There is no doubt the Chicago Bears have their eyes on Ohio State defensive end Joey Bosa. He is one of the best pass rushers in the 2016 NFL draft class and would make for a quite an addition to their developing defense. The idea of pairing him with Pernell McPhee must sound appealing. Stories about Bosa have become somewhat of a fascinating odyssey from his partying ways off the field to his father being a former player himself for Miami.
What some might not know is that Bosa has deep ties to the city of Chicago, dating back to one of its most infamous periods. As it turns out, Bosa is the descendant of a notorious mob boss.
"But one thing many people don't know about Bosa is that his great-grandfather, Tony Accardo, was a Chicago mob boss for more than 40 years.
Accardo wasn't just some random low-level mafioso, either. Accardo, known to his mob associates as "Joey Batters, " or just "Joe B." for short, was a heavy hitter in Chicago, figuratively and literally. Al Capone gave him the nickname after Accardo allegedly killed two guys with a baseball bat. Accardo, who died in 1992 at the age of 86, never spent a night in jail."This guy was such a cold and calculating killer that he once took revenge on a group of burglars who ransacked his house in 1978 in the most brutal way imaginable.
"Each was found with his throat cut; one was castrated and disemboweled, his face removed with a blow torch, a punishment imposed, presumably, because he was Italian and should have known better."To top it all off, some believe that Accardo, who was Capone's right hand man and bodyguard, had a direct hand in the famous St. Valentine's Day Massacre. He may have been one of the machine gunners who killed the seven men, according to a former FBI agent named William F. Roemer Jr. At the same time, Roemer also said Accardo had a degree of integrity about him, keeping the dark side of his work away from his family. Bosa's uncle Eric Kumerow, who also played in the NFL, had a lot of teams coming to him with concerns about the ties to his grandfather and his reputation.
"It's so silly, " Cheryl Bosa said. "When my brother was drafted, that was a big thing. The teams would interview Eric and they wanted to know if (Accardo) was going to have any impact on changing the game." According to Cheryl, former FBI agent William Roemer, who authored the 1996 book "Accardo: The Genuine Godfather, " told teams Accardo would have no part in influencing the outcome of games. "(Roemer) told them you will never have to worry about (Kumerow); his grandfather has more integrity than any human being I have ever met, and he would never put his grandson in a situation like that, " she said.Joey Bosa himself has admitted it would've been a treat to meet his great-grandfather, having heard nothing but "amazing" things about him. Just goes to show that reputations are far different inside the family than outside. Makes it a bit unnerving to know there's a kid with that kind of history to him. At the same time, Chicago Bears fans would be lying if they didn't admit it would be a little bit badass to know they had a guy with legit gangster blood running through his veins getting after quarterbacks on Sundays.
