Ronnie Harrison Jr. missed a hell of a finish.
The Chiefs came from behind to beat the Browns 33-29 in their season opener Sunday at Arrowhead Stadium, sealing a fourth-quarter comeback with an interception in the final minutes.
Harrison, a Browns safety, had to watch from the locker room after he was ejected for shoving Chiefs running backs coach Greg Lewis near his neck during a first-quarter altercation on the Chiefs’ sideline.
Harrison initiated the incident when he stepped on the midsection of Chiefs running back Clyde Edwards-Helaire after Edwards-Helaire had been tackled.
It’s that part of the sequence that Chiefs coach Andy Reid took issue with after the game.
“You don’t do that on our sideline,” Reid said. “You don’t do that to our guys — bottom line.”
Initially, the referees only flagged the Chiefs sideline for a penalty, when one official watched Lewis shove Harrison off of Edwards-Helaire, who was on the ground as Harrison appeared to step on him.
But after a huddle — and likely some help from a booth referee watching a replay — they assessed Harrison an offsetting unsportsmanlike conduct penalty and also ejected him for the retaliation.
“So the fellow that was involved with it came over, and he was on the chest of our player and that’s what happened,” Reid said. “So (Lewis) was trying to get (Harrison) off, and he didn’t want to get off, so he kind of just lifted him a little bit and then he got hit. But he was there to get that fellow who was leaning on our guy. That’s why there was a penalty, right? So the officials fixed it, which I thought was important.”
Browns head coach Kevin Stefanski was asked about the incident after the game but said, “I didn’t see it yet, so I want to watch it before I comment on it.”
Lewis is in his fifth season on the Chiefs’ coaching staff. It’s his first season as the team’s running backs coach after coaching the wide receivers for four years.