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In the first quarter of the Pittsburgh Steelers Thursday night loss to the Minnesota Vikings, head coach Mike Tomlin was forced to bench wide receiver Chase Claypool. Tomlin did it because Claypool drew a ridiculous personal foul as he continues to be the most penalized wide receiver in the NFL.
Tomlin did it in hopes Claypool would get the message about what is acceptable and what isn’t. And for a time it looked like he got through to him. During the Steelers late-game rally, Claypool made a couple of truly impressive catches.
But then this happend. With less than 40 seconds to play and with no timeouts, Claypool catches a slant for a first down. But rather than hustle the football to the line of scrimmage so Pittsburgh could clock it, Claypool struck a pose.
Yep, he had to take several second to do his first-down pose while down on one knee. Guard Trai Turner rushed over to get the ball, it fell to the ground and wasted even more time. Then, after the Steelers finally clock the ball, you see Claypool visibly upset with Turner.
This would seem to suggest the message to Claypool didn’t get through pic.twitter.com/uVbVv26GzE
— Brooke Pryor (@bepryor) December 10, 2021
Claypool’s lack of awareness of the game situation is mind-blowing. The amount of time wasted with his theatrics cost the Steelers at least one play and even though we have no idea if it would have changed the outcome, there’s no denying how bad this looked for Claypool in a season where he has underperformed.
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