Former Giants come up with a solution to the Clay Matthews situation

It’s getting hard to be a defender in the NFL.

Rule changes designed to promote player safety and protect quarterbacks (and therefore owners’ bank accounts) have lead to flags that frustrate the living daylights out of defenders. It all came to a head Sunday as Green Bay Packers’ star edge rusher Clay Matthews got his third roughing the passer penalty in three games for what looked to everyone who wasn’t the ref like a clean hit.

The previous week he got flagged for this hit:

Fortunately for Clay, some former New York Giants have come to the rescue, namely pass rushing extraordinaire, Osi Umenyiora.

Osi’s solution? Just don’t hit (or land on) the quarterback.

Note: Terrell Thomas later corrected himself, saying that Osi made the remarks in 2010, not that he is somehow remembering something from two years in the future.

In his prime, Umenyiora was one of best pass rushers in the NFL, using a lightning first step and speed around the edge to blow past tackles before they could do anything about it. He also perfected a chop move to knock the ball out of quarterbacks’ hands.

So there ya go NFL pass rushers — Don’t want to get flagged? Just do what Osi did.

Easy, right?

Or you could do this: