How many young, aspiring QB’s saw the above 1987 advertisement and thought to themselves, “man, if I ever make it to the National Football League, I’m placating the burly dudes on the offensive line with cheap-ass Isotoner gloves for Christmas.” Hopefully not many more besides former Detroit starter Scott Mitchell, who last week was shocked to learn OT Lomas Brown once intentionally blew a blocking assignment in the hopes of his own teammate being knocked out of a game. PFT’s Mike Florio quizzed Mitchell about the incident (“for someone to just lay down like that, it’s unacceptable”) on Dan Patrick’s NBC Sports radio program earlier today :
“It just really hurt,” Mitchell said. “It was extremely disappointing. I’m really shocked by it, to be honest. Here’s a guy I’ve had in my house, I had a big dinner for the offensive linemen every year, he came to my house and ate dinner, I gave my offensive linemen gifts every year. For him to do that is just reprehensible, beyond words. It’s really disappointing, it really is painful. When you mess with my family, mess with my livelihood, mess with my health, it’s unacceptable. It’s B.S. I just wouldn’t do it to a teammate. I wouldn’t do it. If Lomas has a problem with me, come talk to me. To try to get someone hurt, it’s just mind-boggling.”
Mitchell suffered a broken finger on his passing hand when Brown allowed Packers defensive end Sean Jones to get a free shot at him in a 1994 game. That injury ended Mitchell’s season, and Mitchell noted that it could have been a lot worse than a broken finger.