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In Hindsight, Maybe Cooper DeJean Should Have (Legally) Obliterated Justin Herbert on the Sideline
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I keep thinking about this play from Monday night’s game:
“He was really smart pulling up at the end of this,” says Troy Aikman, but Aikman is wrong. 25 years ago, Brian Dawkins would have obliterated Justin Herbert on a sequence like this. And it would have been 100% clean and legal. DeJean has the sideline and he doesn’t have to ease up at all because Herbert has to go through him to get out of bounds. This isn’t a bang-bang type of thing where the QB has a clear path to the boundary and somebody comes in and takes a cheap shot as he’s running out.
To reset the scene, this happened around the two-minute mark in the fourth quarter. Quinyon Mitchell had just been flagged for DPI on 3rd down, so it was 1st and 10 and Herbert ran for seven on this play. He had two more key carries AFTER this that went for 20+ yards combined, both designed runs that helped get the Chargers in field goal range.
If you think about it, DeJean hitting Herbert with a legal de-cleater could have – 1) forced a fumble, 2) made Herbert think twice about scrambling again, and/or 3) made the offensive staff wary of dialing up more runs. Herbert gashed them with his legs a couple of times after this very play, and who knows if DeJean pulling up had any sort of role in inspiring that.
From the department of “more than one thing can be true” –
Cooper DeJean pulling up there was classy, but putting a shoulder into the QB would have been 100% clean and legal.
Kevin has been writing about Philadelphia sports since 2009. He spent seven years in the CBS 3 sports department and started with the Union during the team's 2010 inaugural season. He went to the academic powerhouses of Boyertown High School and West Virginia University. email - k.kinkead@sportradar.com