Jaguars wide receiver Marqise Lee left Saturday night’s preseason game with what looked like a serious knee injury, and his teammate Jalen Ramsey says the NFL is to blame.
Lee was hit directly on the knee by Falcons safety Damontae Kazee, and Ramsey said Kazee was just doing what the NFL tells defensive backs to do: Hit receivers low, rather than high.
“You can’t be mad at 27 [Kazee],” Ramsey said, via ESPN. “You have to be mad at the NFL; not mad at them, but that is how the rule is. People are scared to tackle normal because I guess they don’t want to do helmet-to-helmet and get flagged. . . . Game-changing stuff could happen. You don’t really want to blame anyone, but you feel bad for him. I don’t know, man, that’s just tough to see it happen to one of my teammates, period, but you can’t really blame 27.”
Kazee was flagged for lowering his helmet into Lee’s knee. Kazee said after the game that the hit was unintentional and he plans to reach out to Lee.