Warren Sapp's perfect lunch includes good company from teammate Simeon Rice and plenty of seafood.
By RICK STROUD
Published August 1, 2003
[Times photos: Toni Sandys]
Warren Sapp, right, feels like a champ after polishing off two bowls of sushi and rice during lunch in Tokyo with Simeon Rice, who stays away from seafood.
Simeon Rice, left, will stick with his drink as he watches Warren Sapp dig into a plate of chiraish with tuna, yellowfin snapper, salmon and roe with Sushlzanmai.
TOKYO - The aroma of tuna so fresh you can taste the sea greets them at the door of Sushizanmai, a sushi bar tucked in an alley of the Ginza shopping district.
Though it was just past midday, the restaurant was nearly empty except for a few guests startled to see the two enormous defensive linemen, who were greeted by two tiny Japanese women in kimonos as they ducked under the door.
Twenty minutes earlier, they formed an unusual taxi squad. Warren Sapp, dressed in a Loyola Marymount basketball shirt and shorts, and Simeon Rice, wearing a paperboy hat pulled down near his eyes, left the Tokyo Dome Hotel on Thursday in search of lunch.
Rice doesn't eat seafood. But Sapp, the patient fisherman, knowing his teammate was nudging the hook, waited for him to take it.
"I'm eating," said Sapp, as he and Rice squeezed into an elevator and were rushed upstairs at the restaurant.
They were the only ones seated at the counter. The seafood was displayed in a refrigerated glass case in front of the bar, and two chefs were perched behind it eagerly awaiting their order.
"What is this?" asked Rice, watching a raw, 6-inch filet disappear from Sapp's plate.
"That's what I ordered," Sapp said. "That's eel." High in vitamin A, eel is supposed to help fight fatigue during the summer but is served year-round.
"You should go on Survivor or something, you know what I'm saying?" Rice said.
"I'd be damn good at Survivor. I agree with you," Sapp said.
It's estimated that the average person in Japan eats 831/2 pounds of seafood a year. That's roughly six times the American consumption. Although seafood is prepared various ways, from grilled to boiled, it often is eaten raw.
In one sitting, Sapp could set the record.
"Sports? Sports?" inquired a chef, spreading his arms wider than his shoulders. "Big."
"Football," Rice said as a way of explanation.
"Good. Big," said the chef, who like the rest of the employees spoke no English.
"Big don't always make good," Sapp said.
"Thank you very much," the chef said, giving his only rehearsed response.
The waitresses brought them a wet towel, which traditionally is steaming hot during the winter and pleasantly cool during the summer. Known as an oshibori, it is for wiping your hands. Men like Sapp can get away with using it to wipe their faces. A cup of complimentary green tea is provided with each meal, but Sapp asked for a Kirin beer.
Then he ordered chiraishi, a selection of fish served on a large, flat bowl of rice. On this day, it looked like someone drained an aquarium.
Tuna, yellowtail snapper, salmon and fish eggs formed a Pacific pinwheel that Sapp plucked apart with chopsticks.
It was a perfect lunch for Sapp - sushi and Rice.
"Wow. This is the man right here. Where else could he eat this kind of food?" Rice said.
"This is good s--- right here, cuz," Sapp said as he woofed it down. "I'm in hog heaven right now."
"You should've been a Marine, dog, for real," Rice said.
"You know, (assistant head coach/defensive line coach) Rod (Marinelli) would like this. You know Rod was a Marine?" Sapp said.
"He tells just that one story," Rice said.
"When you got him one-on-one, he'll talk about it," Sapp said. "He was talking about the time he and this dude were in a foxhole for like 40 days and 40 nights and it rained every (expletive) day."
"For real?" Rice asked. "You said he was there for 40 days?"
"Forty days and 40 nights," Sapp said. "That's why he always says s--- like, "I'd never invite that guy into my foxhole!' He can tell some stories."
"I can't imagine that," Rice said.
"Give me another one of these, Rocco. Then I'm ready to go," Sapp said to the chef. "Sure you don't want something, Sim?"
"No, I'm good," Rice said. "I don't eat any fish. I eat chicken. I eat turkey, too."
The chefs scramble to fix another bowl of chiraishi when Sapp adds to the order. "Put some octopus in that one," Sapp said. "Donde arigato."
Rice, who speaks some Japanese, begins to correct Sapp but stops.
"Am I dead a-- wrong? What's wrong with it?" Sapp said. "Donde arigato, right? Means thank you very much. Oh, it's domo arigato."
Just then, the women distribute bowls of what looks like dirty water.
"Yeah, that's onion on top. There's a rule. Don't take anything they give you," Sapp said. "Because if it was any good, they wouldn't give it to you."
"It's water?" Rice said.
"Yeah. Dishwater with color," Sapp said.
"I don't want to grow a tail or something," Rice said.
Sapp is asked if he wants another Kirin.
"I'm good. I've got to go to a press conference," Sapp said. "If they ask me about (kickboxing star) Bob Sapp I might blow up. That dude is making money off my name. He played for the Bears a little bit. But he couldn't play."
"Oh, he played before?" Rice asked.
"He played for Washington. They broke our streak at the Orange Bowl," Sapp said, recalling the Huskies ending the University of Miami's 58-game home winning streak in 1994.
"He's an ultimate fighter. He's a champion," Rice reminded Sapp.
"He's beating up 5-foot-tall Japanese people," Sapp said. "This man don't whup nobody. You can't be that big and come to Japan. There's no people my size over here."
"Sumo wrestlers," Rice offers.
"Sumo wrestlers don't fight. They belly bump," Sapp said.
"Check. We're ready. We've got to go back to the Tokyo Dome and pay $25 a ride. I've got to come back tomorrow. ... There's some big, wide buildings in this city. It's like New York. Smaller but bigger."
"They've got way too many stipulations here," Rice said. "It's way too confined. The culture is cool, but I wouldn't kick it here."
Then Sapp and Rice disappeared into a taxi. For the Bucs sackmasters, the rush never stops.
