Miami Dolphins and Cincinnati Bengals Clear Benches For Punt Return Brawl

Hit ’em with a left. Hit ’em with a right…

Source: Michael Reaves / Getty

The Miami Dolphins and Cincinnati Bengals got into a bit of a brouhaha in the fourth quarter during a punt return. Dolphins special teamer Jakeem Grant was back to receive the kick when a flash of orange and black reminiscent of Calvin and Hobbes “inanimate” stuffed tiger fan full speed into him long before the ball ever got close to his hands. For those of you who don’t fancy football, this is illegal. The punt returner must at LEAST be allowed to catch the ball. Not only was Grant blindsided, but he also appeared to be pretty hurt by the crushing blow.

This made his teammates very unhappy. Many of them, what appeared to be at least thirty, cleared the bench to step to the Bengals in retaliation for the dirty play. Prior to this incident, several players had already been ejected and the tension on the field was palpable. This final offense was the poorly-extinguished match that was thrown atop a pile of incendiary powder.

To make matters worse, the Bengals were kind of getting their a$$ kicked as they had only managed one measly touchdown to that point in the game. Peep the big steppin’ in the video below.

Even the Dolphin’s head coach Brian Flores looked like he wanted in on the action, stepping up to defend his players as soon as he saw the confrontation bubbling.

Later on Flores apologized for his rowdy behavior.

“… I’ve got to do a better job of keeping my poise. But, look, I’m going to stick up for my players,” Flores said after the game. “They’re going to stick up for each other without getting penalties, without hurting the team, but we’ve got to do a better job of keeping our poise as a team.”

Flores said he was quick to defend his players because they’re almost like his “kids.”

“I’m just going to be honest, these are like my kids. The first time, yeah. The second time I got a little upset about it, but still I’ve got to do a better job. I have to. I can’t do anything to hurt the team. My emotions got the best of me there. But again, you see somebody you care about get hit like that twice … But I have to do a better job. I’ve got to keep my poise better. We have to do a better job of that as a team.”

Dirty game.