Stephen A. calls out Ja’Marr Chase 🗣️ ‘He flat out LIED!’ | First Take

Stephen A. calls out Ja’Marr Chase 🗣️ ‘He flat out LIED!’ | First Take

Welcome back to First Take. Let’s go to the Bengals here where Jamar Chase has been suspended one game for spitting on Jaylen Ramsay in Sunday’s game against the Steelers. Ramsay was ejected for throwing a punch at Chase and said after the game that Chase spit on him, which Jamar Chase denied, but the league saw video and sided with Ramsay. If the suspension stands, Jamar Chase would go without pay for the Bengals upcoming game against the Patriots. Now, for a little more context here, Chase is appealing the suspension. Sure. But I don’t know how because there’s video of it, but that’s okay. Are you good with a oneame suspension, Chris Ky? No. The league got it wrong with Jamar Chase just like they got it wrong with Jaylen Carter. And it’s clear that the discipline that they doled out has not served as a deterrent because we’re talking about those incidents happening weeks apart. And the last time we saw something of that nature on an NFL field in a prime time spot was back in 1997 with Bill Romanowski spitting on JJ Stokes. And here’s the thing that I’m most concerned about y’all. It’s not the fact that the action of spitting on somebody is the most degrading thing that you can do to another human being. What I’m concerned with is the response because I don’t think it’s fair and reasonable to anticipate that players would react the way that we saw Dak Prescott react in the season opener and being composed. What you’re going to see is guys respond more like what we got from Jaylen Ramsay. And god forbid if you get the wrong one, it escalating into an incident that becomes ugly and mars the NFL. Similar to what we remember from those 90s Knicks Heat matchups where the NBA had to adopt a rule about players not coming off the bench for altercations because of how ugly that scene got. So that’s my biggest concern with how the NFL is handling this. And I don’t think they sent a strong enough message that spitting on somebody is a bright red line that should not be crossed. Completely agree. I said that yesterday. I thought it should have been a minimum of two games. Minimum two games. Um, and it’s partially because of what happened with Jaylen Carter. You already saw what happened to the season opener. You gave the punishment and Jamar Chase did what he did. Number one. Number two, he flat out lied on camera. Camera’s rolling. I never opened my mouth. I never did anything with a straight face. So now what he has to realize is that anything you say is going to be questionable from now on because you know the cameras caught you and you were telling a boldfaced lie to the media with the cameras rolling. I never opened my mouth. I And clearly you spit right on him. It was clear in it was clearly intentional. And we all know that’s one of the most egregious things you could do to another human being. There’s no doubt about that. But the fact that he did it was bad enough. The fact that he did it where there was precedent set where you knew, okay, there was a punishment that come down because you can’t be doing stuff like that. That’s number two. Number three, you lied through your face. You lied to your face. Now, he gets about $57,000 a game. You should double that up. It should be a cool million plus. Yeah, he making $41 million a year, dog. Like, exactly. That that ain’t much. That ain’t much. But, you know, but they’ll tell you it’s a million million. Fine. It should have been at least a million dollars. He should be suspended for two games. And and to me, I think the NFL dropped the ball. I I I appreciate both of you and and what you’re saying and I don’t necessarily disagree, but I would say this. The NFL has to stay consistent in their punishments. So, what they gave Jaylen Cardier at the beginning of the season, you can’t change because weeks have gone by if the player hasn’t exhibited the behavior before. So, I’ve been in the, you know, and I I deal with Troy Vincent. He and I are are friends. We deal with stuff, punishment players. Yep. There has to be a precedent set and you can’t just get out of it because of what the player says, how he responds. Now, if in the off season because I appreciate what you’re saying about how these things can escalate and what you don’t want to happen is it go from the field to the locker room to the buses what and we know listen our game is emotional as it is. There’s violence involved in our game. You don’t want this thing to continue to escalate. But the league will have to institute that before the season starts as opposed to because the first thing that would have happened is if they tried to levy a heavier punishment, it would have been appealed and they would have lost with an arbitrator because there’s no precedent set. So the league although it may not be enough and I appreciate that it’s all you can basically do because it was already said. You can’t you can’t