The Pittsburgh Steelers were without their best offensive player for quite a while.
Star WR Diontae Johnson suffered an injury early in the season, and he wasn’t able to lead the team’s passing game through a complicated stretch.
He’s tried to make a statement since coming back and regaining that WR1 status, which he reclaimed from disgruntled youngster George Pickens.
That has often led to some frustration, which was evident in Week 8 during the loss to the Jacksonville Jaguars, where he heavily criticized the referees.
Johnson stated that he didn’t like the referees and even went as far as to imply that they had taken a bribe because of some blown calls.
Needless to say, the league didn’t care for his comments, so they hit him with a hefty $25,000 fine.
Now, ProFootballTalk reveals that Johnson doesn’t plan to appeal the fine and will just play ball and pay it like a good sport.
Diontae Johnson decided not to appeal the $25,000 fine for criticizing officials after the Jaguars-Steelers game. It would have been resolved not by a joint NFL-NFLPA process but by the league. https://t.co/DHsRWj4w9Z
— ProFootballTalk (@ProFootballTalk) November 9, 2023
Per the report, one of the reasons not to appeal is due to the procedure employed.
Apparently, these kinds of fines don’t fall within the joint procedure created by the NFLPA and the NFL, which means the league has full control of the appeal.
That pretty much makes it impossible for Johnson to win the appeal, so there’s no point in wasting time and resources fighting a lost battle.
Leave a Reply