NFL Analyst Dan Hampton Apologizes for Katrina Analogy

By: Stephen Smith
Topics: Video

Defensive tackle Dan Hampton (99) of the Chicago Bears in 1986. Hampton, now an analyst for Pro Football Weekly, apologized for on-air comments he made about Hurricane Katrina.

(Credit: Getty)

As the NFL season kicks off this Thursday in New Orleans, football pundits are weighing in on whether the Saints can repeat as Super Bowl Champs.

One such analyst, Hall of Famer Dan Hampton, doesn't think the Saints will fare well in their season opener against Minnesota - and he used a questionable analogy to make his point.

"The Vikings need to go down there and hit that town like Katrina," the former Chicago Bears lineman proclaimed on Pro Football Weekly's television show.

Hampton issued an apology Monday night on profootballweekly.com

"It was a spur-of-the-moment comment intended strictly as a metaphor for the storm-like intensity I believe the Vikings will bring to their rematch with the Saints, and it simply never occurred to me that anyone could read anything more than that into it.

"I have nothing but the deepest respect and greatest admiration for the people of the Gulf Coast, and I am horrified that even one of you would think I would make light of the terror Katrina wrought, and that I have clearly offended so many of you.

"I realize now it was a terrible choice of words, and I offer absolutely no excuses. I screwed up, about as badly as I could, and I am deeply and profoundly sorry."

Stephen Smith
Stephen Smith is a news producer and sports editor for CBSNews.com

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by garyndavis September 8, 2010 5:10 PM EDT: Dan Hampton apologized to the people of NOLA for his remark about Hurricane Katrina. The term Blitz is used all the time. The Blitz killed 43,000 Britons and leveled/damaged more than a million houses in London alone. Are we supposed to apologize to the British and specifically the people of London for their losses, during WW II, every time a sports announcer says "the Blitz is on?" You don't have to apologize to me Dan! This PC stuff is getting out of hand.; Reply to this comment

by zipkin119-2009 September 7, 2010 10:33 AM EDT

Now CBS News owes Hampton, and the rest of us, an apology for not reporting the salient fact of New Orleans' flooding in 2005: it wasn't caused by Hurricane Katrina, it was caused by catastrophic design and construction flaws in the "hurricane protection system", built by our tax money, via the US Army Corps of Engineers. Not my opinion, the unanimous conclusion of the members of two separate forensic engineering panels, one from UC Berkeley and the other from LSU.
Hampton mis-spoke. What's CBS News' excuse?

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by skeeterandbucky September 7, 2010 12:45 PM EDT: Absolutely and if CBS had skipped this trivial slip of the tongue most would have had no clue that it had happened. Try reporting something that matters!