Jared Verse said Thursday that he has spoken with his Cleveland Browns teammates about not coming to his defense after Pittsburgh Steelers guard Mason McCormick slammed him to the ground following a point-after attempt on Sunday.
“That’s a conversation that we’ve had and spoken about,” Verse said. “I’ve made my issues known about the situation, but also I didn’t put them in a position to let them know beforehand I was going to talk the way I talked to the Steelers and Steelers Nation or whatever they are. I got to be better than that. I didn’t do enough on my part. We all got to pick it up.”
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McCormick received a 15-yard penalty after he caught a leaping Verse in the air and dumped him to the ground during the Steelers’ 27-6 win. He said afterward that he didn’t know who the player was that he was tangled up with.
“Just felt somebody jump, and we’re told to get jumpers’ hands down, and that’s really it,” McCormick said.
“To be quite honest with you, that was the play that made me really angry,” Verse said. “I was already upset about the game, the way things were moving, but at that point it became really deep. You’re doing dirty s***, you’re trying to sweep my legs out. That honestly could have put me in a position to not be able to finish the season, put me in a position to change my life in a very bad aspect, so that upset me.
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“The lack of reaction by those around me had upset me a lot. They were focused on the game and everything like that, but a similar play happened to Derek Barnett on the next field goal, and I lost it. Because those are my brothers, those are my teammates, and when you do something like that to them, it upsets me very deeply. … These are my teammates, these are my brothers, and we’re not fighting for each other.”
There was tension entering the game between Verse and the Steelers after the Browns defensive end called out Pittsburgh for playing during when the two last met in Week 4. He also said that Cleveland was going to “make Pittsburgh ours” in the days leading up to their Week 9 matchup.
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“I’m very upset about it and if this wasn’t football I’d be acting a different way,” Verse said after the game about the play adding, “To do something like that, I just can’t have respect for that.”
