Goodell pursues personal foul ejections, rips Pro Bowl

SAN FRANCISCO -- Commissioner Roger Goodell said during his state of the NFL address Friday he’s pursuing a change to the in-game discipline policy with the competition committee.

Goodell said he’d like to see a policy instituted where two personal fouls in the same game would equal an automatic ejection of the player.

“That’s consistent with what we believe are the safety issues and the standards of sportsmanship,” Goodell said. “We should take that out of the hands of the officials at that point. They obviously will have to throw the flag but when they do we will look to see if we can reach an agreement on the conditions in which they would be ejected.”

The issue will be discussed further with the NFL Players’ Association later this month at the Combine and come to the forefront with the Competition Committee at the owners’ meetings in late March.

Bengals head coach Marvin Lewis is a member of the Competition Committee.

This comes on the heels of two Bengals-Steelers games that racked up more than $200K in fines and eventually landed Vontaze Burfict a three-game suspension by the NFL.

Antonio Brown: Burfict 'wanted to kill me,' never winked at Jones

Burfict in particular, the Bengals’ leader in unnecessary roughness penalties over the last years, has only had one game during his career in which he received multiple personal fouls in the same game. That came in Week 6 of the 2013 season at Buffalo.

The rule holds specific relevance for the Bengals who have finished in the top five of the NFL in total unnecessary roughness penalties each of the last three seasons. Burfict committed 33 percent of the Bengals 37 unnecessary roughness penalties over the last three seasons.

“We want to keep the focus on the game and the great play that is happening,” Goodell.

END OF THE PRO BOWL?: The Bengals saw seven players participate in the Pro Bowl last weekend and after comments from Goodell, the possibility exists they could be among the last to play in the game.

Goodell expressed disappointment in the competitive nature of the game and sounded like a man considering eliminating it altogether.

"I had raised this issue three or four years ago,” Goodell said. “We worked with a number of players to make changes in the game. They had a positive impact, at least in the short term. But I didn't see that this past week.”

The league disbanded the conference format two years ago, switching to a draft format. This past season's teams were led by Hall of Famers Michael Irvin and Jerry Rice. As the game wore on most offensive plays barely featured tackling or any defense resembling a normal game.

"I think our biggest standard has to be what we expect from the NFL and what our fans expect from the NFL,” Goodell said. “If it's not quality, it's not a real competition that we can be proud of, we have to do something different. That's my number one priority right now. I'm open to new ideas, I'm open to how we do it, but it's not the kind of game that I think we want to continue to have in its current format, based on what we saw last week.”

GOODELL BITS: Roger Goodell offered up a few more pieces of news during his annual press conference. The first was the NFL playing a game in Mexico next season. The Raiders will play the Texans in Mexico City on Nov. 21.

That marks the fourth game played outside the United States next season. The Bengals will act as host to Washington on Nov. 30 in London.

The number of games overseas could grow in the coming years, according to Goodell. All three of the games in the UK this year have already been sold out.