With just under seven minutes remaining in Sunday’s victory over the Los Angeles Rams, Washington Redskins receiver Terrelle Pryor caught a 9-yard pass from Kirk Cousins that was negated by a holding penalty against left tackle Trent Williams. Pryor was hit just after catching the ball and tackled by Rams safety Cody Davis.
While the play appears rather unspectacular to the passing glance, Pryor was at least concerned about the play enough to send a message via Twitter to Davis on Tuesday.
While making sure to note he didn’t view the play as “dirty,” Pryor asked for Davis to try not and hit a player so close to the knees next time. Davis appears to make contact with his shoulder just above Pryor’s knee.
The hit was not malicious and didn’t appear to be illegal in any way, as Pryor seemed to note in his tweet. It’s also not surprising that he would like to not be hit that close to knees.
The “strike zone” of where defenders can hit receivers in the act of catching the ball continues to shrink. As the ability to hit a player high has been eliminated, defenders instead are going lower at a far greater clip. It’s the unfortunate byproduct of the changing NFL rules through the years.
@CodyDavis rule 101 ... not a dirty play...BUT..We all want success try to hit a little higher and not take out knees in future.. thank you pic.twitter.com/srnzHmkafg
— Terrelle Pryor SR (@TerrellePryor) September 20, 2017