Sean Payton believes Jeremy Shockey was not bounty pool informant

In a text message revealed by Jeremy Shockey, his former coach, Sean Payton, said he knows Shockey had nothing to do with telling the league about the bounty program.

When Warren Sapp, for some reason, named former Saints tight end Jeremy Shockey as the snitch that told the league about New Orleans’ bounty program that led to a drastically-different Saints organization for 2012, Shockey predictably was outraged.

He and Sapp had a minor Twitter war but Sapp said he backed his source unequivocally. Now, Shockey has what he said is definitive proof from the guy who’s taken the biggest punishment from the league in this entire mess.

That would be coached Sean Payton, who apparently texted Shockey the following.



So, what does that mean? Well, assuming this is a real text -- it did come from Shockey’s Twitter account -- it means that Payton doesn’t believe Shockey is the one who told the league about the bounty pool. So, that's good, I suppose?

Either way, the real question we want answered: As one of my editors asked a little while ago, in what context is Payton texting the word “hug!!!!!” to Shockey?

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