We all love a good NFL scrum, especially when it stays sportsmanlike. But once punches start flying, things get scary and serious. One time, legendary offensive lineman Andrew Whitworth found himself in such a fight on the field during a game. Looking back on it, he still gives Ryan Fitzpatrick grief for how the quarterback acted during the chaos.
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The scene was Week 9 of the 2008 season, a matchup between the Cincinnati Bengals and the Jacksonville Jaguars. Fitzpatrick was starting in place of the injured Carson Palmer and making the most of the opportunity. With solid protection from Whitworth, he helped lead the Bengals to a 21-3 lead late in the third quarter.
At 0-8, Cincinnati found itself in unfamiliar territory. They were at home with a big lead against a team that had a few wins under its belt. Guys like TJ Houshmandzadeh and Chad Johnson were starting to feel themselves, and they began talking trash to the Jags, specifically to defensive tackle John Henderson, a woolly mammoth standing at 6-foot-7, 335 pounds.
But neither TJ nor Chad had to go back into the trenches to face Henderson. No, that was Whitworth’s job. After a play in which the offensive lineman had his helmet ripped off by Henderson, the opposing tackle wouldn’t let go of Whit’s face. This caused him to start throwing punches in self-defense.
“He gets riled up, so we start getting in some full-on swinging sessions,” Whitworth explained on an episode of New Heights. “That leads to an all-out brawl. Me and him going, helmets ripped off, we’re fighting across the field. We both get ejected.”
The moment had Travis and Jason Kelce on the edge of their seats. They couldn’t believe that someone would challenge Big John Henderson to a fight. But Whitworth was simply cut from a different cloth… He was a madman.
Fitzpatrick, being the quarterback, wondered what Whitworth expected him to do in such a situation. After all, Palmer was injured, and they couldn’t afford to go to the third string.
The Bengals also ended up winning the game, and it was Fitzpatrick’s first win as an NFL starter. So, he didn’t want to get involved in the fight, especially with an 18-point lead in hand. So, he ran toward the sideline during the scuffle, something Whitworth still remembers to this day.
But little did Fitz know that his desertion would be exposed when the team received their fines from the league the following Wednesday, revealing just how willing he had been to stay out of the chaos.
The Halo Rule exposed Fitz
Back in the day, the NFL had weird rules for how it handled things. One of those was how they punished players for fighting. Instead of reviewing the tape and determining who was involved, they would simply fine any player within a 2-yard radius, or the “halo” of the fight.
So, on Wednesday after the game, Whitworth, of course, got fined for his involvement in the fight. But what about Fitzpatrick?
“10 guys on offense got fined, guys,” Whitworth told the Kelce brothers. “There was only one guy on the offense who didn’t get fined. On tape, you can see him running to the sidelines.”
The culprit was none other than Fitzpatrick. Whitworth hilariously spotted him on film that week, full on sprinting to avoid the skirmish. Fitz jokingly said that he shaved two seconds off his 40-yard dash time that day.
“John Henderson’s bigger than he is,” Fitzpatrick said, pointing at Whit. “What am I going to do [after getting involved in the fight]? Seriously, what am I going to do?”
Fitz said it’s a story that Whitworth will never let him forget about. The betrayal still gets brought up between the two almost 20 years later. Some things just tend to stick in people’s memories, and that’s surely the case for Whitworth here.
Today, Fitzpatrick and Whitworth co-host a podcast and handle the pregame show for Amazon’s Thursday Night Football. They’re a hilarious duo with plenty of great stories from their playing days. Let’s just hope for Fitz’s sake that, given another chance, he would prove Whitworth’s loyalty expectations wrong.
