Dominic Raiola is a walking stereotype. That is, if you believe a member of the University of Wisconsin marching band.
Raiola played the part of big, bad football player picking on the marching band on Sunday, according to a Wisconsin band member. The band performed the national anthem Sunday prior to the Green Bay Packers-Detroit Lions game, and Zach York says he and the band were verbally abused by Raiola. York used his Facebook page Sunday night to accuse the Lions center of some pretty insensitive comments.
“Dominic Raiola is literally the worst person I have ever had the fortune to encounter. After marching down the field awaiting the national anthem, He went off on a verbal tirade, among other things, questioning my sexuality (as a band member) and then continued on to bring my sister and my recently deceased mother into the conversation. After I refused to give him the satisfaction of turning to look at him, he switched targets to a trombone ranting at him calling him overweight and saying he can’t play a real sport. After our halftime show, the same fine gentleman called a female member of the band the ‘c’ word.”
This isn’t the first time Raiola has acted like a 300-pound man who gets paid to bash his head into other 300-pound men. Earlier in the week, he expressed displeasure with Packers fans’ tradition of mooning the opponent’s buses as they leave Lambeau Field.
That tradition is even more of a bummer for someone like Raiola who has never beaten the Pack at Lambeau.
“Well, usually you’re [ticked] off when you leave there because you don’t win,” he said, according to the Detroit Free Press. “Let me out of this [expletive] bus. Yeah, you got mooned. It’s like, ‘Get me the [expletive] out of this bus so I can go put my hands on somebody.”
Raiola did clarify that he was joking about hurting fans and said he loved playing in Green Bay.
However, if these band allegations are true, it wouldn’t be the first time Raiola has had issues with fans. He made an obscene gesture at his own fans in 2008 — an act he said he didn’t regret — and added he’d like to give out his home address.
“I’d do that, but you can’t,” he said after that incident. “Nobody plays with fists. Everybody wants to play with metal.”
The Packers beat the Lions 22-9 on Sunday. Detroit quarterback Matthew Stafford was sacked five times.
Photo via Facebook/Badger Band
