NFL’s taunting crackdown miffs some Eagles, whose team has seen more infractions than others

It was a penalty that helped the Eagles greatly during their come-from-behind victory over the Los Angeles Rams in Week 3, but some Eagles didn’t love seeing the yellow flag emerge.

Puka Nacua was penalized for taunting after catching a 20-yard pass that would have set up the Rams in Eagles territory late in the third quarter, looking to build on a 26-21 lead that the Eagles were cutting into.

With Eagles linebacker Jihaad Campbell still near him after he was tackled, Nacua spun the football on the ground and, without even looking at Campbell, flexed his muscles and pointed toward the end zone, miming a first-down signal. It was the third time Nacua did it that day, so maybe it was because Campbell was near his feet, but veteran Eagles cornerback Adoree’ Jackson, himself a victim of Nacua’s celebratory move earlier in the day, didn’t think Nacua deserved a penalty.

“Hell no,” Jackson said last week. “You’ll know if a [expletive] is taunting you. I’ll tell you that right now. You can tell when somebody is coming at you taunting you. You can tell disrespect, you can feel disrespect, you know disrespect.

“Sometimes you just got to let people play.”

The Eagles weren’t complaining in the moment. The penalty backed the Rams out of field goal range and they eventually turned the ball back over to the Eagles on downs.

“I’m glad it was a call, but still, it’s too ticky-tack,” said Eagles linebacker Nakobe Dean, who has watched every game so far from the sideline but was gearing up for his 2025 debut on Thursday after recovering from surgery to repair his left patellar tendon.

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Dean will make his debut knowing the rules and limits around celebrating have changed since he last played in January. In the offseason, the league decided to crack down on taunting and unsportsmanlike conduct, even going so far as to ban certain gestures. The Eagles were hit with a taunting penalty on opening night, when Nolan Smith stood over Dallas running back Miles Sanders and flexed his arms.

The Eagles have been penalized twice more for taunting since, and a survey of NFL game logs through five weeks of the NFL season revealed that the Eagles’ three taunting penalties lead the NFL. Only three other teams — Green Bay, Los Angeles, and Seattle — have been flagged for taunting, and all of them just once. Arizona tight end Trey McBride was not flagged for his Week 3 incident, but he later was fined $11,593 for taunting, an amount all players are subject to for their first offense.

Other potential taunting violations have shown up as unsportsmanlike conduct penalties. Dallas has been flagged for three unsportsmanlike incidents, which included one obvious taunting penalty from CeeDee Lamb after his defender was called for pass interference in the end zone.

The two other Eagles violations after Smith’s came from Jalen Carter, who was called for taunting during the Rams game after the first of two blocked field goals by the Eagles (and has a target on him from previous unsportsmanlike violations), and from Cooper DeJean, who was flagged after a tackle during a Week 4 road win over the Tampa Bay Buccaneers. DeJean was penalized after making an open-field tackle on Bucs running back Rachaad White. After the tackle, DeJean stepped over White and looked down.

“There was no intent to disrespect the player at all,” DeJean said a few days later. “I feel like I made the tackle, I got up, and my momentum was already taking me that way. Obviously you don’t want to step on the dude. It wasn’t intended to disrespect anyone, but the refs don’t know that. They just see the action.

“You work so hard during the week, and you put so much time and effort and emotion into the game. Then Sunday comes, and you’re finally there and you’re trying to play your best on Sunday and you have so much emotion running through your body because of the plays you’ve seen all week, and then now you’re out there doing it and making those plays, and you want to let out some emotion when you make that play. Then you get penalized for it, and it’s tough.”

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Dean, who is preparing to enter the fray in a new world, said the Eagles have emphasized the new rules during meetings. He said coach Nick Sirianni started from the side of the players — that he, too, didn’t like the way it was being policed — but has changed his tone to the Eagles needing to clean it up.

Sirianni said the Eagles address with their players what a certain refereeing crew emphasizes before each game. Before their game against the Bucs, Sirianni said taunting was a topic of discussion, not necessarily because of that crew’s habits, but because the Eagles were “lacking in that area right now.”

DeJean, of course, was flagged a few days later.

“It’s just a different type of penalty that we’re seeing and it’s getting called more,” Sirianni said. “So it’s our job to play within those rules, keep our composure, and play within the rules of the game.”

Even if they don’t like some of the fun being policed.

“I hate how they’re calling it, to be honest,” Dean said. “I didn’t feel like it was a big enough deal last year where they had to bring it a tick up this year. It’s getting really ticky-tack. I wouldn’t say it’s the referees’ fault. It’s the people who told the referees to police it more.”

The inconsistency and subjective nature of some of the calls has been frustrating for players, too. Some obvious taunts are called, some aren’t. For example, after a rare successful Eagles run Sunday vs. Denver, right guard Tyler Steen appeared to get in the face of a Broncos defender. An official separated the two, but Steen wasn’t flagged.

“You know how sometimes when you feel like police are just out there pulling you over because they’re trying to reach their quota?” Jackson said. “I feel like they got to reach their quota on their taunting penalties. Sometimes I feel it’s just bizarre.”

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The remedy is simple, Dean said: Celebrate together.

“No matter how we feel, at the end of the day we know they’re policing it hard, and everybody has to make sure we celebrate with our teammates, celebrate toward our sideline, and, matter of fact, don’t even face the person you made a play on,” he said.

Jackson, one of the oldest players on the Eagles at 30 years old, said he wasn’t worried about potentially getting his own taunting flag, and he also suggested that the Eagles start directing their celebrations internally.

“I don’t really do too much emotes or antics,” Jackson said. “If I do, it’s not going to be anything that anyone can misconceive as taunting. You’ll know that it’s me celebrating and doing it with my teammates. I think that’s the best coaching point that we all get. … We talk about just celebrate with your team.

“So, Puka, flex with your teammates. Coop, I don’t know, you don’t want to step on a man because that’s even worse. You got to look down to make sure you’re not stepping on him.”