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Josh Norman on roughing rules: “It’s not powder puff football”

Hashtag Sports Conference 2018 - Day 2

IMAGE DISTRIBUTED FOR HASHTAG SPORTS - Washington Redskins cornerback Josh Norman, center, talks with NASCAR driver Ryan Blaney, left, and Kim Coons during live session of the podcast Glass Case of Emotion at the Hashtag Sports 2018 conference at the TimesCenter on Tuesday, June 26, 2018, in New York. (Kevin Hagen/Hashtag Sports via AP Images)

AP

Pretty soon, the news will be when a player or a coach says he likes the direction the league is going with their rules to protect quarterbacks.

But Washington cornerback Josh Norman isn’t going to be the guy.

During an interview on ESPN Radio, Norman said that plays like the ones Clay Matthews keeps getting called for (including one last week for sacking Washington’s Alex Smith) were not much fun for the participants or the viewers.

“Look, man, we’re all starting to sound like a string orchestra,” Norman said, via the Washington Post. “They hear it. They hear the noise, and the noise is starting to get louder and louder. Pretty soon, there’s going to be a stampede, because at the end of the day, it’s hard to watch. It really is hard to watch. You see a game, see some plays that are being made, and it’s football. It’s not powder puff football that you used to play back when you was in school. No, it ain’t that. It’s the real thing. . . .

“It’s sad that you take away the thing that makes football, football, and that’s being in the dirt. That, my friend, really is pretty sad. But like I said, who knows? I’m pretty sure it’s going to get brought up at the end of the year.”

It’s probably coming up sooner than that, as the league’s competition committee will have a conference call next week. And while they aren’t expected to change the wording of the controversial rule, it wouldn’t be a surprise if the rule as written didn’t start getting called differently, as happened with the lowering-the-helmet rule.