Richard Sherman's got nothing on these Hoosier rants

Seahawks cornerback Richard Sherman's rant Sunday brought to mind rants (or at least somewhat unflattering comments) of the past.

Wally Bruner was a former White House correspondent for ABC, the network's Vietnam bureau chief, the host of the popular game show "What's My Line," and finally of the how-to-do-it TV show "Wally's Workshop." He lived in Indianapolis from 1971-78 in a big house on Meridian Street. As he and his wife departed, he gave an interview to Indianapolis Star columnist Tom Keating, which included this parting shot: "We came here with high expectations. But gradually, everything came apart. The more people we met the worse it seemed to get.

"Basically we're leaving because the thinking is so very narrow in this community. People here talk about fellowship, but it's only that - talk. Even people who appear to be of a liberal persuasion are comfortable belonging to clubs with restrictions against race or religion. This is the way of living in Indianapolis.

"I can't tell you how happy we are to be leaving. This is a strange community and one I won't recommend."

Jack Cottey, Marion County Sheriff, 1995 - 2002. In his last month in office he had his car towed. It was nighttime when he came to the office of the towing company to retrieve his vehicle. He was in a bad humor. A video camera rolled, recording for the ages some seriously NSFW footage. "I'm sick of this s---, and I'm going to do everything I can to bury this group, starting in the morning," he said. "I'm going to bury some peoples' asses. I'm just telling you, 'Hold on to your ass in the morning."

A.J. Foyt was the Bob Knight of auto racing -- speaking frankly, often profanely and at least once smacking someone upside his head. And in 1991, after being eliminated from a race at Nazareth, Penn., he railed memorably (and profanely) to an on-the-scene TV sports reporter against fellow driver Jeff Andretti: "Well, g------ Jeff Andretti run right over me, he's all over the g------ track. ... kept from knocking him through the g----- wall. I'm tired of this s---. You got people out there shouldn't even be in the g------- race car."

Benjamin Harrison, was the 23rd U.S. president, the only U.S. president who lived in Indianapolis, and a decorous man. However, in 1878, when body snatchers dug up his deceased father and sold the corpse to a medical school in Cincinnati (this was just three years before Harrison's election to the nation's highest office), Harrison could not contain his outrage. He addressed the citizens of Cincinnati in writing, seeking answers from the Ohio College's medical school: "Who did it, gentlemen of the Faculty? Your Janitor denied that it laid upon your tables, but the clean incision into the carotid artery, the thread with which it was ligatured, the injected veins, prove him a liar. Who made that incision and injected that body, gentlemen of the Faculty? Who took (my father's body) from that table and hung him by the neck in the pit?"

Robert Indiana, the famous artist (that giant, widely-copied LOVE sculpture at the Indianapolis Museum of Art is his), was born Robert Clark and spent his childhood in Indianapolis. But it was only after he moved to New York that he became a big star in the art world. "I have divorced myself from Hoosiers pretty completely," Indiana said in a 1963 interview with the art critic Richard Brown Baker. "People from Indiana have a peculiar way of talking which I lost. . . I don't know that I ever had it. . . but I lost it years and years ago. And, generally speaking, they're like my own family - most of them are rather simple people with uncomplicated lives and I outgrew that a long, long time ago."

Jim Mora, coach, Indianapolis Colts, in a press conference following the team's Nov. 25, 2001, loss to the 49ers, launched into one of the most storied rants in NFL history, at one point sounding sort of like a bird caught in a trap: "A disgraceful performance. We gave them the frigging game. In my opinion that sucked." This leads into the since-immortalized "Playoffs" section of the speech.

Danica Patrick is no A.J. Foyt, but she is a pistol: After crashing at a 2011 race at Bristol Motor Speedway, Bristol, Tenn., she wondered aloud, via her in-car radio: "What the f--- was that? I'm fine, I'm just f------ pissed."

Axl Rose, Lafayette, Ind.-born Guns 'n Roses frontman, performed in Indianapolis in July 1992. Then Indianapolis Star rock critic Marc Allan did not love the show. Rose fired off an angry FAX (so '90s!) that began: "You don't get it...Wait that's too easy...Maybe you don't want to get it - or you'd have to face yourself and oh my God that's just too scary."

Mario Venzago, former music director, Indianapolis Symphony Orchestra, ousted unexpectedly, 2009, in an interview with Strings magazine earlier that same year: "Indianapolis is a nice city, but it's very boring."

Maxwell Anderson, former director, Indianapolis Museum of Art, who left for a similar job in Dallas, told Evan West of Indianapolis Monthly in December 2011: "You're judged by your character in Indianapolis. In Dallas, it's a combination of character and your level of aspiration," and "Texans are unafraid of anything. That's very appealing to us, to be in a climate where the question is, 'What can we do next?' and not, 'Are we sure we can pull that off?'"

Bob Knight, Indiana University basketball coach, 1971-2000, set the standard in ranting. His Patton-esque tirades were legendary and legion and mostly out in the open. Here's what he said at a press conference to sportwriters: "Just trying to help you young guys who've chosen this profession that's one or two steps above prostitution." And here, to a TV reporter who'd asked him a question: "Now I'm not here to argue the thing with you, I'm not going to f------ debate things with you g------ people from television." ESPN broke them down and ranked them, and obviously the entire thing is NSFW.