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While the rest of their team was celebrating their win over the Dolphins on Saturday night, Kansas City Chiefs defensive lineman Chris Jones and former Chiefs defensive lineman Tamba Hali were over in Miami’s locker room laughing it up.
Wait, what?
According to Chris Perkins of the South Florida Sun Sentinel, “It was one of the most bizarre scenes I’ve ever seen in a losing playoff locker room.
“For a few brief minutes Saturday night, not long, perhaps three or four minutes, one small corner of the Miami Dolphins’ locker room had such a raucous buzz you’d have thought they’d just won their first playoff game in 23 years.”
Again… what?! How?
The reason Jones and Hali were not in the Chiefs’ locker room, but in the Dolphins’ was because they were visiting their old teammate Justin Houston.
Houston, who signed with the Dolphins just four days before the game after being released by the Carolina Panthers, said about the bizarre scene, “When it’s over, it’s over. You still show love.”
Not everyone in the Miami Dolphins locker room felt that way.
“I would have told them to get the (expletive) out,” one offensive player told Perkins Monday as the Dolphins were cleaning out their lockers.
“That would have had me hot.”
Another Dolphins player told him, “I’ve never seen anything like that.”
Others, like Miami defensive tackle Raekwon Davis, didn’t think it was a big deal for Jones and Hali to be laughing in the Dolphins’ locker room after Miami lost 27-6, ending their season.
He said Jones was just showing respect for Houston and that he wouldn’t tolerate disrespect in the Dolphins’ locker room.
Some, obviously, would say that is exactly what Jones, Hali and Houston, who had one tackle in the game, were doing.
As Perkins pointed out, in 15 years covering the NFL it was the first time he had ever seen an opposing (and winning) player in the losing team’s locker room. He also added that he has covered the NBA for 10 seasons and it was his “first time seeing laughter in a locker room after a playoff loss.”
“This was strange,” he added.