guarantee that. You can’t guarantee that it or I’m not saying you’re wrong because obviously it would have been appealed and who’s to say he he could have won. But I you know me covering the NBA for as many years as I’ve had dealing with old commissioner David Stern. God rest soul. All right. David Stern had the fear God instilled in a lot of players because it was certain things he let you know give a damn about no president. You try that. You do something like that. There’s a line that you cross. He said, “I will circumvent that president and I will deal with you.” That was the mentality. Okay. Adam Silva is a phenomenal commissioner and we all love him, but in the same breath, he’s also seen as being somebody, dare I say, a bit nicer than David Stern was. Sure. Well, a lot of times you see a lot of stuff happening. You won’t see you wouldn’t see that happening because David Stern didn’t play. And you got to look at it from that standpoint as well. The fact that Jaylen Carter did what he did, all right, and you already handed down that punishment. Somebody like a David Stern would have looked at him and said, “Oh, so you knew that we were going to punish you and you still did it anyway.” Oh, really? That’s the game we playing. So, let me show you how Let me show you how this goes. I’m just saying But here’s the thing. Come down to is it did he throw punches afterwards? Did he escalate any more? and you’re talking about a 17game season as opposed to an 80 plus game season. So the suspension and what it would do to your team from that point forward. Now obviously the Bengals aren’t in a situation where it matters that much but you but again all of these things have to have because the CBA the way it’s written for the for the players association and the league it has to be agreed upon. So what happened in week one, you can’t change it now, you know, week 11 because you’re it because it it seems more insulting unless he does that and swings punches or does something. But that’s the pro but that’s the problem though, Jeeoff, and here’s where I think the NFL could get some leeway if they levied a different type of discipline toward Jamar Chase relative to what we saw from Jaylen Carter. You’re talking about the other player being involved in that. Jamar Chase’s actions instigating an altercation that led to Jaylen Ramsay being ejected to led to punches being thrown. So that escalation being triggered by what Jamar Chase did makes the nature of it different than what we saw in week one. Here’s the other thing that I think we got to acknowledge and the irony of all of this is that it’s happening in the season where the NFL wants to emphasize sportsmanship amongst all of its players. But here’s the problem that I have with this. It’s not a big enough deter. Yeah. What happens if there’s a player that thinks he’s away from the refs where they don’t see it and he spits on another guy to provoke a fight to get the other guy tossed? People don’t remember in that game it was the fourth quarter of a one possession game. Yeah. Now the Pittsburgh Steelers end up running away with it, but that’s beside the point. What keeps other players from trying it in future games? And that’s the part that the NFL has to be concerned with when it comes to the discipline. It needs to be something so scary that no one even thinks of doing it again for any reason. And the danger the danger I I respect totally, Jeff, where you’re coming from. As somebody that’s covered collective bargaining for decades, I get where you’re coming from. You talk about precedent not being violated, etc., etc. But when it comes to the league office and the muscle that it can flex, every now and then there are incidences that take place where the league needs to to show just how significantly they can flex. You need to be mindful and dare I say fearful of the heavy hammer that they can bring down upon you without bringing up names or anything. I remember instances where David Stern or or somebody else would come up and this cat go 25 games this going this cat go he give a damn about no president no you’re dealing with me now you understand because we ain’t having it and because it’s bad for the league you cannot have a Jamar Chase who’s my favorite receiver in the National Football League who’s a stud who’s a superstar you cannot have him literally and flagrantly spitting on another player and then looking into the camera. I don’t know what y’all talk about. I never open my mouth. Really? Just to add on just to add on to that too, like he is appealing this as we pointed out earlier. So, it’s a one game suspension that he’s appealing and essentially still doubling down saying he never spit on a player. If you want to go back to what Jaylen Carter did, I mean, he got ejected what, six seconds into that first game of the season in the locker room after the game. He was apologetic. Won’t happen again. My bad. I should have never put my teammates in that situation. And I love Jamar Chase, too. Look, my