NY Daily News columnist calls ex-Bronco Bill Romonowski a racist after he tweeted about Cam Newton

Shortly after Panther QB Cam Newton abruptly left his post Super Bowl press conference, former Denver star Bill Romanowski started a Twitter firestorm.

Romanowski tweeted, and since deleted, the following: “You’ll never last in the NFL with that attitude. The world doesn’t revolve around you, boy! #CamNewton”

For most black men, being called a “boy” by a white man invokes feelings of racism. Several NFL players quickly took to social media to respond to Romanowski, who played 16 years in the NFL, readily admitted to using steroids, and once paid more than $400,000 to teammate Marcus Williams after a Romanowski punch damaged Williams’ eye socket so badly that it ended his career.

Monday morning, the New York Daily News published a piece, written by columnist Shaun King, with the headline: “King: Bill Romanowski was blatantly racist even before he called Cam Newton ‘boy’ in post-Super Bowl tweet”

“Apparently, even though it’s 2016, I have to explain where the racism is in that tweet,” King wrote. “Newton is not a boy. He’s not a rookie. He’s the MVP of the NFL. He’s a father. He’s the face of his franchise. He’s a businessman and a role model.”

After the initial responses came in, Romanowski posted this: “Calm down everyone! I meant he needs to grow up!”

About an hour later, Romanowski, who has more than 50,000 Twitter followers and is the face of a sports nutrition company, apologized in a new Twitter post that remains on his page.

This story was originally published February 8, 2016 at 12:55 PM.