New Orleans Saints tight end Jimmy Graham is going to have to confine his dunking to dipping hot beignets into steaming chicory coffee down at the Café DuMonde in the French Quarter on the River.
Graham’s signature finish to his touchdown celebration has been dunking the football over the goal posts. He is, after all, a converted basketball player. Who ‘Dat Nation loves it when he does that, the Atlanta Falcons… not so much.
Everything was going well with that until Graham managed somehow to bang the goal posts in the Georgia Dome so out of line that they had to call a time out and get a couple of guys out with a massive big level to straighten the thing out.
Word is that the Falcons front office filed an official complaint with Roger Goodell’s office….which eventually led to the commissioner’s office issuing a ban on dunking the goal posts in the NFL.
Actually there is no way that the league can prevent players from dunking the goal post if they take a notion to, however, the refs will enforce a 15 yard penalty for unsportsmanlike conduct on the kickoff and, of course, there will be a fine. The NFL needs some more money.
Graham went scoreless in the first preseason game but was right there against the Tennessee Titans with two nice touchdowns and two nice dunks to follow up with. The penalties were accessed, drawing frowns from Head Coach Sean Payton and Goodell will surely collect his levies, but Jimmy Graham was having way too much fun at the time to care very much.
Sean Payton probably would not have taken the dunking penalties so hard if they had not been accompanied by another 20 Saints penalties which Payton described as, “painful to watch.” Graham and Payton had a heated discussion of the sidelines and Payton won, big surprise. Payton softened the blow by adding that he was Graham’s ‘biggest fan’.
So the NFL gives us yet another reason to call them jokingly, the No Fun League. We all knew that the league would win in the end and the end of the goal post dunking era has arrived. Graham has taken it in stride and the Saints will still get double digit touchdown pass receptions from their star tight end dunks or not.
Jimmy Graham scored 16 touchdowns last season and just negotiated a new, four year contract with the Saints that nets him around ten million dollars a year and makes Graham the highest paid tight end in professional football. Geaux Saints!
