Bruce Arians accused Dolphins of cheating, and Dolphins had something to say about it

It’s understandable why Arizona Cardinals coach Bruce Arians is frustrated. His team, picked by some to win a Super Bowl this season, is 5-7-1.

His apparent frustration led to one strange comment Sunday. Arians said it was “kind of odd” that the rain mostly fell when the Cardinals had the ball against the Miami Dolphins on Sunday. We’ll chalk that up to a throwaway comment or a joke and not Arians accusing the Dolphins of controlling the weather.

But Arians did specifically accuse the Dolphins of cheating, or if that term is too harsh, some gamesmanship. Arians told SiriusXM NFL Radio the Dolphins shouted out the Cardinals’ snap count and that helped cause a missed extra point by Chandler Catanzaro early in the game. If the defense mimics an offense’s snap count it’s penalty if officials catch it.

Arians also told SiriusXM NFL Radio that the Cardinals are submitting that play to the league.

Arians is one of the few coaches in the NFL who doesn’t have a filter and will speak his mind about anything. But Dolphins special teams coordinator Darren Rizzi gave it right back, after saying he was “a little bit offended” because Arians was “kind of accusing us of cheating.” So he took some shots at the Cardinals to Adam Beasley of the Miami Herald.

“To be honest with you, I don’t know which of the three he was talking about, because [Catanzaro] missed three,” Rizzi told Beasley. “The very first one, they had three guys jump offsides, so the play really should have been shut down by the officials. Go back and watch the play — their long snapper, left guard and left tackle all moved and they really should have shut the play down, so I don’t know if that got their rhythm off.”

Then Rizzi got back to Arians’ comment about it raining more when the Cardinals had the ball.

“Other than me making it rain when they had the ball, there was nothing we did that was illegal,” Rizzi told the Herald.

Savage.

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Frank Schwab is the editor of Shutdown Corner on Yahoo Sports. Have a tip? Email him at shutdown.corner@yahoo.com or follow him on Twitter!
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