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| Following a change of wardrobe after his surprise press conference, George Santos was photographed as he entered Club Gitmo. |
FSN Sports
In a move that threatened to shake the foundations of the entire league, embattled New York Congressman George Santos on Tuesday denounced London Bakers owner QCurl Sharif as a “complete imposter” whose storied organization is “built on pure fantasy.”
Santos, who faces expulsion from Congress based on a number of allegations, including campaign finance fraud, appeared in Nashville for Bacchanal Week. At a news conference near Nashville’s Bicentennial Mall, where the annual Bacchanal will be staged beginning on Friday, Santos stepped to the microphone wearing a flamboyant Carmen Miranda costume, suggestive of his native Brazil, complete with a headdress made of tropical fruit.
“It gives me no pleasure to say this,” Santos began, “but it must be said: The man who calls himself QCurl Sharif is a fake, a fraud and a fantasy. Q is a nobody, and I hate to see millions of good, honest people deceived by a pretender.”
As Santos elaborated in a long, rambling narrative, he came to Nashville two decades ago as the original drummer for Brazilbilly. Performing nightly with frontman Jesse Lee Jones at Robert’s Western Wear, Santos said he came to know people in country music circles. Later, he said he worked in media relations for the NFFA in its early years—a claim that could not be independently verified.
“I’m in a position to know certain things,” Santos said. “QCurl Sharif is actually a guy named Warren Denney who works for the Country Music Hall of Fame. I played on the Hall’s rec league volleyball team with him. He was never knighted by the Queen of England. He’s not a folk hero in Ukraine. He’s not besties with Joe Biden. He was never the target of an assassination attempt by Taylor Swift. Focus on the Family never put a fatwa on him. He doesn’t operate a swanky club in London. He did have a pet chimpanzee named Mr. TD, but that’s about it. Everything else is a fabrication.”
The question was put to Santos: “Are you saying the whole league is built on a fraud?”
“No, not the whole league,” Santos replied. “For example, I know for sure that Dave the Animal runs a huge international narcotics manufacturing operation in New England. I’ve seen the Methlon facilities. He was one of the rich donors I tried to cultivate for my campaign after he served as chief mediator with Covid-19 during the Trump Administration. DTA is totally legit, even if not totally legal.”
Media reaction was swift and severe. Fox News, a longtime critic of Sharif, used Santos’ claims to paint Sharif and the Bakers—and, by extension, the entire NFFA and its founder, Dr. Jorgé Linardo—as dangerous frauds who peddle anti-American values.
Sharif, who was reportedly at his West End Treehouse with Bakers coach Snoop Dogg as they filmed a TV commercial for BudHub, a new delivery service operated by Sod Bakers, LLC, was not available for comment. Meanwhile, protesters assembled in the 12 South neighborhood, near the team’s former headquarters, carrying signs that said, “Say it ain’t so, Q.” Speaking to an ABC News camera crew in front of the Cherry Bomb Café, Bakers superfan Bill Cheatham, sporting an AR-15 over his shoulder, “I knew it was so all along. Q deceived us and then took the team out of town. And now it turns out he’s just some cog in the country music machine named Warren. Man, [bleep] that.”
On Wednesday, Beelzebubbas owner MetaWorld Death, flanked by NFFA Commissioner Bernie Sanders and Deputy Commissioner Meadow Soprano, addressed Santos’ accusations in his own press conference outside NFFA Headquarters in downtown Nashville.
“I think we all know George Santos’ track record, and it speaks for itself,” said MWD. “Nevertheless, these are serious charges that many credulous people will take as truth, especially when amplified by the haters and liars. It is an abomination to bring these absurd allegations during Bacchanal Week, the celebration that best exemplifies all that is good and true about the greatest sports league of all time. It is not easy going into the annual Integrity Dinner hosted by my old friend Sir Q when our integrity is being challenged in this way.
“I can’t help but think of the words of the philosopher George Clinton, who helped provide this league with its intellectual underpinnings and who will be with us this weekend: ‘Fantasy is reality in the world today. / But I’ll keep hanging in there; that is the only way. / I’m free of the need to be free. / My mine is mine, and mine my mind will always stay. / No man-made law is gonna take it away.”
“Let’s not hate George Santos,” MWD continued. “He’s living a fantasy as a way to cope with the unbearable realities of his world where, like the song says, ‘Insanity is normality.’ He came here dressed like a tropical drag queen because he desperately wants what the NFFA has always embodied. But society has unfortunately taught him that he should try to tear down what we have built here for the world instead of becoming ‘free of the need to be free.’ What he said yesterday should not be seen as accusations against the owner who represents the spiritual heart of this league but as a desperate cry for help. And just as this league has filled such a deep spiritual need for millions, we should reach out to poor, lost George now with a lifeline.”
With that, Commissioner Sanders stepped to the microphone and said, “In the spirit of this great league, I hereby offer an invitation to George Santos to join the annual celebration of the Bacchanal, where he can be whoever he wants without judgment. And I want you to know that the invitation doesn’t just come from me. Ladies and gentlemen, the President of the United States!”
As the media watched with jaws dropped, Joe Biden emerged from behind a backdrop curtain and said, “Look, let’s dispense with the malarkey that QCurl Sharif is somebody else. Barack and I have been guests at his Tree House many times. I delivered the eulogy at his funeral, for crissake, back when we thought he had been killed in Ukraine. I smoked cigars and sipped brandy with Furious George. Sir Q is the real deal.
“There is simply nothing in our country like the NFFA, which has become a beacon of hope and sanity for so many. I’ve recently been to Israel and met with the leader of China, but there is nothing I could do this month that is more important to renewing this nation than to be here to celebrate an American dream that some people misleadingly call ‘fantasy’ football. George, you have a chance to quit the fantasy world of the Republican Party and latch on here to something that is real and vital. Why don’t you leave your problems behind and come be part of the solution?”
Santos, last seen entering Club Gitmo on Wednesday afternoon, could not be reached for comment. FSN will continue to update this story.
