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The steepest of your 4 fines the former Steelers linebacker James Harrison incurred in 2010 stemmed from the vicious helmet-to-helmet strike he delivered on Cleveland Browns receiver Mohamed Massaquoi, knocking him out by using a concussion. The hit went without penalty on the sector, but the N.File.L., intent on meting out stiffer discipline for violations of participant protection, docked Harrison $seventy five,000 — not less than many of which, Harrison claimed over a podcast Thursday, was offset by his coach, Mike Tomlin.

Harrison, appearing on Barstool Sports’s “Heading Deep” podcast, advised his previous Pittsburgh teammate Willie Colon that Tomlin — who nonetheless coaches the Steelers — slipped him an envelope before long after the great was levied.

“Dude, I’m telling you — 75,” Harrison mentioned, referencing Click for source the level of the great. “And that i ain’t gonna lie to you personally: When that happened, appropriate, the G-est factor Mike Tomlin at any time did, he handed me an envelope following that. I ain’t gonna say what, but he handed me an envelope following that.”

Harrison recounted the Tale unprompted, after Colon asked him about the heftiest high-quality he absorbed throughout his 15 N.F.L. seasons.

“Pay attention, on almost everything I like, on my daddy’s grave, I hit that guy with about max fifty p.c of what I'd,” Harrison explained of Massaquoi. “And I just strike him simply because I wished him to let unfastened from the ball. If I had understood they was gonna fine me $seventy five,000, I would've attempted to eliminate him.”

Harrison’s fantastic was afterwards lowered to $50,000. Although Harrison did not explicitly say exactly what the envelope contained, the mere insinuation that Tomlin compensated him in almost any way evoked comparison on the so-named Bountygate scandal, wherein the New Orleans Saints’ coaching team was firm about A 3-year interval to own offered payouts to defensive players who wounded opponents, In line with a league investigation. The Saints’ coach, Sean Payton, didn't spend players himself, although the league suspended him to get a 12 months, partly, for not stopping the system just after he was produced mindful of it.

It can be unclear if the league will focus on the make a difference with Harrison and Tomlin; a spokesman with the N.F.L. declined to comment on Friday. League regulations stipulate that groups and its users are prohibited from shelling out a player’s wonderful.

In a statement, Steelers President Art Rooney II said he was positive that Harrison’s allegations are untrue. “I am extremely specified nothing such as this at any time transpired,” Rooney stated. “I do not know why James would generate a remark like this, but there's merely no foundation for believing anything at all like this.”

Harrison on Friday posted a press release to his Instagram account that seemingly walked back again his before comment. “Mike T. Has NEVER paid me for hurting an individual or Seeking to harm anyone or place a bounty on Any person!” it study.

Harrison, along with the Hall of Fame security Troy Polamalu, was the snarling encounter with the Steelers’ protection from the 2000s, after they gained two Tremendous Bowls. The league’s defensive player from the year in 2008, Harrison created a track record for administering violent hits that teetered to the boundaries of legality. After the strike on Massaquoi in 2010, Harrison and Tomlin argued that it absolutely was clean up and didn’t benefit a good. Tomlin, at enough time, also said he favored more durable penalties and rule adjustments to improve participant security.

A member with the N.File.L.’s Opposition committee, Payton, along with the Saints’ Firm, have experienced a combative connection Together with the league because Bountygate, and it's only deepened, following the egregious non-simply call that probable denied New Orleans an excellent Bowl berth pursuing the 2018 time. During a radio job interview on Thursday, Payton all but challenged N.File.L. Commissioner Roger Goodell to research the Steelers, saying he will be “shocked” In the event the league did and that folks “shouldn’t keep their breath” looking ahead to it to take action.

“I believe what occurred with us back again in 2011 in so some ways was a sham, and nonetheless there wasn’t a lot we could do with it,” Payton explained on one hundred and five.seven FM in Baltimore. “The gamers ended up vindicated, but from the league or coaching standpoint, there isn't a union, there isn't any illustration.”

He added, “That’ll be something which’s tucked away or beneath the rug at Park Avenue. They’ll take a look at it briefly. Hear, don’t get me started on that. I shed $six million in salary, and Truthfully it had been something which I’ll under no circumstances truly get over due to the fact I know the way it had been handled And exactly how it was operate and The explanations guiding it. That’s just the reality.”