Green Bay Packers linebacker Clay Matthews can’t help but chuckle over the circumstances that led to his former teammate Martellus Bennett lining up Sunday for the New England Patriots after apparently being too injured to play in Green Bay.
According to Rob Demovsky of ESPN.com, Matthews said the only way to look at the situation was to laugh about it and move on.
“We all got a good laugh from it,” Matthews said. “It is what it is. Martellus is in their locker room now and not here anymore. So now we’re just focused on the guys we have in here.”
The Packers released Bennett last week with a failure to disclose injury designation focused on Bennett’s ailing shoulder. Bennett claimed that Packers physicians were pushing him to play when he needed surgery to fix the damage in his shoulder, which the Packers were supposedly well aware of when they signed him this offseason. He also said he told his agent to inform teams he was retiring and not to claim him. Instead, the Patriots claimed him anyway and his played for his new/old team Sunday night in Denver.
“You know what, I think everybody knows the story there — we don’t need to talk about it much more,” Matthews added. “Like I said, we’re focused on the guys in the locker room, but it’s an interesting story that will probably be talked about for a while.”
Bennett played just seven snaps in his first game back with the Patriots, but he caught three passes for 38 yards in his limited time on the field.