Jonathan Jones knocked Buffalo Bills quarterback Josh Allen out of Sunday's Week 4 game with a hard helmet-to-helmet hit in the fourth quarter, but the New England Patriots cornerback wasn't ejected.
Jones was penalized for unnecessary roughness, but it was offset by a Bills holding penalty during the play.
Bills safety Micah Hyde thinks if the scenario was reversed, and a Bills player leveled the same hit on Patriots quarterback Tom Brady, the Buffalo player would have been tossed from the action.
“That’s the first thing that came out of my mouth on the sideline. If one us did that to (Brady), we wouldn’t have been in the game anymore,” Hyde told reporters after his team's 16-10 loss, via WKBW’s Matthew Bove.
“There’s no way. There’s no way we would've continued to play in that game. Even with the holding penalty that we had offset. There’s no way. Obviously, that’s our quarterback. We ride or die with him. To see that happen, you know, Josh didn’t slide, but at the end of the day it doesn’t matter if it’s a running back, you can’t head-to-head. So, that’s when the confirmation review that it was head-to-head, because I didn’t get a good look at it. But, like I said, if that was their quarterback, there’s no way that you could continue playing.”
Superstar players often get preferential treatment. We often see it in the NBA, but the NFL certainly has it, too.
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Hyde, in fairness, does make fair points with these comments, but the reality is a six-time Super Bowl champion is going to be treated differently than a second-year quarterback.
Allen reportedly is in the concussion protocol after the Jones hit, so his status for the Bills' Week 5 road game against the Tennessee Titans is unclear. Backup quarterback Matt Barkley replaced Allen on Sunday and failed to impress.
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