Jalen Carter spits away his image rehab in ugly Dak Prescott incident: ‘You can tell he’s devastated’

PHILADELPHIA — The only thing Jalen Carter did right on Thursday night? He didn’t run and hide from dealing with the swarm of media he would inevitably face. 

Carter stood at the corner of his locker, ready to face the consequences of his actions after spitting on Dak Prescott before the first snap of the Philadelphia Eagles showdown against the Dallas Cowboys even played. There was his opportunity to give his side of the biggest spit story since Roger McDowell spit on Cosmo Kramer in 1987. 

This explanation wasn’t as funny.

“It was a mistake that happened on my side. It just won’t happen again,” a dejected Carter said following the game. “I feel bad, just for my teammates and the fans out there. I’m doing it for them. I’m doing it for my family also. They showed the most love. You heard them out there today. 

“Just not being able to finish the game, or start the game even, finish the game (is disappointing). It won’t happen again, I promise.”

It better not. 

Jalen Hurts put the Eagles on his back vs. Cowboys after Jalen Carter’s spit stained opening night

Cody Benjamin

What Carter did on Thursday night took away any good will he had against the court of public opinion, headlined by a jury that doesn’t care if Carter has matured or not. They only go by what’s in front of them. 

Just two years ago, Carter pleaded no contest to misdemeanor charges of reckless driving and racing — the result of a crash that killed a Georgia football player (Devin Willock) and recruiting staffer (Chandler LeCroy). He was sentenced to 12 months of probation, a $1,000 fine and 80 hours of community service and would attend a state-approved defensive driving course.

This incident caused the Georgia football star to fall from potentially the top overall pick to No. 9 in the draft, where the Eagles scooped him up and took faith in their evaluation of players that Carter would thrive in their organization.

Until Thursday night, they were right. 

Carter has had a couple incidents on the field, incidents that could easily be dismissed based on the situation. He had an unsportsmanlike conduct penalty in a Week 15 game against the Pittsburgh Steelers last year for smacking the helmet of Steelers tight end Connor Heyward during a punt. The Eagles were fortunate officials determined Carter’s foul occurred after the play, and didn’t lose the chance to regain possession in the fourth quarter of a critical game. 

Nick Sirianni went over to lambaste Carter on the sidelines before defensive line coach Clint Hurtt separated the Eagles coach from saying anything further. Eagles’ chief of security Dom DiSandro was also set to intervene. 

This incident was significantly different. Not only did it involve an ejection of the game, but a disgusting act that is inexplicable. 

“I’m going to keep all our conversations and all my disciplinary things in-house, but we have to fix it as coaches,” Sirianni said in the early hours Friday morning. “You see how I coach with emotion, and I want them to play with emotion, and that’s what I kind of say all the time is you have to do it within the rules of the game. We need everybody out there to help us be successful.”

What actually happened between Carter and Prescott?The exchange that occurred between the Eagles defensive star and Cowboys quarterback is a typical “he said, she said” tale. Prescott appeared to have spit in the direction of the Eagles defense prior to Carter’s loogie towards the Cowboys quarterback,  but Carter was the offender that drew the unsportsmanlike conduct penalty and the automatic ejection. 

Prescott did his best to explain what led to Carter’s unsanitary crime. 

“In that case, he was trolling, I guess you could say, trying to mess with [Cowboys RG] Tyler Booker. I was just looking at him. I was right here by the two linemen and I guess I needed to spit, and I wasn’t going to spit on my lineman and I just spit ahead,” Prescott said. “I would say he was back there and was in that sense and he goes, ‘Are you trying to spit on me?’ At that point, I mean I felt like he was insulting me. I wouldn’t spit on somebody. 

“‘I’m damn sure I’m not trying to spit on you.’ We’re about to play a game. I’m wondering why you’re trying to mess with the rookie, and so when I stepped through, I actually say the words like, ‘Why the hell would I -” excuse me, but I’m probably even more colorful. ‘What would I need to spit on you for?’ He just spit on me in that moment, it was more of a surprise than anything.”

There wasn’t a side of the story for Carter to give, nor did he care to explain.

“I don’t try to do nothing out of the ordinary … But if it’s something there, you all see it,” Carter said. “When things started to come out and you started seeing things, you can go off that. But I got nothing to say about that.”

If Carter allows the court of public opinion to judge what happened, he didn’t win over the jury. This is certainly an incident that will be jotted down when determining if Carter has matured from the player he was at Georgia. 

Five career unnecessary roughness penalties can be swept under the rug. Those moments are in the heat of battle. 

This one is inexcusable. Carter let his emotions get the best of him. 

“I’m sure he probably regressed that to some extent,” Prescott said. “I’m pretty sure he knows that I didn’t try to spit on him or wasn’t even aiming to spit on him. So something that’s probably going to get a lot of coverage and a lot of attention that I feel sorry for him in the sense of.

“I mean I know how excited each and every one of us are right to kick off the season and the season opener, and hell of a player like that doesn’t even get a chance in the first play. Unfortunate circumstances.”

Teammates have his back Carter’s incident will likely lead to a suspension, as the NFL has made it clear this offseason they were going to target players for sportsmanship and unsportsmanlike conduct. The league has a golden opportunity to make a prime example of Carter here. 

No matter what happened between Carter and Prescott, the Eagles star defensive tackle let his teammates down when they needed him the most. Thanks to Carter’s ejection, Moro Ojomo and Jordan Davis played a significantly high percentage of snaps in his absence. Ojomo played 55 of the 61 defensive snaps (90%) while Davis was in for 53 (87%). 

The Eagles run defense was gashed early on, as Javonte Williams had two rushing touchdowns in the first half while the unit struggled to get off the field. Dallas did end up with 119 rushing yards — 69 in the second half — but ended up going scoreless on four second half possessions. 

Credit to the Eagles for overcoming Carter’s stupidity, which likely made the locker room more forgiving knowing they are good enough to prevail selfish acts. 

“There’s a sense of accountability and everything, and I know he’s done that, and so it’s just something that we all can learn from, right?” Eagles quarterback Jalen Hurts said. “An unwise man will make a mistake and not look back on it and learn from it. So you have to look at those things and be able to take something away from it and we will.”

Some of the leaders chose not to divulge any further on the incident, such as Zack Baun — a newly appointed team captain this year. Lane Johnson, the longest-tenured Eagles player, already took initiative with Carter.

He’s pretty certain Carter understood the consequences of his actions.  

“You can tell he’s devastated, but it’ll be a lesson learned for him,” Johnson said. “We missed him out there today. Yeah, man, it’s one of those things, but I was proud of how the guys responded, and JC was in here at halftime to coach the guys up, doing his part.

For Carter’s sake, an incident like this better not happen again. The margin for error is gone, especially for a player that’s good enough to earn $50 million a year just because of the impact me makes on the field. 

The spitting incident won’t go unnoticed outside the Eagles locker room. This team, however, sees things differently. 

There’s a reason why they have won 40 of their last 52 regular season games after all. 

“Jalen is a part of us. We’re never gonna push our brother down. We’re never gonna put him down,” Ojomo said. “He did something, and he’ll learn from his mistake and move on.”