Rajon Rondo Got Fined For Trying To Trip Jae Crowder During Game Three

Whether he was just stretching or not, Rajon Rondo is paying the price for tripping Jae Crowder.

Rondo was fined $25,000 by the NBA on Sunday after the injured Chicago Bulls guard was caught on camera trying to trip Crowder on the bench during game three of their first round series on Friday.

Though an afterthought for much of the season—he even lost his spot in the starting rotation for a time—Rondo has become a focal point of the series. The former Boston Celtic shined against his former team before fracturing his thumb in game two. After that game, he said the Celtics “gave up” in the loss that put them down 2-0. That hand injury, thought, is what put him on the bench in the first place which put him on the bench in the first place.

This isn’t the first time Rondo has tried to trip a player on the bench. Last year while with Sacramento he tried to kick Deron Williams while on the bench with a mysterious back ailment. It seems every time Rondo is sidelined, his feet get a little happy. For his part, Rondo was coy about whether he was trying to trip Crowder in the first place.

“When you tear an ACL, your leg gets stiff every once and awhile. I stretch my leg out throughout the game,” he told the media after the game. “I guess he got so deep into our bench it looked like whatever may have happened.”

Clearly, the NBA thought this stretch was intentional. The best line of this entire controversy, though, comes from Gerald Green.

Snitches get stitches, and trippers get fines.