Texans' Azeez Al-Shaair, Who Some Call The Modern Day Vontaze Burfict, Has A Comical "Highlight Reel" Of Dirty Hits

Relative to some of the other dirty hits you'll see around the NFL, this tackle on Sam Darnold last night wasn't especially violent. It was ridiculous in the sense of... that's just so easy to avoid. As a defender, you know by now that you can't land on a QB with your full body weight. Which sometimes does seem unavoidable. But on a tackle that takes THAT long to complete, he should have plenty of time to think about it. Just roll over man. It can't be that hard. But a quick search of Azeez Al-Shaair's name will yield an And-1 mixtape's worth of dirty hits that are significantly... more ridiculous.

I feel like Azeez's reputation as the dirtiest player in the NFL is thwarted a bit by the team he plays for. The Houston Texans are among the most forgettable team in all of professional sports. I'd bet there are a lot of casual football fans out there who would struggle to name you a single player on the Texans outside of C.J. Stroud. They'd probably come up with Nico Collins after a few seconds of thinking. But you get my point. Nobody sees the Texans playing the 10 PM EST, Monday Night Football game and thinks to themselves, "Hell yeah. This is going to be awesome". The Texans are an exceptionally generic, boring, non-threatening football team.

Except for this Azeez Al-Shaair guy. He's pretty threatening. If this guy was playing for the Cowboys, or the Chiefs, or the Ravens, or any team the NFL consistently shoves down our throats in primetime, he would be WAY more widely known as the dirtiest player in football. Not that he doesn't have that reputation already. But he's not a household name in the same way, say, Vontaze Burfict was. But he is right on par with him when it comes to being a dirty player... (who is also kind of hilarious to watch).

He's real big on whacking his opponents in the head (and occasionally trying to choke them out).

Here's a fun little late hit against the Titans.

And of course, in case you've forgotten, Azeez Al-Shaair is the player who attempted murder on Trevor Lawrence as his slid to the ground last season. 

When Azeez Al-Shaair is inevitably fined for last night's hit on Sam Darnold, it will be his 7th fine in the last three years. That's $85,877 in fines. Which based on my math, should put him just over $100k in dirty hit payments in three seasons of football. Which really does not seem like enough. Azeez Al-Shaair is on a 3-year, $34,000,000 contract with the Texans. A contract which realistically, he's probably earned in part by being a dirty player. Despite the occasional penalty yardage, there's something to be said for having a linebacker who offensive players fear might try to pull a knife on them mid-play. So if I'm Azeez Al-Shaair… having to cough a measly $100k over 3 seasons… which is 0.02% of my gigantic contract… that's certainly not enough to make me "think about my actions", or change the way I play football. Not if it's gotten me this far in life…