There has been a number of taunting penalties in the NFL this season, but this is the first time to our knowledge there’s been one levied after a player insulted another’s mother.
Late in the third quarter on Sunday, the Lions were down 13-7 to the Browns and had returned to Cleveland territory. Between quarters, Lions guard Jonah Jackson was flagged for unsportsmanlike conduct. It was revealed after the game that Jackson had been penalized for insulting the mother of Browns defender Jadeveon Clowney.
While not a death blow to the Lions’ chances to get their first win of the season, the penalty was definitely costly. The Lions would have had first and 10 at the Browns’ 42-yard line, and instead faced first and 25 at their own 43. They subsequently failed to pick up a first down on the series and wound up losing the game, 13-10.
Lions guard Jonah Jackson lines up against the Cleveland Browns. Icon Sportswire via Getty Images“I don’t know what to tell you,” Lions coach Dan Campbell told reporters after the game. “It was something that is said. It was something about somebody’s mother, OK? And there was a lot of talking going on out there, but so it was a penalty.”
“It hurt,” Campbell continued. “And look, he knows it. He knows it. He knew it when it came off, but there was a lot of talking going on. And as a matter of fact, while I’m getting told that, I’m hearing talking. But that’s part of it.”
Jackson “insisted” he could not remember exactly what he said to Clowney about his mother, per the Detroit Free Press, but said he apologized for it after the game.
Jadeveon Clowney Getty Images“First of all I should have never even put my team in that situation, but it was the heat of the moment, heat of the game,” Jackson said. “We actually chopped it up after, apologized. It was both sides, but definitely should have never been in that situation to begin with.”
