You can blame a lot of people for the madness that took place on Saturday night between the Cincinnati Bengals and Pittsburgh Steelers.
Vontaze Burfict. Pacman Jones. Marvin Lewis. Mike Tomlin. Joey Porter. Just to name a few.
Looking back at the game on Sports Sunday, Tom E. Curran suggests that someone else needs to take share of the blame.
“Am I out of my mind for saying the league bears a large segment of responsibility for this?” asked Curran. “They knew this was going to go on. They had those guys in the no fly zone before the game. Yet, no one from the NFL ops - who were so quick to go down to the Patriots sidelines a couple times so far last year and this year - was able to go down at half time and say, ‘Look, we’re going to start ejecting people. Get your players away from the officials after they make a call. If we don’t get that kind of cooperation there’s going to be bench penalties.’”
Patriots owner and CEO Robert Kraft is still taking shots about Deflategate. Our Boston Sports Tonight crew discusses Kraft's comments and who he should really be targeting.
Things aren't all hunkydory between Malcolm Butler and the New England Patriots.
Sure, he showed up to the Patriots optional workouts this week. And sure, that likely means he's not going to hold out come training camp. But that doesn't mean he's happy, according to CSNNE's Mike Giardi.
"He wanted to be traded," Giardi said on Early Edition Thursday. "He knew what the money was in New Orleans. So when we talk about him, 'Oh he's happy. It's nice that he's joined his teammates again.' He had no other choice.
"He wanted New Orleans. He wanted them badly. They couldn't work out a deal. So what's he supposed to do now? Sit at home? No, you suck it up. You have to turn yourself back into a Patriot at least for a year, and hope. Who knows, maybe you do your work and maybe they say, 'Hey, Malcolm, you know what, we can't give you Gilmore money. But maybe we can find something. Maybe we've got $10 or $11 million."
In the meantime, Butler will play for $3.91 million after his teammate Stephon Gilmore inked a deal worth $65 million this offseason.