Thomas proceeded to escalate the matter in a second tweet.
“Jeff Duncan is a hoe. Trying to stay relevant so let’s speak on it,” Thomas wrote.
“The Saints leak information to him to try to ruin players value but see I’m not broke so I can speak on it. He is broke so he need clicks. Go look at all his articles that never end up being true.”
The AP reported last March that Thomas had agreed to a one-year contract restructure, so the wideout seems to be arguing that the plan was always for him to hit free agency at this point, but Spotrac and Over the Cap’s contract tables both indicate that the Saints would have controlled his rights had they wanted him to return.
Where Duncan likely got under Thomas’ skin was not in merely reporting on the impending release, but his commentary that the wideout’s “last straws” with the Saints came when he was arrested for criminal mischief in November and in January when he blamed Derek Carr on social media for his season-ending injury.
Thomas has been plagued by injuries the last several years, playing in just 23 of the Saints’ 67 regular season games over the past four years, including missing the entirety of the 2021 season.
Last year, in 10 games, Thomas caught 39 balls for 448 yards and one touchdown.
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