Detroit Lions safety Kerby Joseph was apparently unhappy about being passed over for this year's NFC Pro Bowl team, so he decided to take his frustration out on opposing Los Angeles Rams quarterback Matthew Stafford.
Stafford, a former Lions star who was traded to Los Angeles before the 2021 season, was mentioned in a since-deleted post on Joseph's Instagram page following Detroit's Week 17 win over the San Francisco 49ers. .
The image shows Joseph holding a tablet with 'F*** Stafford' written on the screen.
Although the post was deleted, many assumed it was a nod to Derby's interactions with Stafford during the Lions' 26-20 Week 1 win over the Rams on September 8.
A clip from that game showed veteran Stafford accusing Joseph, a third-year player from Illinois, of being “dirty.”
“You're very dirty, and you know it,” Stafford told Joseph at the time. “It's recorded.”
Joseph was passed over for the Pro Bowl despite leading the NFL in selections with nine this season.
Detroit Lions safety Kerby Joseph was apparently unhappy about being passed over for this year's NFC Pro Bowl team, so he decided to take his frustration out on Matthew Stafford.
Former Lions quarterback Matthew Stafford accused Joseph of being “dirty” earlier this season.
Joseph was passed over for the Pro Bowl despite leading the NFL in interceptions with nine this season. Only one other player, Green Bay safety Xavier McKinney, has more than six picks on the year. Instead, he appears as a second substitute.
There are three components to Pro Bowl selections: fan voting, player voting, and coaches voting.
Joseph was first among all safeties in fan voting, but apparently suffered with his NFL teammates and coaches.
The Lions and Minnesota Vikings will close out the NFL regular season with an unprecedented, high-stakes matchup on Sunday night.
Detroit (14-2) and Minnesota (14-2) will become the first teams to meet in the regular season with at least 13 wins and 28 wins combined.
“It's unique,” Vikings coach Kevin O'Connell said.
It's also quite momentous.
The winner gets the NFC North title, home-field advantage into the Super Bowl and a coveted bye in the playoffs. The loser will begin the postseason on the road next week as the league's first wild card with 14 wins.
“This is exciting, but it's not like it's the playoffs,” Lions coach Dan Campbell said.
Detroit has been aiming for first place in the conference since losing its lead last season following a controversial loss in Dallas late in the regular season. The painful setback put the Lions on the road to the NFC championship game in San Francisco, where they blew a 17-point third-quarter lead.
“You come out of that game feeling like it gives you the best odds of going last, I mean, everyone knows what the prize is, and that's the Super Bowl,” Campbell said.
Detroit's Jared Goff (16) leaves the field after a win over the San Francisco 49ers
The Lions entered the season with aspirations of reaching the Super Bowl for the first time in franchise history and looked like a contender, winning 12 of their last 13 games.
Meanwhile, the Vikings had modest expectations when the season began nearly four months ago and exceeded projections. They started 5-0 and won their last nine games to put themselves in position to defeat the defending division champions on their own turf.
“We knew we had to win a lot of football games to keep up with a team that really has been, if not the best, one of the two best teams in the league for most of the year,” O'Connell said.
Vikings running back Aaron Jones said he and his teammates always knew they had what it took to be among the best in the NFL.
“We weren't on anyone's radar,” Jones said. “But it was never dark in this building when we came in. It was always light, it was always a pleasure to be here.”
Detroit's Jared Goff was selected to start the NFC Pro Bowl, and Sam Darnold was chosen as an alternate.
Leading the league's highest-scoring offense, Goff has completed 75 percent or more of his passes in half of his 16 games to join Tom Brady (2007) as the two NFL quarterbacks to hit three-quarters. parts of his attempts in eight games of a season.
Darnold, who completed a season-high 81.5 percent of his passes in a two-point loss to Detroit at home in October, threw for a career-high 377 yards in last week's win. about Green Bay.
He has thrown a career-high 35 touchdown passes, eight more than he threw in the previous four seasons combined with three teams, to show the promise the New York Jets envisioned when they selected him No. 3 overall. in 2018.
Darnold became the first NFL quarterback to win 14 games in his debut season with a team. He was 21-35 as a starter in six seasons with the Jets, Carolina and San Francisco.
Lions coach Dan Campbell admitted Sunday's game won't match the intensity of the playoffs
Lions defensive coordinator Aaron Glenn said Darnold's rebirth is reminiscent of Baker Mayfield's resurrected career in Tampa Bay.
“There are some of these quarterbacks, or players, in this league that people just give up on very quickly,” Glenn said. “Sometimes the environment has a lot to do with it.”
Vikings tight end TJ Hockenson did not play in the previous matchup against his former team because he was still recovering from reconstructive knee surgery after tearing ligaments on a low hit by Joseph in Week 16 of last season. .
Detroit drafted Hockenson in the first round out of Iowa in 2019 and traded him to a division rival seven games into the 2022 season. He has 39 catches for 446 yards in nine games this season.
Lions defensive end Za'Darius Smith had one of the best seasons of his career with the Vikings three years ago, when he had 10 sacks and earned Pro Bowl recognition.
Smith, acquired from Cleveland at the trade deadline, has gone sackless for three straight games after recording 2 1/2 sacks in consecutive games against Green Bay and Chicago.