Even though me made a dirty play, Browns coach Mike Pettine insisted that rookie linebacker Chris Kirksey was “not a dirty player.”
The Titans might beg to differ, after the forearm shiver to the head of quarterback Jake Locker as he slid in the end zone Sunday.
“It was definitely a personal foul, there’s no doubt about that,” Pettine said, via Mary Kay Cabot of the Cleveland Plain Dealer. “And I think it was a situation where Chris was coming off a block and maybe didn’t know exactly where he was and just instinctively went to attack him. Anybody that knows Chris and Chris’ history knows that he’s not a dirty player. I thought the flag was well-deserved and whatever action comes from the league, well-deserved.”
The personal foul on the play was offset by an unnecessary roughness penalty on the Titans, but Locker said after the game he thought it was a “cheap shot.”
“To me, you don’t have to [talk to him] that much,” Pettine said of Kirksey. “He knows. The kid knew right away and felt bad about it. Like I said, if you know the kid and what high character he is, you’d know that there was no intent to harm there.”
Kirksey’s best known (so far) for being the video game glitch “Tiny Titan” in Madden 15.
But he’s going to have to reach into an adult-sized wallet to pay the fine which is surely coming.