Jared Sullinger doesn’t want to get a reputation for being dirty, either with the league or with his fellow players.
Sullinger was quick to accept responsibility for his flagrant foul in Wednesday’s loss to the Los Angeles Clippers, when he came down hard with both arms around Clippers forward Blake Griffin‘s shoulders in the third quarter. The flagrant was Sullinger’s fifth such foul of the season, which means the next one will bring at least a one-game suspension.
“I told Blake that it was my bad if he thought I was a little rough,” Sullinger told Mark Murphy of the Boston Herald. “He said he understood.”
The second-year forward has committed three flagrant fouls in his last two games, although one of the flagrants he committed in Tuesday’s loss to the Nuggets was rescinded by the NBA. Still, Sullinger’s next flagrant-one foul will give him six flagrant points on the season, bringing a mandatory one-game suspension. If he commits a flagrant-two, the more serious infraction in the two-tiered flagrant foul system, he would be up to seven flagrant points and would be suspended two games.
