It’s getting hard to be a defender in the NFL.
Rule changes designed to promote player safety and protect quarterbacks (and therefore owners’ bank accounts) have lead to flags that frustrate the living daylights out of defenders. It all came to a head Sunday as Green Bay Packers’ star edge rusher Clay Matthews got his third roughing the passer penalty in three games for what looked to everyone who wasn’t the ref like a clean hit.
The previous week he got flagged for this hit:
Do not hit quarterbacks high.