He probably should have understood this before now, but New York Jets quarterback Mark Sanchez appears to be learning how to be a successful, single, very eligible bachelor in New York City without constantly making headlines.
You just gotta be smart. I’m with Scotty [McKnight] most of the time. You know people have usually been cool, but there’s always people trying to catch you, taking a picture of you doing something that oh yeah him and Hayden [Panettiere] are doing that. It’s like come on. We’re sitting at a club hanging out and we happen to be at the same place or something like that," Sanchez said on Fox Sports Radio with Petros and Money. "t’s just too bad, but that’s the way it goes. It’s totally worth it to be where I’m at and get all the perks of playing in the NFL. If that’s one of the downsides I can live with it."
Sanchez, of course, learned about the harsh glare the hard way when his "rumored" relationship with 17-year-old Eliza Kruger was blasted all over the Internet, the airwaves and the newpaper pages.
"It’s an Internet deal and I mean you know this very well being in the media. I’m playing in New York. One of the biggest cities in the country and you’re going to get scrutiny on-and-off the field, no matter what you do. You know you just gotta be smart about who you hang out with and it’s not even worth talking about at this point anymore. It’s a few months old. It’s just that’s the nature of gossip in the city. I mean that’s kind of the way things go and it’s…you know this better than anybody. I mean people embellish stories, fabricate stories, to try to drive traffic to their website, to try and get people to start talking about their publication. It didn’t bother me. It was just too bad that somebody had to go do stuff like that, but it’s a probably a great lesson about playing in New York and being in the spotlight. You know you learn from those things."
Sometimes the lesson isn't much fun, either. Even if it is one you shouldn't have needed to learn in the first place.