The Matt Thomas Show with Ross - Texans LB Azeez Al-Shaair Facing Possible Suspension Following Ejection

Episode Date: December 2, 2024

Houston Texans linebacker Azeez Al-Shaair delivered a late hit to Jacksonville Jaguars quarterback Trevor Lawrence after Lawrence began a slide to end a run play in the second quarter of Sunday's game. Al-Shaair's violent blow to the head of the defenseless quarterback ignited a brawl as Lawrence left the field with a concussion. Al-Shaair, as well as Jaguars rookie cornerback Jarrian Jones, was ejected. Adam Schefter of ESPN reported the NFL is reviewing the hit and that a suspension is expected for Al-Shaair, but the length of that suspension is yet to be determined. Matt Thomas of "The Matt Thomas Show with Ross" and Dan Mathews of "The A-Team" review the play and debate the possible consequences Al-Shaair will face as the Texans enter a bye week prior to their Week 15 matchup against the Miami Dolphins.

More Matt Thomas Now on Sports Talk 790 No doubt that Trevor represents that one Oh my That'll be Al Shire who's flagged for the big hit on the slide

And that's going to start A little bit of a scrum afterwards As the Jaguars coming to protect their QB Oh my goodness This deserves an ejection In my opinion Another flag has come down with the activities on the bench,

but the bigger concern right now is what's going on with Trevor Lawrence. He was taken off the game, out of the game on a golf cart. Apparently he is okay, but concussed to no surprise. Ejection came for him and a member of the Jacksonville Jaguars who got involved in a fight and absolutely should have done so. I don't document every time LZ. Oshartier does something. there has been a few people that have said that he has had some questionable plays in the past.

I think there was a fight that he threw a punch during the Chicago Bears game. But again, I wouldn't have a long memory of Al-Ziz al-Zer Shahir's history of overly physical play. I saw his tweet this morning when I woke up and he obviously apologized and said that he had been harassed on Twitter, which is what Twitter does is harassed people. So without trying to get two over the top one way or the other, it was a dirty hit. It could have been avoided. I know the game is fast.

I know the game is physical. I know that sliding for quarterbacks is tough. I know there have been some people this morning saying that maybe quarterbacks shouldn't slide because, again, you're asking to get hit more than you are not getting hit. And that's something I think for competition committee and probably just for coaches to philosophically discuss. He probably should be suspended for the Miami game. game. But, and I'm saying this not because I live in Houston, Texas, or I'm a Texans fan or an observer, I'm just telling you that one game suspension for this, plus being kicked out

of the game yesterday to me, Dan, feels like an appropriate punishment for a set offense. Well, it's also, too. I mean, you're taking the rational approach to this because what a lot of people do in our industry is they want to rush to social media and show you just how mortified they are, that somebody would actually do that on the field and how angry they are. And, you know, I mean, I saw a couple of different ones, like one of them was that he should be suspended for as long as Trevor Lawrence is still out. All right. Why don't you go ahead and save that one for another time or maybe you can just not even use

it at all? And another one, too, is kind of like I was talking about with the Rockets and Thunder earlier. I actually saw somebody say, well, that's what Houston does? What? like what do the Texans have to do with your Jones against the Astros? Like that's what that's what you're allowing for it. And then again, it's social media.

People just have a license to be stupid. Kind of like going through airports. I mean, people just feel like it's a license to be rude and be dumb because there's no accountability for it. But no, I mean, everything you said is 100% true. It was not a good football play. It was a play that he knows better. And probably hindsight being 2020, he wouldn't try to make the hit.

But it's also, though, too, it's football. Like, that happens. That is going to happen. Despite your best efforts to protect everybody. But the forearm was not beyond football. That was, I've got a quarterback or I've got a runner heading my way. I want to make sure he's down. What's his job?

