Illinois TE Tip Reiman Questions If Birds Are Real at 2024 NFL Combine

Based on some of the responses from prospects at the 2024 NFL scouting combine, it's a good thing these people can play football because common sense is apparently lost to them.

Illinois tight end Tip Reiman joined in on the birds aren't real movement that started out as a satire and has since been picked up by people prone to giving their mind over to conspiracies.

Among the things Reiman said when speaking to reporters on Thursday were two questions asking if they have ever seen a baby pigeon and something about power lines being a recharging station for pigeons.

If one were to defend Reiman, he might be in on the joke and has a very good deadpan delivery to make it seem like he thinks birds aren't real.

If Reiman does genuinely believe birds aren't real, it's still possible he doesn't have the most absurd quote at the combine. Texas Tech safety Tyler Owens said he doesn't "believe in space" and flat-earth conspiracy theories have some "valid points."

For those who may not be aware, the birds aren't real movement began in 2017 when Peter McIndoe, a psychology student at Arkansas, saw a group of protesters at women's marches happening around the world and counterprotesters pushing back against the people at the women's marches.

In an interview with Zoe Williams of The Guardian, McIndoe said he joined the counterprotesters and created a sign that read "Birds Aren't Real" as "an absurdist statement to bring to the equation."

When people asked him what it meant, McIndoe explained to Williams he improvised a response that it was a movement that had been around for 50 years to save American birds, but it failed because the "deep state" destroyed them all and replaced them with surveillance drones that were tracking everything we were doing.