Rookie seasons are full of learning experiences and Titans tackle Taylor Lewan had one this week.
He learned that he’ll wind up with less money in his pocket if he isn’t able to avoid unnecessary roughness penalties on the field. Lewan was fined $8,200 for drawing a flag in the second quarter for retaliating to a shove from Saints defensive tackle Akiem Hicks with a shove of his own to Hicks’s facemask.
“It was petty; it was not very mature of me to do,” Lewan said, via the Tennessean. “But it was one of those heat-of-the moment things you have to be smart about.”
Lewan also drew a flag for grabbing Cameron Jordan’s facemask later in the contest, which makes for 30 yards in penalties for a Titans offense that doesn’t need those kinds of obstacles for success. It’s little surprise, then, that Lewan says he needs to “be smarter” moving forward because players that hurt their teams can find playing time hard to come by.