Well, it's a tackle, but you don't tackle with forearms typically. I mean, I don't want to slow this down. I don't want to slow it down to a microsecond to say, in the heat of the moment or whatever the case would be. What I want to say was, it was if you look at it a hundred times at regular speed, at fast speed, at slow speed, it was a dirty hit. I'm not, I'm not disagreeing with the way that it ended up, yes. But at the same time, though, too, his job is to tackle the defensive player. That's his job. So, I mean, if you want to talk about that tackling is not thought well anymore, all these different things,

that's fine. But Dan, you can't say by any mean necessary, which I think what you're trying to say. Bring them down by any means necessary. That's not, that's, the NFL has said you don't do that. If that's the case, everybody will be spearing people. You have to, you have to do it a proper way. And if you don't do it a proper way, you're going to face a 15-yard penalty, or you're going to face ejection, or you're going to face, I mean, whatever, or fines or whatever the case may be. There are certain ramifications. His job is to tackle. His job is to legally tackle. And that was an illegal tackle that forced a significant injury that forced an injection from the ball game. Well, it's also, though, too. I mean, for,

everybody and I'm going to keep it on point but also to at the same time use a different example is where was all of this hand-wringing last year when C.J. Stroud's head bounced off the turf at MetLife. Nobody was coming after Quinn and Williams. Nobody was saying that he needed to be suspended as long as C.J. Stroud is out, any of those different types of things. So it's like all our selective outrage that people will throw out during situations like this, more often than not, it's just about the benefit of the city.

situation because Aziz al-Shayr, most people have no idea who he is. So, of course, to them, he's faceless, he's nameless, he's all of these different types of things that they're going to say, oh, yeah, no, there's no place for that in the game. Give me a break. There was no, there wasn't a place from the game. There's no place in the game for what he did yesterday. There isn't. I'm sorry, there isn't.

I mean, but I'm not, I'm not ready to indict him for the rest of his NFL career like some others are. And that's what I'm saying. But there isn't a, there is no oops into that yesterday. There was no oops to it. That was a ejectionable, is that word? Ejectionable offense.

We'll go with it. Yeah. That's what it was. And eject them, fine them. I mean, finding's not going to do anything. No. You're going to have to suspend because, I mean, this has been yet another offense.

And I saw people posting videos today of, I guess, what was it last year or a couple of years ago, he kind of like choked Tom Brady as he was going at him on a play. then of course you talked about the Bears game. He had the hard hit of Caleb Williams on the sidelines, then throwing a punch at a player. So, I mean, I get that, you know, it's one of those things that people are going to look at

and look for examples of, oh, man, this guy's a dirty player. Here's an example of how he is a dirty player. But it's also, though, too, let the league suspend them and let them handle it and let it be done. I mean, all of this, I mean, I even saw somebody try to say that he should be banished from the game. Like, that's ridiculous. It is.

But I'm not letting one fan of the Jacksonville Jaguars giving a national tone to this. The tone of this should been nasty hit, illegal hit, ejected, probably suspended for a game, and hopefully he learns from this. And I don't know if you have to go much beyond that.

And that's where I think the problem is is that again, when you have television and radio and newspapers and fans that all have platforms to whatever level, agree, you're going to get a variance of answers. There's nothing universal said. I mean, there are some people that are defending that saying that Trevor, you know, like I was watching ESPN today and they were talking about how, you know, that maybe NFL quarterback should not slide anymore because you're

basically asking for those, for two high octane athletes to clot at the same time. Well, we're seeing enough of these slide plays in college football. We're not seeing, we're seeing some collisions, but we're seeing a lot fewer than we did say 20 or 20 years ago when there wasn't a slide rule. The slide is supposed to be the I'm giving myself up for the play. That's what the slide is supposed to be. So then to tell an offensive guy, because we talk about this all the time, well, the rules are built for the offensive side of the football, maybe so. But also too at the same time, I mean, if you're going to try to have them limit themselves in the way that they play,

then I'm not going to do that on the offensive side. either. Again, the slide is to say, hey, I'm sliding, I'm giving myself up on this play. I am no longer a threat to you. Yeah. I, I, again, I don't, the sport is very, very physical. You and I will definitely agree on that. There's no right way to do it except running out of bounds, but that's just not how work, there's a football field. And Trevor's trying to get his yards, but he also realizes, hey, I got to give myself up. I don't want to be in a situation where I potentially can get hit and hurt and it unfortunately happened because of any legal play that forced an ejection of a ballgame. And I thought the whole on-field situation was on handle properly.

