To football insiders and fans, Shannon Sharpe was synonomous with the Denver Broncos. In his ten seasons as a Bronco, he had earned seven consecutive trips to the Pro Bowl, been named an All-Pro four times, and won two Super Bowls. Many would believe that these accomplisments were quite remarkable for a TE selected by the Denver Broncos in the seventh round (192nd pick overall) of the 1990 NFL Draft.

However, despite all of his accolades, Shannon Sharpe and the Broncos could not come to terms on a new contract. Sharpe then became an unrestricted free-agent and recently signed with the Baltimore Ravens. He figures to be an important "cog" in the Raven attack, and may be a difference-maker for the Ravens in the AFC Central race next season.

Sharpe described the NFL as a "business" in a recent interview on ESPN's Up Close with host Gary Miller. He also said he understands the circumstances that led to his departure from Denver. In their discussion, Sharpe candidly discussses his year-long silence with the media, his former coach Mike Shanahan, and his feelings on leaving the city of Denver.

If you missed Sharpe's appearance, you can read the edited transcript below or watch the streaming video of the interview.

Miller: Shannon, have you gotten used to being introduced as a Baltimore Raven yet?

Sharpe: It's kind of growing on me, because you spend ten years in one organization and everyone refers to you as a Bronco, and people still have a hard time, saying, "are you a Raven?" and I'm like, "yeah." And I'm very proud of being one.

Miller: Shannon, you have had a code of silence all year long. A lot of it was because you guys took the trip to Australia and some comments there were criticized in the media, and you also felt that your own organization didn't really support you. Now that you are talking again, can you talk about why you took the year off from talking to the media and how you feel about the whole situation now?

Sharpe: Yeah, I kind of felt that you don't have to go seventeen and a half hours to play a football game. I understand that you want to get the world more involved in American football, but to go seventeen and a half hours to people that really don't understand football, they play a Rugby league or whatever that is that they play over there, when you?ve got people right in the states that have never seen a football game. So I understand that the NFL is a business to make money, but I don't understand going seventeen and a half hours to go play a football game.

Miller: You are a guy that is very gregarious, very loquacious who always speaks his mind, and the media always asks, "where is Shannon Sharpe?" after a game because he has the best quotes. How tough was it to go the entire year without talking.

Sharpe: Well it was easy. It was not difficult at all, because it gave me the best opportunity for me to sit back and analyze, and see what people were saying and how they were perceiving me. I think that it was the best thing, and all in all I kind of felt that I wasn't going to be in Denver. No one stepped to the plate to make me feel that I was going to be in Denver, so there was not much to talk about. What happened was that there was a chain of events, Bubby (Brister) being benched, a lot of things transpired that everyone wanted me to comment on. I really felt that taking the vow of silence prepared me for what was going to happen.

Miller: You know your buddy, John Elway, had a lot to do with why the guys didn't succeed much this year and finished six and ten. It was the worst ever follow-up by a NFL Champion. He said that when Bubby was replaced by Brian Griese, that kind of let the players know that you weren't going for a championship this year. Do you agree with that?

Sharpe: Well, the thing of it with Mike (Shanahan) is that he felt that Brian gave us the best opportunity to win football games, and get us to level of football we wanted to get to. For whatever reasons, I really don't know, Bubby played really well the previous year, he won five games for us and played great. For that to happen, especially in a preseason game, you don't put a lot of offense in because you don't want to show a whole lot. I thought that Bubby could have handled that situation, but it wasn't my decision to make. Mike made the decision and we went along with it.

Miller: You could second-guess them a little a bit about the way your contract negotiations went, though. A minute ago, you said that you kind of knew you weren't going to come back this year, and yet it really hit you emotionally, you said when you found out that you wouldn't be staying there and you thought about it and you were going to be become a Raven. You said in all honesty, you cried.

Sharpe: I did, there is no question about it. I think after ten years you become attached to a city, you become attached to an organization and I still feel this way. I felt that I gave them more than what they were willing to give me. I read a comment that Mike said, "He?s the highest paid tight end in the league, how can he feel that this isn't his home?" But it was never about the money, it was about respect and about giving back what I gave to you. If you look at what I?ve gotten in ten years of playing in Denver, I got eight hundred and twenty five thousand dollars in signing bonuses, which is unheard of. I have been in a long relationship for ten years, seven consecutive pro bowls, four times All-Pro, and won two Super Bowls. And, coming off the years that I came off, to get three hundred thousand, or one hundred and fifty thousand was ridiculous. I felt that it was really, really unfair. But I never said anything about it, because I just wanted to go play football. If you look at my record when they wanted to sign a big time free agent, I was the first person they called to talk to the guy and tell him what a great organization it was. And I did that even though I didn't have a contract and I was talking to the guys that they wanted to sign for an enormous amount of money. So I was very disappointed the way this situation panned out. But I understand it is a business, and Mike was doing everything he possibly could. I like to think he was doing everything he possibly could to get me back, but for whatever reason I wasn't able to fit under the salary cap.

Miller: How do you feel when you see the contract they gave to Kavika Pittman?

Sharpe: You know the thing is and I have always said this, "If you are in Denver, you are there for only one reason, you?re there because Mike wants you there, and if you?re not there, it is because Mike didn't want you there." So, I'll leave it like that.

Miller: Well he got seven years, twenty eight million dollars, the kind of signing bonus you were looking for and that you got with the Baltimore Ravens. Another thought that has been out there that Shanahan is kind of a control freak, and he likes things his way and he likes to say the Denver Bronco way only coming from one source, and you?re a guy that always likes to speak his mind. Mike has kind of refuted this, but did you ever get the sense that he thought you spoke a little too much, a little too out of control?

Sharpe: I don't really think that he ever thought I was ever out of control. Maybe sometimes he thought I was trying to get a lot of attention. I was Shannon Sharpe before Mike got there. I went to the Pro Bowl before Mike got there, I was an All-Pro before Mike got there. Mike gave me an opportunity to get to a Super Bowl, to elevate my game to a whole new level. I mean Michael Jordan was still Michael Jordan even before Phil Jackson ever got there. But Phil gave him an opportunity to take his game to the next level. That is what Mike (Shanahan) enabled me to do. Whatever differences Mike and I had, because I was able to go out and perform at a very, very high level on the football field, I got away with a lot of things that maybe, if I was an average football player, I wouldn't have gotten away with. But I understand Mike?s situation, he has a right, Mr. (Pat) Bowlen has given him total control out there, and he has a right to run the organization the best way he sees fit. But I am my own person, and to a certain extent he let me be the person that I am. By the same token, when I went to talk and interview with Baltimore, I told them the type of person I was, I wasn't going to sugar-coat anything, and I wasn't going to say anything they wanted to hear just to get a contract. I told them upfront that I wanted to win, to be in a situation that was stable. I wanted a coach in charge that was a disciplinarian, I didn't want the prisoners to run the asylum, I like structure. They assured me that is what they had, and they were going to give me the opportunity to do in the long run what I wanted to do, and that is to break the record (Ozzie Newsome?s career records for catches and receiving yards by a tight end).