On the eve of NFL draft, Josh Allen apologizes for high school tweets

Josh Allen — the Firebaugh native, standout college quarterback and expected first-round pick in Thursday's NFL draft — is apologizing for a series of tweets he wrote in 2012-2013 while still in high school.

Yahoo news reported on the tweets Wednesday, pulling several examples that included racial slurs and other offensive language.

Allen quickly owned up to the tweets, which had been deleted in January and dug up this week, and apologized, telling ESPN that they were written when he "was young and dumb."

That would seem in line with comments Allen made last week at an appearance at Reedley College.

"Coming from a small town I wouldn’t say I was sheltered, but I just hadn’t seen a lot and just being around different types of people from different backgrounds was a really cool experience," Allen said, when asked what he learned most from his one semester at Reedley College in fall 2014.

"It’s just a diverse culture around here that you’ve got no choice but to get along with everybody because you’re playing on the same team.”

Allen addressed several specific tweets, telling ESPN that one was a reference to an episode of "Modern Family." Another was a reference to a song by rapper Rick Ross.

The story obviously got response on social media.

Of course, Allen is not the first to find controversy for his Twitter feed. He's not even the first this week. See: Kanye West, Shania Twain and Randa Jarrar.

And given the timing, some are positing that the story has more to do with the business of the NFL than any real outrage.

If Allen is the first overall pick in the draft, he will likely be picked up by the Cleveland Browns. If he were to fall in the draft (due to a massive amount of negative attention, for example), he could be picked up by another team.

This story was originally published April 26, 2018 at 9:42 AM with the headline "On the eve of NFL draft, Josh Allen apologizes for high school tweets."