I thought the Texans probably should have sent him to the sideline as fast as possible. The Jaguars ran. I mean, it was a hot mess for about 10 minutes. No, it was. And I mean, it's an emotional play and football is an emotional game. And that's going to happen if you don't take the guy out of the game, which eventually they did. But it was after there was the full-on brawl on the field. but two at the same time Trevor Lawrence knows the risks of playing this game as much as anybody

I don't think there's a single player that goes on to an NFL field and feels like hey I'm going to absolutely come off this field and not be injured today. Now I'm not saying that it makes everything okay but also two at the same time he realizes it's a mean nasty game it can be a physical game

and this is one of the things that can happen from playing this game. All right so again, take on this is not trying to get into too much of he never should play again or he's an awful human being or he's the worst person on earth is he did something that was highly illegal

and very very dangerous and there has to be a punishment that goes with it. That's my take. What is yours? 713-213-212-5-790. 7-13-212-5-790 if you want to jump into the conversation. Yeah, it's unfortunate with the hit with the Zs. It's not what we're coaching. It's just

want to be smart and everything we do and not hurt the team. Get a penalty there. We just have to be smarter when the quarterback is going down. Just an unfortunate play, not representative of who Aziz is. Z's a smart player,

really great leader for us. And we hurt. We felt his presence not being there. His loss, it really affected us on the defensive side. Just not what we're coaching. I didn't want to see the melee and all of the aftermath. That's not what we're about.

It's not representative of us. So I'll talk to Aziz, address him personally, and we'll move forward from it. As it answered, you know, I trust D'Amico to get this figured out. D'Amico wasn't a dirty player. He certainly doesn't coach dirty. Dirty play, it was. And if it happens again, then Aliz is going to find himself in a severe amount of trouble with the league, not only just the team with the league, hurts his team by being ejected.

But, again, I don't know Alzi Zashear at all, but my guess is he's not a vicious human being. He probably feels very bad for what he did, but there has to be a punishment for sometimes for even when you feel bad about something. And you can run to social media and apologize, but the NFL's going to be like your actions speak louder than your tweets. I don't think I don't think anymore, but you can't. And that's the thing. I mean, he did deliver the apology. You mentioned that earlier. But, I mean, in terms of acting like this is the only time this has ever happened in the league or that this.

This will never happen again if you severely punish Aziz Al-Shayr. I'm sorry, you're not going to get that conclusion. And it's the crazy thing about sports is we celebrate late hits in sports. When a quarterback gets a late hit and the flag comes down, what does the crowd do? Cheers. Well, I mean, we used to even more. I mean, you know, God, you mentioned the four-letter network earlier. They used to have a segment called Jacked Up.

Now, obviously, with, you know, all of the issues they've had with head trauma and everything else in the league, it's kind of now, hey, we've got to get a, away from that. Well, the types of, yeah, the types of posts we saw yesterday, they're not happening as often because there are, there are coaches in the league and there are players in the league that have prepared themselves for situations like this. It's still not uneasy, but it has to be done. But I mean, that's the thing, though, too, is, I mean, even veteran people who have covered the NFL for a long time and are saying that that's the dirtiest and worst hit they've ever seen in their entire life, I'm sorry, I just don't believe you. Like, that's, this has been, a violent game ever since ever since its inception.

And, I mean, you're going to have plays like this again. That's just the way that the NFL and just football is in general. Well, hopefully not, because as soon as it happened yesterday, it was very scary. It was just really, really scary. And I don't ever want to watch a football game thinking to myself, that's the last time I saw a particular athlete walk or talk and chew gum and eat vet food. And, you know, it's just, it was really ugly. the aftermath of it.

And oh, by the way, I thought, I know who said it. It might have been Daryl Johnson had said this. I'm all four. All that was offsetting penalties. You can't offset all that. Because if the Texans player, if that was C.J. Stroud having that happened to them by a member of the Jacksonville Jaguars, and you're telling me through all that, through all the fights, through the vicious, illegal forearm hit, that the play just never happened. That's absurd.

there should be a change in the NFL to say, all right, we can offset the personal foul calls, but there should have been a penalty on the play for Jacksonville that would have advanced him 15 yards. So, I mean, in terms of like actual real-time accountability, like that's that you've got to make it count for something. That, hey, this is what got it started. I understand the emotions afterwards, but that's what, I mean, I think if nothing else, I do agree with you on that. I mean, just go ahead and have that penalty be upheld and tell the officials, hey, look, we understand what happened afterwards, but we've ejected them. We've given them 15 yards for that.

