At least four Redskins players nearly had their own Lennay Kekua. According to an NFL.com report, a woman who used the name Sidney Ackerman on her @RedRidnH00d Twitter account, contacted a handful of Washington’s players in hopes of starting an online relationship with them.
When some of those players tried to meet up with Ackerman, and those attempts did not come to fruition, they began to suspect something was amiss. Ackerman had been using the photos of Internet adult entertainer C.J. Miles to attract attention, but a report by the NFL discovered that she had no plans to take it to a level that alleged Kekua inventor Roniah Tuiasosopo did.
“I think it was all about attention,” said Phillip Daniels, the Redskins director of player development. “I don’t think it was any of the other stuff. It was just about being able to talk to them, pretending to be someone they aren’t.’’
But the Ackerman account, run by a woman who is a Redskins fan, did send pornographic videos and personalized photos of Miles to the players in hopes of gaining their trust. The report says that the players were in part convinced she was real because she had over 17,000 followers on the account. Ackerman’s Twitter and Facebook were deleted when she became aware that NFL.com was preparing a story on the situation.
“If you think about it, a lot of them are single guys, and they see somebody who looks good in a picture or something,” said Daniels, who posted a warning. “In many cases, it involves someone who is a fan of the team, so they’ll start talking about the team. You have to recognize that something just isn’t right.
“But you’re talking about a lot of guys who are single. I don’t fault the guys. I fault the people who are doing this crazy stuff, causing these problems.”
The saga of Manti Te’o, the Notre Dame linebacker who alleges that he was tricked into a year-long online relationship, will likely raise awareness among other college and professional athletes about “Catfish” situations.