Clay Matthews calls NFL ‘soft’ for roughing the passer penalties
Clay Matthews had a message for the NFL after his latest roughing the passer penalty.
Matthews said after the Green Bay Packers’ 31-17 loss to the Washington Redskins on Sunday that the NFL is going “soft” with their protection of quarterbacks.
Clay Matthews on his roughing flag: "Obviously I don't agree wit it again. That's a football play … I think they're getting soft." More from Matthews to come. https://t.co/WnaNiCAevk
— Rob Demovsky (@RobDemovsky) September 23, 2018
Matthews was called for a roughing the passer penalty for the third week in a row. He incurred one roughing the passer penalty against the Chicago Bears in Week 1, a high-profile penalty for the infraction in Week 2, and the latest came against Washington.
The first penalty was for a late hit, but the latter two were for plays that in the past would have been deemed clean. However, the new rules say that you cannot slam a quarterback into the ground and that you cannot lay on them with your body weight. Matthews violated the body weight part of the rule with his hit on Alex Smith.
The rule is a terrible one because they are preventing defensive players from being able to do their job effectively. Please tell me how else Matthews should have tackled Smith in a way that would have not allowed the QB room to break the tackle?