Fred Warner Is Down $41,793 From Week 3, And The NFL Is Pushing For Suspensions Already

Week 3 of the NFL season just dropped six major player safety foul announcements that could lead to guys getting benched. Yeah, we’re talking about suspensions here, and it’s happening way sooner than you might think. No player has hit that three-fine limit *yet*, but the league is clearly not messing around.

The Hip-Drop Tackle Is Getting Expensive

Two of those six fouls were the dreaded hip-drop tackles. Guess who got dinged? Fred Warner, that 49ers linebacker, and Rams safety Kam Curl. Each of them got slapped with a $17,911 fine. Warner, though, he doubled down on the bad decisions, also catching a $23,882 fine for illegal use of his helmet in a tackle. So yeah, for Warner, that’s a cool $41,793 out of his pocket from just one week. That’s a significant chunk of change, and it shows the league is serious about this rule.

Blindside Blocks and Defenseless Hits Are Still In The Crosshairs

The rest of the player safety violations? Three blindside blocks and one hit on a defenseless player. Texans linebacker Jamal Hill, Giants tight end Isaiah Likely, and Steelers linebacker Cole Holcomb all got fined for those blindside blocks. Then you had Texans linebacker Azeez Al-Shaair taking a hit for fouling a defenseless player. These aren’t minor infractions either; they’re the kind of plays that can genuinely hurt guys.

What Happens Next When These Fines Keep Piling Up?

Here’s the kicker and what every team has to be looking at: if any player racks up three fines for *any* of these qualifying infractions, they’re sitting out a game. That includes blindside blocks, hip-drop tackles, illegal helmet use, hitting a defenseless player, launching, or horse-collar tackles. The NFL is clearly drawing a line in the sand on player safety. We’re only in Week 3, and we’ve already got six of these. With no one hitting the suspension threshold yet, it feels like it’s just a matter of time before a key player on some team gets that third flag and has to watch from the sidelines. Coaches better be drilling this into their guys because losing a starter for a whole game over a fineable hit could absolutely swing the momentum of a season.

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Originally reported by Pro Football Talk.