Ah, college, what with its keggers and sleeping whenever and trying to yank dudes’ tongues out of their mouths. Dwayne Johnson shared tell of his school days in a recent profile in Sports Illustrated, and his behavior was a bit rough, even by WWE standards — as in, the kind of rough wherein the Rock once tried to extricate a tongue from the mouth to which it belonged. The supposed moment in question came when Johnson’s place as a University of Miami football player was faltering and teammate Kevin Patrick mocked him. The two started fighting — “It was like a movie fight — the desk got turned over, stuff was flying all over the place†— but when sheer physicality failed, Johnson allegedly took a pretty drastic step to end the smack talk. “He wouldn’t stop talking, so I decided to pull his tongue out,†Johnson explained. As Johnson would soon learn, however, catching tongues is not quite as easy as cat lore would lead you to believe. He continued, “I stuffed my big ol’ hand into his mouth, and I had a couple of fingers around his tongue, but it was so damn slippery! I was quite serious about pulling it out, but I couldn’t quite get a hold of it. Eventually I gave up, the fight ended, and two minutes later we were hugging each other.â€
It’s a heartwarming tale, to be sure … only Patrick says it didn’t go down like that. While he cops to the epic brawl, Patrick insists his tongue was left untouched and intact. He told the Palm Beach Post, “I don’t give a sh*t what he says. We got in a fight. There’s no doubt. We tore that place apart. But he never stuck his hand in my mouth.†He also tweeted, “I love my brother but one thing is for sure. If he tried, he’d currently be a fingerless actor.†So, in the aftermath of Johnson’s anecdote, it seems we’re left with a number of unsatisfying options: Johnson did try to detach Patrick’s tongue from his body and Patrick repressed the trauma; Johnson casually fibbed about a tongue-yanking, an option we refuse to believe; or Johnson was angry enough to pull on somebody’s tongue, but not so angry as to remember whose tongue it was. Whatever the truth may be, it’s safe to say Tooth Fairy has been recast in a new, chilling light.