Matthews on hit: "It wasn't a very smart play"

In yesterday's 34-28 loss to the 49ers, Clay Matthews, who had made comments earlier in the week concerning the Packers wanting to "hit the quarterback," made a stupid play that stupider officials screwed up on. On the play, 49ers QB Colin Kaepernick had taken about 1.5 steps out of bounds before Matthews came out of nowhere and clothes-lined him. The tackle resulted in a brief of fight between the teams, in which a penalty was called on the 49ers.

 Now in this situation, both penalties should've been off set and the game should've continued from where Kaepernick stepped out. But instead, these refs allowed a replay of third down, in which the 49ers scored a TD. So really, the refs gave the 49ers four free points yesterday. Now this uncommon mistake ended up not mattering in the final score, but nobody will doubt that the momentum of the game shifted at the time that TD was scored. And it's all because Matthews just had to make an unnecessary tackle. 

“First off, it wasn’t a very smart play," Matthews said. "I had already committed to hitting the quarterback. I guess I should have figured he was going to step out of bounds. It’s nothing personal. I went up to him later and was joking around with him. But not a very smart play.”

It was stupid. I really can't even understand why he did it. There is absolutely no point in tackling defenseless players.