Four safety rules passed at meetings
Associated Press
NFL owners passed four player safety rules for next season yesterday at Dana Point, Calif., and adjusted the calls on the kind of tackle that injured Patriots quarterback Tom Brady in the 2008 opener.
Defenders who are knocked to the ground no longer can lunge into quarterbacks if the play is still going on. Kansas City safety Bernard Pollard did just that on the hit that ended Brady's season almost before it began, and NFL officiating director Mike Pereira placed such plays in the player safety category.
"We're trying to make the game safer for the guy getting hit and the guy doing the hitting," said Pereira, who plans to retire this year.
That adjustment was not a rule change and did not require an owners vote. But four other rules were adopted by the 32 teams:
Pereira, commissioner Roger Goodell and the two heads of the competition committee — Atlanta Falcons president Rich McKay and Tennessee Titans coach Jeff Fisher — repeatedly have emphasized that the players themselves sought many of these alterations.
LAW AND ORDER
MAN KILLED WASN'T IN CROSSWALK
A pedestrian wasn't in a crosswalk when Cleveland Browns wide receiver Donte Stallworth hit and killed him with his Bentley, according to a report released yesterday by police in Miami Beach.
According to the report, Stallworth told officers he flashed his lights to try to warn Mario Reyes, a construction crane operator who was rushing to catch a bus after getting off work around 7:15 a.m. March 14.
Police said Stallworth was driving about 50 mph in a 40 mph zone. No charges have been filed against Stallworth pending the outcome of blood tests.
A police diagram shows that Reyes was hit in the far left lane of the six-lane MacArthur Causeway — not in a nearby crosswalk. Stallworth stopped a few feet away.
CHIEFS
TIGHT END GONZALEZ OPEN TO TRADE
Contrary to remarks by Kansas City owner Clark Hunt, Tony Gonzalez wants to be traded if the right deal can be made, a person close to the Pro Bowl tight end told the AP.
Asking not to be identified because of the sensitivity of the subject, the person said Gonzalez, 33, was surprised that Hunt had said the Chiefs were definitely not going to trade their 10-time Pro Bowler.
"If the right deal can be made, Tony very much wants the Chiefs to trade him," the person said. "Tony is not demanding a trade. Tony cherishes the time he's spent with the Chiefs and he loves the way he's always been treated by the fans there. But he knows of some other teams that would be interested in him and if the right deal can be made, he wants it to be made."
BROWNS
OPEN COMPETITION FOR STARTING QB
Brady Quinn or Derek Anderson? Eric Mangini isn't sure, so he's throwing the Cleveland Browns quarterback job into a free-for-all.
"I don't have a projected starter at this point," Mangini said at the NFL meetings. "What we're going to do is we'll have an open competition where they'll both get a chance to establish that they'll be the starter."
Anderson, coming off a Pro Bowl season in 2007, opened last year as the starter. As the Browns struggled, he was benched for Quinn. Both quarterbacks subsequently were injured, and Mangini replaced Romeo Crennel as coach after Cleveland finished 4-12.
