Atlanta Falcons veteran defensive tackle Grady Jarrett broke into his sack dance Sunday at Raymond James Stadium, arms flailing, knees high-stepping … but wait.
Atlanta had just scored 15 straight points in the fourth quarter and the Bucs and quarterback Tom Brady were backpedaling. Down 21-15 with just over three minutes remaining, the Falcons appeared to force a Bucs punt with Jarrett’s sack of Brady.
So it seemed.
Jarrett certainly thought so, and so did the entire Falcons bench. Atlanta already had swung the momentum in its favor. The sack was huge … if it had been a sack.
Someone on the Falcons bench yelled, “Flag.”
Jarrett reeled around in disbelief. The Falcons coaches and players went crazy as the yellow hankie dotted the field right where the sack occurred.
“Personal foul, roughing the passer, No. 97,” said referee Jerome Boger over the PA system.
The entire league is yelling “Flag” now. The NFL’s concussion overreaction has gone mad. It happened again Monday night when Kansas City’s Chris Jones harmlessly, most thought, sacked Las Vegas quarterback Derek Carr.
Now the league’s players and coaches want instant replay of roughing the passer penalties. I do, too. This has gotten out of control.
Jarrett was livid Sunday. Brady acted as if nothing had happened. Routine sack — or routine roughing penalty — depending on your perspective. Most saw a football player making a football play.
After the game, Brady was brief with reporters, just like his former coach Bill Belichick.
“I don’t throw the flags,” Brady said.
But this wasn’t a routine roughing-the-passer call. It was the worst roughing-the-passer call I’ve seen in 50 years of watching football, of course, until Monday night with Carr. Do you think Fran Tarkenton would have gotten that call? Uh, yeah, right.
Falcons cornerback Mike Ford said it best as he stormed up and down the sideline.
“If that was Mariota, there’s no way they call that [expletive],” he said in reference to Falcons quarterback Marcus Mariota.
He may as well lumped in every other quarterback in the league. It appeared to be the Brady Rule, or as several Falcons players yelled in disbelief, “Tom Baby.”
It’s trickling down, however. Carr got his against Kansas CIty.
Here was Jarrett, a football player, celebrating a big-time football moment. It was taken away from him. The league’s scared vision of concussions is the real culprit here.
But Brady is just Brady. He gets calls. Michael Jordan got calls all the time. Mickey Mantle’s strike zone was surely squeezed. Unknown boxers probably never would have gotten away with an Ali rope-a-dope strategy, taking points as blows landed. The great players get the calls; we get that. But this was egregious.
I’m not saying the Falcons win the game if the Bucs were forced to punt, but the ball was certainly taken out of their hands. The rest of the drive was pedestrian. The Bucs made a couple of first downs, Brady took two knees and the game was over.
But this is getting ridiculous. Football players aren’t even being allowed to make football plays. The game is becoming lost in the translation of those in striped shirts.
Boger offered this explanation: “What I had was the defender grabbed the quarterback while he was still in the pocket, and unnecessarily throwing him to the ground. That is what I was making my decision based upon.”
I was standing on the Falcons sideline as Jarrett sacked Brady. I thought it was a huge play, a momentum jolt in the Falcons’ favor. The personal foul left me wondering what had just happened. I looked at the Jumbotron for the replay.
Ha, fat chance. That replay wasn’t going to be shown at Raymond James Stadium. Scoreboard operators knew right away that was controversial.
NFL Sunday started off this past weekend with Dolphins quarterback Teddy Bridgewater getting sacked on the first play of the game. He was deemed “out for the remainder” of the contest due to what NFL spotters noticed in Bridgewater’s motor skills as he left the field.
He showed no signs of a concussion according to team neurologists, hired to make sure players are kept safe. Spotters high up in the booth, however, noticed something. They didn’t talk to Bridgewater. No eye test. No on-field test of his motor skills. Nothing.
They just noticed something.
The eventual diagnosis — elbow injury, out for the game. He may even miss next week’s game while under the NFL’s concussion protocol. Huh?
Bridgewater was starting for the Dolphins because he was replacing regular starter Tua Tagovailoa, who had been flung to the ground and slammed his head on the turf two weeks ago.
No flag for the Bridgewater sack. No flag for Tua’s body slam. Just football plays.
Tua, of course, played a week ago, and probably should not have, as he was injured again and missed Sunday’s game at the New York Jets. That error in coaching judgment led to the overcautious decision with Bridgewater.
NFL Sunday would just get worse with the NFL’s darling Brady getting his preferential treatment. Falcons coach Arthur Smith chased referees down the sideline for three plays screaming, “That is [expletive] horrible.”
He was absolutely [expletive] right.
With that play, the NFL either warns referees to back off the flag-throwing or to continue what has been mandated. Something certainly needs to be decided.
I’m guessing there will be more personal fouls on routine quarterback sacks for the time being.
Officials don’t really know what to do. Players certainly have no idea. America’s game is becoming the National Flag League, with the officials the only ones pulling the flags.
This article originally appeared on . Chris Hays covers high school football and college football recruiting and the NFL for the Sentinel. He can be reached at CHays@orlandosentinel.com.
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