Matt Forte’s contract situation with the Chicago Bears remains a prickly thorn in the side of a team with high hopes for 2012. Forte twisted that thorn Friday night.  Read more after the jump.
The Bears running back told WSCR-AM in Chicago he will likely skip training camp without a long-term deal from the team.
This came hours after Forte told NFL Network’s Kimberly Jones he was uncertain about his status for camp, but wouldn’t sit out the 2012 season.
Forte is not interested in signing his franchise tag, which would net him $7.7 million. He remains “optimistic” as the sides continue to dialogue, but admits the ongoing tussle has affected him.
“You can’t let it get too personal,” he told the radio station. “I mean, it’s always personal when you are dealing with the business side of the league because they are talking about you as a person.
“When you are an athlete and you’ve done everything that you’ve been asked to do and you’ve excelled out there on the field, and then you go out in the media and you see there is stuff written about you how they are devaluing you as a player at your position and saying that you are not as good as what you think you are or what the stats say — I mean, the stats can’t lie. If you have good stats and you are playing good, obviously you are a good player. So it gets personal when you are devalued like that.”
Forte might be weary of the media chatter, but he can’t deny the league-wide perception shift at the running back position.
It not a vast surprise he’d threaten to skip training camp, but Forte also maintains he won’t miss a regular-season snap. That’s a mixed message to put out there publicly when the Bears have shown zero urgency to furnish him with a contract this offseason. Instead, they brought in Michael Bush, only chipping away at Forte’s leverage. One of league’s longest-running contract dramas might not end happily in Chicago, at least not for Forte.
