Brandon Beane, Buffalo Bills general manager on Tuesday acknowledged that was “an exchange” between Bills guard Richie Incognito and the Jacksonville Jaguars defensive lineman Yannick Ngakoue during the Sunday night’s AFC wild-card playoff game. But he believes that there is some sort of misunderstanding of what Incognito said which caused Ngakoue to accuse Incognito of making racial slurs after the Bills’ lost in the Sunday’s game with a 10-3 record.
Beane said, “There was definitely an exchange. I Think There is a misunderstanding of what was said.”
After the incident, Ngakoue referred to Incognito by his jersey number 64 and tweeted a post which said that the Bills player was “goin[g] to come harder than some weak racist slurs.” He further wrote that he is proud of his African heritage just like the 70 per cent other Black players on the league. At the end, he concluded his tweet by writing a hashtag that read “Iaintjonathanmarin!”
However, it is still unclear what Incognito may have particularly said to Ngakoue. On Monday, he said that Incognito made the comments after a running play but he could not recall whether Incognito used the N-word, though here are possibilities that he may have used other demeaning words.
Beane said that the team is still conducting its investigation and gathering information on the incident. He further confirmed that the NFL is also looking into the matter as well.
Incognito was not present during the Bills’ final open-locker room session of the year. However later, Dion Dawkins, another Buffalo offensive lineman defended his teammate and tweeted that he was next to Incognito the entire game and the entire season and did not hear him say anything.
Notably, this is not the first time that Incognito has been accused for making racial slurs. During a 2013 episode in the past, Incognito was accused of racism and was even suspended for bullying a teammate, Jonathan Martin while with the Dolphins.
