Earlier this week, PFT reported that Bengals cornerback Adam Jones would be fined and not suspended for removing Raiders wide receiver Amari Cooper’s helmet and then slamming Cooper’s head into it during last Sunday’s game.
Jones, who was flagged for unnecessary roughness to the dismay of those who thought he should have been ejected, was curious to know how we’d learned that information before him, but it doesn’t appear anyone scooped him when it came to the size of that fine.
Jones said Wednesday that he has been fined $35,000 as a result of the incident with Cooper. Jones added that he plans to appeal the penalty, although it is considerably less than the $91,000-plus he would have lost if the league decided to suspend him. They passed on that option, perhaps because they weren’t in the mood to risk losing another appeal, but Jones still feels like he was penalized too much.
“It’s magnified because it’s me,” Jones said, via Geoff Hobson of the team’s website.
Past history has often played a role in discipline handed down by the league, but some acts are going to draw heavy fines regardless of what happened in the past. This feels like one of those cases and it’s hard to believe that there are too many players that would have avoided a stiff penalty for doing what Jones did to Cooper on Sunday.