Steelers' James Harrison voted "meanest" man in the NFL

(CBS) - Football is a mean game. But who are the meanest of the mean? A Sports Illustrated poll among players shows that, by a huge margin, Pittsburgh's James Harrison is the meanest man in the NFL.

The Steeler linebacker took 35 percent of the vote, far and away the meanest guy in the league. Second place was another linebacker: the Baltimore Raven's Ray Lewis with 5-percent. Defensive tackles - Ndamukong Suh of the Lions and Richard Seymour of the Raiders - round out the top four.

The methodology of what exactly "meanest" means is a little vague. Then again, Harrison's resume speaks for itself. The four-time Pro Bowler has racked up over $100,000 in league fines in his career - including a $75,000 whopper for a helmet-to-helmet blow last year that left Browns wide receiver Mohamed Massaquoi with a concussion.

Also, Harrison once called NFL commissioner Roger Goodell a "devil." That's a pretty mean thing to say.

Still, it's a rare accomplishment that, in a sport of large, angry men running into each other as hard as they can, one man was so emphatically voted the angriest of the lot.

Sports Illustrated didn't disclose its polling system, other than to say that 287 NFL responded to their survey question.

SI did a similar study in baseball and determined that Chicago White Sox catcher A.J. Pierzynski was the meanest man in the MLB. So we look forward to a Pierzynski-Harrison Matchup of the Meanest in the near future.