Yeah, eject the other guys. Don't throw extra flags. Just get rid of them out of the game. And again, if the Texans had CJ Stride had that happen to them and you get nothing out of that except just the redo of the play, football fans would have been really mad. And if I was Jacksonville, I'd have been mad too. No, I mean. Now Jacksonville to get the first down, ultimately on the play, I believe. but that was just, it was absurd.

Offsetting penalties. Offsetting what? You had a Jacksonville player came over and wanted to kick Al-Zis Al-Sherr's ass because he barely, you know, he was trying, you know, not trying to, but he almost decapitated his quarterback. Well, I mean, that's the thing is, I mean, I would expect that, like you said, if something like that happened to C.J. Shroud, then, yeah, you need to have everybody on the field at the time.

You don't think, well, Laramie tells him on there and said, let's go, I'm going to throw hands right now. I would expect Larryman Teltzler go, I want to go throw a hands. I think that C.J. Stroud would probably in a roundabout way expect them to as well. For sure. David, Missouri City at 1038 on 790. David, good morning. Boy, you said

it beautiful. Good morning. Listen, I see these guys, I'm old, man. I'll be up at L.A. fitness. I see these guys, you know, working out and stuff throwing 14,000 pounds and stuff, you know, in consecutive workout. If he had to hit that

guy underneath that chin, I wouldn't watch football that could have killed him if you have to take this is not a joke football is fun when I see nice clean hits oh wow everybody

you know they glued to see did you see that and the guy gets up everybody gets up and continue to play football don't have to be what do you call MMA wrestling

come on stop stop you don't punch nobody in the face when he's out of bounds and stuff you got to stop you don't twist quarterback legs, ankles. You got to stop that stuff.

NFL has to get smart and stop that stuff because somebody's going to get hurt real bad. You're going to lose a lot of fans and it's going to get a bad or worse a reputation. Repetation. You got me. All right. Thanks. Thank you very much of the phone call.

I appreciate it. First of all, you're not going to lose any fans. Short of every game being point-shaped, you're not losing fans. Everybody loves the NFL. Not going, nobody's watching a game yesterday going, I'm done with football. ball. I mean, maybe they're one person, but generally speaking, we all still finish the game.

We still watch the game. And again, the NFL players, generally speaking, have done a better job of making sure plays like this don't happen on a regular basis. And that's probably the part of the reason why there's going to be a suspension, because there has been a trend where defensive players have been able to manipulate their body, somehow, some way, to get away from the quarterback who's sliding. Well, it's also, too. I mean, you know, one of the roles that was implemented this year was the hip drop tackle. But the problem is you have to call it if indeed you're going to say, hey, we're putting an emphasis on this this year. And you haven't done that. They've done, they've done well enough in terms of, you know, the helmet to helmet hits, take your head out of

the play, all those different types of things. That's fine. But you've got to be able to do this all across the board then if you're really focused on player safety. Because if that's the case, then it needs to be emphasized week in and week out with officiating crews, hey, we're calling that penalty. Like, it's going to happen. You have to call it as soon as you see it. And this is where, I mean, the increase of instant replay. We see it in the college game and I know that people hate it, but it's also too as well. I mean, if we're going to say that we're going to try to get this right, then get it right last night, though. That was exactly, that was the appropriate call to be made. I mean, I know you can go and go to hundreds of examples of other problems out there, but what we're

talking about yesterday wasn't debatable. There was no way in the world he should have been able to get away with that and stay in the football game. Call was made right. Now, the hip drop thing, it's been a sensitive issue. Joe Mixon would back you up on that situation. By the way, Adam Schaefter just a few seconds ago, it is anticipated that Al Shire will be suspended. It's just the question is how long will the suspension be? Yeah, I mean, I can't argue that. I just can't.

It was as nasty as it gets. Again, I'm not condemning him for the rest of his career. I believe Al-Z's Al-Shaier will hopefully never have it happened again. I hope this is a huge warning sign for other players in his position and in the situations that in. And some of it can be inevitable. But that to me, at regular game speed look like that could have been avoided. And that's the reason why he's going to be suspended.