Former Miami Dolphin tells story eerily similar to the Myles Garrett-Mason Rudolph brawl
The Pouncey brothers are ‘bout that action.
Hours before the NFL suspended Myles Garrett and Maurkice Pouncey for their role in Thursday night’s brawl, former Miami Dolphins defensive lineman A.J. Francis shared an eerily similar story involving Maurkice’s twin Mike.
The incident happened in 2013 when a rookie Francis participated in organized training activities, or OTAs. Per the 2011 Collective Bargaining Agreement, OTAs cannot consist of live contact or one-on-one drills yet the Dolphins had found a loophole and were essentially doing both.
Francis, who the Dolphins had signed as an undrafted free agent, had the unfortunate luck of being matched up against Pouncey.
Their first two face-offs went pretty much as expected — Francis with his face in the dirt and the future Pro Bowler snickering.
Then it hit him. Pouncey was intentionally pulling him to the ground. At that point, Francis was willing to risk it all but not fumbling the bag came first.
“‘A.J. they just gave him $60M, your signing bonus was $7,500... they will cut your angry ass just chill,” he wrote on Twitter, recalling his thought process.
As he walked back to the defensive line, Francis was ready to move on. Fins assistant coach Kacy Rodgers had other plans.
“‘Bitches don’t make this team,’” Francis remembered Rodgers saying.
That was all Francis needed.
The next rep, he lined up right over Pouncey’s nose and bulldozed the veteran at the sound of the whistle. As he’s being driven back, Pouncey rips off the Francis’ helmet at which point pandemonium ensued.
As bodies flew, Pouncey cocked the helmet back and swung it at the rookie’s unprotected head. Mid-swing, however, he just stopped.
“That same angel that told me to chill told him to chill,” Francis said.
Still, Francis didn’t make it out unscathed.
In Francis’ estimation, taking a haymaker to the face is much better than a helmet. He might be right but there’s an even bigger lesson here: never mess with a Pouncey.
