Arthur Smith of the Falcons responds to the sentence for the Bijan Robinson controversy
After learning that he had been fined $25K and the team had been penalized $75K for the dispute surrounding running back Bijan Robinson’s exclusion from the injury report before Atlanta’s Week 7 victory over the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, head coach Arthur Smith of the Atlanta Falcons talked with reporters on Friday.
“There’s an inquiry and usually you have to respond with a letter,” Smith explained,
“It wasn’t like a court case, it wasn’t a lot of time spent. Here is how we interpreted it. Here was our intent. Nothing was done to try to game anything like that and I understood their point of view. So lesson learned there.”
During his 11 offensive snaps against the Bucs, Robinson only managed one carry for three yards. Following the game, he said he started “feeling weird” the night before. Although he was not mentioned on the team’s official injury report, he noted that he was experiencing headaches from an illness during the Tampa Bay game.
Even if a physical setback occurs less than a day before a game, clubs are still obliged to disclose it.
What I will give the league a lot of credit for is there are a lot of things, when you’re going through the injury report, and clearly we understood their point of view, but they also understood our point of view, too, which is why it wasn’t some contentious battle,” Smith said during his comments, as shared by the club’s official website.
Smith and the Falcons have bigger things to worry about, as 6-8 Atlanta trails both the 7-8 New Orleans Saints and the 7-7 Buccaneers in the NFC South standings. As of Friday afternoon.
