DIRTY LANDRY
Miami WR should have been tossed for vicious hit
WE interrupt this season of taunting, bowand-arrowing and other wonderful displays of unsportsmanlike conduct to bring you some old-fashioned NFL head-hunting — the kind that shortens careers and, years later, sends brains to Boston University’s lab for CTE study.
That may sound a bit overdramatic, unless you saw this play.
The Bills we r e leading 10-3 and the Dolphins had the ball f irst-and-10 on the Buffalo 11 with 6:13 to go in the second quarter. As Jay Ajayi ran around left end, Dolphins receiver Jarvis Landry slanted across the middle, turned his shoulder and launched into pursuing Bills safety Aaron Williams with a hit to the head and neck area. A flag came out, and Williams went down, stayed down and eventually left Hard Rock Stadium in an ambulance.
Not long after the hit, the Bills’ Twitter account posted: “cheap shot.” After the game, Bills coach Rex Ryan said he didn’t see the play and added, “I hope it wasn’t cheap. That Landry, I have a ton of respect for that kid. I wouldn’t think he would do that. I hope that wasn’t the case.”
There were a couple of redeeming elements, as Landry showed concern for Williams, apologized to him on the spot and was contrite afterward.
“If I could take that hit back, I would,” Landry told the Miami Herald. “The guy has a family to feed and this is his livelihood. You never want to see that with anybody.”
And later Sunday night, the Bills tweeted Williams was able to travel home with the team, thankfully, after having a precautionary MRI exam.
“Jarvis Landry was called for a personal foul for a hit on a defenseless player,” Mike Pereira, former NFL head of officiating, said on FOX, where he now is the rules analyst. “It was a crack-back block, and the player that is being blocked in a crack-back block is defenseless, so you can’t hit him in the head or neck area with a shoulder, helmet or forearm. This is clearly a foul and it was called.”
Ironically, the penalty on Landry was declined and a holding penalty on the Dolphins went in the books, so there was no official justice for Williams, who returned this season after missing most of 2015 with a neck injury.
Pereira said he didn’t think the play warranted an ejection because “it is a football play. [The referee] certainly [has] the right, by rule, because the rule does say that flagrant offenders can be disqualified. But usually ejections come from nonfootball acts that happen after the play.”
Earlier in the game, Landry caught a 26-yard deep ball from Ryan Tannehill and was called for taunting the Bills bench. Referee Brad Allen announced Landry would be ejected if he were to receive another unsportsmanlike conduct penalty. That’s where this gets interesting. Taunting plus taunting equals ejection. Taunting plus this hit keeps Landry in the game, where he gets to catch a two-point conversion pass that brought the Dolphins to within 17-14 on their way to an eventual 28-25 victory that ended Buffalo’s four-game winning streak. Better yet, Allen should have thrown Landry out of the game for the hit, as he had the right to do.
The incident overshadowed what should have been a feel-good win for the Dolphins on a day when Ajayi rushed for 214 yards and Kenny Stills put the game away with a 66-yard touchdown reception.
KARMA’S A SWITCH
The Chargers started the season with a colossal loss in Kansas City in which they blew a 27-10 lead. That started them on the road to a 1-4 record that included all kinds of horrible luck, injuries and blown leads. Well, after beating the Broncos last week, the Chargers were the ones to come back from a 27-10 deficit to stun the Falcons, 33-30 in overtime at Georgia Dome.
San Diego closed to within 30-27 on Philip Rivers’ touchdown pass to Melvin Gordon with 5:50 to go. Then with the Falcons driving, LB Denzel Perryman, who earlier knocked two teammates out of the game on collisions, stepped in front of a Matt Ryan pass to Julio Jones for an interception. Josh Lambo’s f ield goal tied it at 30 with 18 seconds to go, but Ryan got Matt Bryant into position for a potential game-winning kick from 58 yards. It had the distance but hit the left upright, showing how the Chargers’ luck has changed.
Atlanta won the toss in OT and drove to its own 45 before Perryman stuffed Devonta Freeman on fourth down. From there, Rivers threw 11 yards to Antonio Gates (remember him?) to set up Lambo’s 42-yard game winner.
“We needed this win for us and we needed it for the fans,” said Lambo, who saw a botched hold ruin his chance at a potential tying field goal in Oakland in Week 5.
PLAY OF THE DAY
The Bengals led the Browns 14-10 and had a third-and-9 from the Cleveland 48 with seven seconds to go in the f irst half. Andy Dalton dropped back and heaved the ball downfield. A.J. Green leapt between the “B” and “E” in “BENGALS” in the end zone with Cleveland’s Jamar Taylor on his back and a half-dozen players from both teams buzzing around him, tipped the ball to himself and hauled it in one-handed as he went to the ground.
BAD BEAT
You’ve got the Chiefs at home giving a cheap-sounding 6{ to the Saints and you’re up 21-7 at the half and 24-14 with f ive minutes to go. But Drew Brees goes on an 80-yard touchdown drive to make it 24-21 and turn the bet. You feel a bit of hope when KC still looks to be in offen--
sive mode after recovering the onside kick, but Cairo Santos’ field goal with 28 seconds to go means you lose by a half-point.
POST PATTERNS
Rex Ryan defended his decision to play LeSean McCoy, whose ailing hamstring didn’t make it through the third quarter. “We never play a guy that our doctors and our trainers don’t clear, so he’s cleared to play and we thought he was fine,” Ryan said. … It was stunning to hear Bills players verbally disrespect Colin Kaepernick by name after beating the 49ers last week, calling him a quarterback who simply cannot throw. Those words may have spurred Kaepernick for a while on Sunday as the 49ers jumped out to a 14-0 lead on the Buccaneers on a 14-yard touchdown pass to Shaun Draughn. But from there, the Bucs went on a 34-3 run, with Jameis Winston throwing three touchdown passes and Jacquizz Rodgers running for 154 ya rd s . Kaepernick finished a dismal 16-for-34 for just 143 yards with an interception and four sacks. He did run for 84 yards on nine carries. Maybe he can do that. … When Cody Kessler got injured, the Browns had to call on Kevin Hogan as their sixth quarterback of the season. Hogan, a rookie from Stanford who was drafted in the fifth round by the Chiefs, threw for 100 yards and incredibly ran seven times for 104 yards and a touchdown. … The Lions wo n their third in a row as Matthew Stafford hit Anquan Boldin from 18 yards out with 16 seconds to go to beat the Reds ki ns 20-1 7. Afte r playing in his 100th career game, Stafford’s 27,890 passing yards are the most in NFL history at that milestone. … Brees, who threw for 367 yards in Kansas City, is the f irst quarterback to have 100 games of 300-plus yards passing.