The New Orleans Saints and Tampa Bay Buccaneers don’t like each other.
That’s completely normal, given they are NFC South divisional rivals. But the disdain between their respective star players Marshon Lattimore and Mike Evans might run deeper than just playing each other twice a season.
It has been well documented that the Saints’ star cornerback Lattimore and the Buccaneers’ star wide receiver Mike Evans have a bone to pick with each other. With these two meeting up this Sunday, we take a look at some of their former clashes and how that resulted for both of them.
Mike Evans vs. Marshon Lattimore Part IV
According to Sporting News, these two rivals have had three run-ins in the past that resulted in on-field brawls and scraps, the most recent one resulting in a one-game suspension for Evans last year after the Buccaneers faced the Saints during Week 2. Evans claimed he witnessed Marshon Lattimore “punch” running back Leonard Fournette and get in Tom Brady’s face, he reacted out of emotion.
Sporting News quoted Evans as saying “I know we were trying to get a flag called and he wasn’t calling it, all I see is Lattimore — he punched [Leonard Fournette] in the face or something like that. Then, like, pushed Tom [Brady]. That’s all I saw. I just pushed him.”
Following that altercation, the NFL suspended Evans for one game.
On September 13th, 2020, Mike Evans and Marshon were jawing at each other and shoving each other after a run play which also included Mike Evans knocking Lattimore’s helmet off, and though this was an incident on its own between the two, it was a rather minuscule one compared to the other two scuffles they had with one another.
The first major confrontation happened in 2017 when Lattimore got into former Buccaneers QB Jameis Winston‘s face after Winston had shoved a finger in the back of Lattimore’s helmet. After that, Evans struck Lattimore from the back before another defensive player intervened between the two.
Over the three scuffles Evans has had with Lattimore, he has accrued $102,810 in fines and also faced two suspensions which came from the 2017, and 2022 scuffles he had with Lattimore.
Lattimore, on the other hand, has received $23,867 in fines stemming from the 2020, and 2022 incidents with Mike Evans but has not faced any suspensions.
These two are very passionate about football, and it shows in their play, as both are four-time Pro-Bowl players and can tend to take their play to physical levels as exemplified in their past run-ins with each other.
As their Sunday faceoff in New Orleans comes, many will be watching this matchup between two of the best in the game.
