For as heated as the Pittsburgh Steelers’ rivalries might have gotten between the Baltimore Ravens and the Cincinnati Bengals, I don’t think any one moment quite measures up in intensity to the 2019 incident between Cleveland Browns DE Myles Garrett and Steelers QB Mason Rudolph.
Following the end of a blowout loss, Rudolph was unceremoniously spun to the ground on a quarterback pressure by Garrett. He took umbrage, shoving the edge rusher, which further initiated a tussle that resulted in Garrett ripping Rudolph’s helmet off. Moments later, he pursued the defender again in what escalated into a scuffle that ended with Garrett hitting him on the head with the helmet he’d pulled off.
Steelers fans will never forgive Garrett for that, and I would imagine many in the locker room haven’t, either, at least not fully. But they did welcome another offender last year, Larry Ogunjobi. It was Ogunjobi who shoved Rudolph to the ground after the whole incident. Speaking with teammate Cameron Heyward on his Not Just Football podcast, he explained precisely why—and what happened afterward.
“I turned around and I see a scuffle and I see a helmet like, ‘boom!’”, he said, retelling the story from his point of view. “I’m thinking Mason hit Myles the whole time. Like, the whole time. So I run down there, I shove Mason, I’m like, ‘Man, what the F are you doing?’”.
And so, at least for the first time that I’m aware of, we now know that Ogunjobi actually thought at that moment that it was Rudolph who swung the helmet, rather than the other way around. Which makes his actions make a lot more sense, in hindsight. Of course, all he needed to see later was the video to know how wrong he was, but that only came after the fact.
“The whole time I’m like, ‘You didn’t see what he did?! You didn’t see what he did?!’”, he recalled, as he got into it with Rudolph’s teammate after shoving him. “Cam comes up, he’s like, ‘Man, you want to go?!’. I’m like, ‘What’s up? Whatchu wanna do?’. Cam’s like, ‘See me after the game’. ‘Aiight’”.
One wonders how close it actually came for the interviewer and the interviewee to come to blows. Former Steelers lineman Maurkice Pouncey certainly took it to Garrett, for which he was suspended. Ogunjobi was also suspended, ultimately for one game—returning for a rematch against the Steelers, initially for what he thought was “standing up for your teammate”.
How wrong he was, and how soon he found out. Following locker room interviews, during which he defended Garrett—before he actually saw what happened—he retreated to the friends and family area of the stadium. My dad looks at me, he’s like, ‘Son, why?’”, he recalled with a laugh. “I look at the video, I’m like, ‘Damn!’”.
Before Ogunjobi signed with the Steelers as a free agent, Heyward says, he went on a sort of apology tour, wanting to clear the air with everybody before entering that locker room—particularly with Rudolph, of course, with whom he said he is now cool.
