‘Career in grave jeopardy’: NFL linebacker savaged for ‘s**t’ act

Dumb, stupid and very immature.

That’s how 49ers tight end George Kittle described De’Vondre Campbell’s meltdown in the third quarter Thursday night (US time) when the All-Pro linebacker refused to enter the NFC West game against the Rams after losing his starting spot.

“Whatever his decision was, it wasn’t for this organisation, it wasn’t for this team and that’s on him,” Kittle said in his postgame press conference after San Francisco’s 12-6 defeat at Levi’s Stadium. “Not very happy about it. I would have had something to say. I wish I heard about it on the field, but I didn’t.

“Is that the reason we lost? Absolutely not … Try to win football games when someone doesn’t want to play football, especially when you’re suited up. It kind of puts you down, especially when you lose two linebackers.”

The 49ers lost linebackers Dre Greenlaw (knee) and Dee Winters (neck) to injuries during the game.

“It’s just dumb. It’s just stupid. It’s very immature,” Kittle said. “I just don’t see how you could do something like that to your team.”

Kittle explained that the situation didn’t cause any tensions as a team, and that Campbell — a ninth-year linebacker — made himself an outlier.

“[There is] not disbelief or disconnection as a team. That is one person, who just decided not to play for his teammates. I don’t that makes our offence or our defence look like we’re falling apart, it’s more of one person making a — like [49ers cornerback] Mooney [Charvarius Ward] said — selfish decision. And I’m with Mooney on that. I’ve never been around anybody that’s ever done that and I hope I’m never around anybody that does that again.”

Ward said afterwards that Campbell refusing to play was “some sucka s–t” and that he “hurt the team” because the 49ers were short at the position.

“He’s a professional,” Ward said after the game. “He’s been playing for a long time. If he didn’t want to play, he shouldn’t have dressed out. He could have told them that before the game. I feel like that was some sucka s–t that he did. It definitely hurt the team. Dee went down and we needed a linebacker … So, for him to do that, that’s some sucka stuff to me, in my opinion. He’s probably going to get cut soon, so it is what it is with that.”

Campbell’s act also drew critism from ESPN’s Stephen A. Smith.

“If it were me, he would have been cut before he left the locker room,” Smith said on First Crack. “He wouldn’t have made it out of the locker room as a San Francisco 49er. And I’ll be honest with you: his career is in grave jeopardy, and it should be. You don’t want a teammate like that. De’Vondre Campbell should be ashamed of himself. There’s no excuse for what he did, and there have been examples, and I’m going to defer to NFL players, I didn’t play, but here’s the deal.

“There are certain things you don’t need to be an actual participant in to understand how egregious it is,” Smith continued. “And this is one of those situations. I would need further understanding if he did it before the game. I would need further understanding if, you know, you had an argument with the coach and you went home, or whatever, you said, bump it, I get that part that involves a lot more introspection.”

Campbell refused to enter the game when called on in the third quarter and he then walked to the locker room with a towel over his head.

Head coach Kyle Shanahan then turned to Demetrius Flannigan-Fowles, who was the only healthy linebacker left on the active roster.

“He said he didn’t want to play today,” Shanahan said of Campbell.

The 49ers signed Campbell as an unrestricted free agent from the Packers in March.

He started 12 of 13 games for the 49ers going into Thursday’s game, but the team had been phasing him out for Greenlaw’s return.

The loss was a crushing setback as the 49ers were trying to creep back into the NFC West race. Instead, they now find themselves in last place and 2 1/2 games behind the division-leading Seahawks.

The 49ers (6-8) face the Dolphins (6-7) in Miami on Dec. 22.

-This story was originally published in The New York Post and reproduced with permission.