An NFL player who has received two suspensions and a $1 million fine this season claims the league isn’t teaching its defensive players how to prevent illegal hits: “I don’t know how I’m going to accomplish it.”
Denver Broncos abandoned security After losing almost $1 million of his pay due to a string of illegal hits that resulted in two ejections, numerous fines, and six weeks of missed pay, Kareem Jackson has obviously not learned his lesson.
According to Jackson, this is because the NFL isn’t a very effective teacher.
The 14-year veteran claims the NFL is picking on him specifically and that they don’t have any answers for how he can modify his aggressive style of play to fit the modern game, in which the league no longer values the kind of collisions it once did.
Following his second suspension, Jackson was given NFL audience with Commissioner Roger Goodell two weeks ago, but things didn’t go quite as planned.
“I was informed that I am accountable for the defensive players’ safety,” Jackson declared on Monday evening before to welcoming 50 young people from the Denver Boys & Girls Club for his yearly “JackaClaus Shopping Spree” at a Parker, Colorado, Walmart.
According to Kareem Jackson, the NFL has not adequately taught defensive players about hit protocols.
Therefore, I’m not really sure how I make plays, protect them, and protect myself. But I was informed that. Furthermore, I’m not really sure how I should play this game going forward. I’m hoping that I can solve it.
“In the end, Jackson continued, “I’m going to go out and play the game the way I have since 2010.”
That should concern Broncos supporters and coach Sean Payton.
When he hit Vikings quarterback Joshua Dobbs in Week 11, he got his second suspension for the first tackle he made after serving his first one.
The Broncos (7-6) have won four of the five games Jackson has missed, mainly because to the ferocious, steady play of his replacement, PJ Locke. Locke is the first safety in team history to record sacks in three straight games.
Despite having a poor start, Denver is attempting to become only the fourth team since the merger to get to the postseason.
Jackson is allowed to return to practice next week ahead of the Broncos’ game against New England on Christmas Eve. The Broncos are trailing the struggling Kansas City Chiefs (8-5) by just one game in the AFC West.
If he doesn’t get sent out again, they could really use their tone-setter in the last stretch.Jackson has received fines, suspensions, and even ejections, as evidenced by this hit on Luke Musgrave.
“I think one approach for me to prevent more difficulties is to lower my objective (zone) even more than I have,” Jackson remarked. It is difficult to try to shield the guy on the other side. I’m not sure how I’m expected to accomplish that.
Along with the $89,670 fine he received for unsafe hits this season, Jackson has forfeited $837,000 in lost pay. However, he claimed the league completely waived the $43,709 fine he received for an unflagged hit on Chiefs running back Isiah Pacheco in Week 6, which Goodell used as an example of Jackson’s excessive tackles during their Nov. 30 meeting in New York.
As the running back was about to go down, Jackson said Goodell asked him why he hit Pacheco the way he did. He replied that, despite the fact that NFL players are the best in the world, no human could possibly alter their course in that split second and avoid contact when the ball carrier ducked at the last possible moment.
“Playing this game and doing what you guys are asking us to do is not doable,” Jackson declared. “It doesn’t make sense.”
Jackson countered, “I told him a lot of these are incidental contact.” “I can’t alter once I commit and go.” Besides, I’m the last line of defence’, Jackson declared. My task is to subdue him.
Jackson claimed that the league “turned around and paid me all my money back for it” two days after using the hit on Pacheco to justify Jackson’s ban.
“Why would you give me all my money back from the Kansas City hit?” was all I could think at that point. These other hits are all essentially the same.
Jackson claimed that he sent Goodell a thank-you note on December 4 for their meeting, along with cut-ups of further unflagged, unfined hits from this season’s NFL.Jackson feels that because other players are not getting flagged, he is being singled out.
“I feel like you guys are picking on me since these folks aren’t getting reported, there are no repercussions, and these are much harsher hits than mine,” Jackson recalled saying.
Tom Brady said in a lengthy tirade on the Stephen A. Smith show last month that the NFL has seen a decline in play only since his retirement on February 1. He blamed this mediocrity on the league’s insistence that defenders keep offensive players out of danger.
Brady yelled, “It is not the responsibility of a defensive player to shield an offensive player.” “A defensive player must defend oneself.” I refrained from tossing the ball in certain directions out of concern that a player might be eliminated. Well, that’s the truth.
That’s right, Jackson said.
“It’s football.” To protect themselves ought to be their duty and responsibility.