husband’s from Cincinnati. can’t go six seconds without seeing a Chase or Burough jersey in that city. He’s completely changed that franchise. But I expected him maybe yesterday to come out and be like, “Hey, look, I blew it. I blew it. I li I did it. I lied. I apologize.” But now we’re tripling down and saying, “I appeal this and I I still never did it.” I I just I’m not understanding the thought process. What what you do if you’re Troy Vincent and you’re Commissioner Raj Goodell, not to say that they haven’t done this or with other people, but in case you did it, you make a special exception here. You summon that man to New York City and you sit him down and you play the video right in front of him. Yeah. And then literally say to him, “You’re appealing this?” Yeah. What if somebody did that to you? Let’s look him right in the face. Right. Let’s look right in the face because the worst case scenario is you’re going to get a game or two games suspect. That’s the worst case scenario, right? So, knowing this, you’re a man, right? This is your reputation, right? This your personal integrity, right? Look at that right here and tell me if somebody did that to you. What you going to say? What you going to do? You going to feel I I appreciate that. And I will say this, knowing Troy the way I know him, don’t don’t think that may not like like I don’t know if you know I’ve known Troy. No, no, I know that. But I’m saying the way that he handles himself, he does a lot of this stuff behind behind closed doors. And he he is a former the guy gets it right. Like he’ll pull guys in. He has conversations. He tries to your point this is much bigger. And to your point, Shay, this is much bigger than just the spit man. Like like your integrity, your word, like all these things that you’re putting, you put these things out there. Let me help you for the future. Right. So that may be that may be occurring. I just think that you get if if if one game has been one game that it stays one game. I I listen I hate the spitting thing and I’m with you. Man spits on me, dude. We’re gonna catch hands and it’s going to be whatever it is, whatever the penalty is and and it’s I I I I wish week one would have been different. I wish when Jaylen Carter did it, it would have been different. But but unfortunately once that’s kind of set, I don’t feel like you can just veer hard off course um for what happened. I don’t think it’s that big of a deal to go from one game to two games in the grand. It’s huge. No, no, no. I’m saying it’s worth I’m saying the incident is worth it. I don’t think it’s that big of a deal to go from that considering two things. Number one, what we just explained and number two, the penalty got handed down after you know he lied. Yeah. Straight lied in front of the camera. I’m just saying you could take you could take all of that in consideration if the fine. Now, you can’t do it in the aftermath, you know, but if it happened before you handed down a penalty. Oh, so we going to sit here and lie with a straight face. We going to do that, too? Go ahead, Cece. No, you’re absolutely right. And here’s what I will say. It’s all about the integrity of the game. Agree. It’s all about the integrity of the entertainment product. And when you have one of your stars, a guy that’s on the marquee behaving that way, when little kids are wearing his jersey and looking up to him, which they are, this is a this is a black black mark on the NFL. And this cannot happen. And to another star, this cannot happen into the future. I’m just going to say this. Jamar Chase better make sure he cross the street at the crosswalks. Yeah. You better make sure moving forward. You handle it this way. And y’all know this better. Y’all know this better than me. You can get into a fight on the field outside of intentionally trying to hurt somebody like you know back you know you come up behind you got to take their knees out you know outside of that spitting it don’t get no worse and that’s the kind of thing that unlike almost anything else on the field or on the court of play. That’s the kind of stuff Cats will walk out the locker room and walk down to the other locker room for. That’s the kind of stuff Cats will catch you outside of the stadium and and not only you, but your boys, too. We know how this rolls. Stuff can end up getting a lot ain’t like we ain’t seen that before between Steelers and Bengals. It ain’t like we ain’t seen that before between Steelers and Bengals players where it’s outside of football. That’s right. That’s the fear of all of it is heightened to most. Absolutely. [Music]

On First Take, Stephen A. Smith, Chris Canty and Jeff Saturday join Shae Cornette to react to Ja’Marr Chase’s suspension for spitting on Jalen Ramsey during the Cincinnati Bengals matchup against the Pittsburgh Steelers.

0:00 Ja’Marr Chase suspended
2:00 Stephen A. weighs in
3:30 Jeff Saturday responds
5:45 Chris Canty weighs in
7:50 Stephen A. responds

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