LATROBE, Penn. - Pittsburgh Steelers coach Mike Tomlin on Tuesday defended safety Anthony Smith, who's known to be a hard hitter in training camp and was the subject of a negative newspaper column last week.

"I think at one point, his actions were referred to as 'thuggery,' or he was referred to as a thug. We take offense to that," Tomlin said. "These are young, professional people that are very good at what they do and are very sensitive to how they're portrayed in the public light. I was offended by that reference to him. He's not a thug. He's a young football player who's trying to be at his best, who happens to play the game very physically."

Ryan Clark, who is vying for the starting free safety job with Smith, told the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, "Not to bring race into it, but is it because he is black that these acts are called thuggery? Because a man has tattoos or may play a certain way, it doesn't make him a thug."

A column by Gene Collier in the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette specifically mentioned an Aug. 6 practice in which Smith leveled wide receiver Hines Ward, who had yelled at Smith in last year's training camp for delivering a hard blow to wide receiver Willie Reid.

The public reaction to such incidents is often "overblown," according to Tomlin.

"We talk about it and we understand that perception all the time is not reality," Tomlin said. "This is what we do, not who we are. We try to keep the lines clear in that regard, but sometimes things are written that are hurtful, and he (Smith) was hurt by that."

Said Smith: "I never mugged anybody or robbed anybody. I got a clean record so I don't know how I can be classified as a thug."

Clark added, "You've never heard of Anthony Smith being in a bar brawl. You've never heard of him carrying a gun, things that you associate with thuggery. (Former NFL linebacker) Bill Romanowski spit in a man's face on the field, (hurt) one of his teammates to the point that he was sued and the word thuggery was never used.

"You're not supposed to touch Hines, we understand that, but if you had a chance to watch the tape (Smith) literally tapped him," Clark said. "Hines had one foot up, he did a Manu Ginobili flop, and when he was on the ground when you look at the picture, he was smiling."

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