Pregame antics irk Joey Porter
Porter, who said in an ESPN interview Wednesday that going against backup quarterback Matt Cassel “shouldn’t be that hard,” felt it was the Pats who were out of line prior to yesterday’s 38-13 Miami win at Gillette Stadium.
As his Dolphins stretched on their side of midfield, Porter said the Patriots kickers and some coaches walked through the team’s stretching lines. Chris Hanson then began punting the ball from Miami’s end zone over the rows of Miami players.
An NFL spokesman did not immediately respond to an inquiry about whether the Dolphins had filed any kind of complaint, or if the Patriots violated any pregame protocol.
The rules state there is a 10-yard neutral zone between the 45-yard lines that the team may not cross.
Predictably, the move got under the skin of the combustible Porter.
“I’ve been playing in the league for 10 years and I feel like I’ve done some crazy things, but I never did that,” Porter said. “You can’t walk right down the middle of somebody’s stretch and start kicking out of the end zone like we’re not even here, like they had the whole 100 yards. They just didn’t want their 50, they wanted our 50, too.”
Never in need of extra motivation, Porter took out his displeasure with the move on Cassel. The outside linebacker sacked the QB three times to highlight a smothering effort by the Miami defense.
“They knew what it was going to do to me,” Porter said. “It was going to get me fired up. I don’t know if it was an attempt to get me thrown out of the game, but I was smart enough to keep my cool. It was just very disrespectful.”
Added fellow Miami linebacker Channing Crowder: “He hates stuff like that. They got him going. Why would they do that? He’s already crazy, and they just poured fuel on it.”
Porter lit the midweek fire when he told ESPN, “It’ll be good to go out there and get our first victory.” After his team’s win, Porter expressed surprise that the comments became a hot topic.
“I didn’t guarantee a win,” Porter said. “I just said that they’re not the same team without Tom Brady [stats]. Y’all said I guaranteed a win. I said it would be good for us to come out here and get our first victory.”
Porter said the quotes were more of a nod to the injured Brady than a dig on his backup, Cassel.
“You really don’t realize how good Tom Brady is until he’s not out there,” Porter said. “They were like a different team without Tom leading them. Not taking nothing away from Matt Cassel, but that’s some tough shoes to fill.”