Despite what Vikings fans will tell you, Lions head coach Dan Campbell had nothing to do with the Saints' Bountygate scandal

It was an accident, plain and simple. In Week 16 of the 2023 season, Detroit Lions safety Kerby Joseph went for a completely legal tackle on Minnesota Vikings tight end and former teammate T.J. Hockenson. Unfortunatley, the hit wound up going a little lower than what was expected, and Joseph took Hockenson out at the knees and Hockenson tore his ACL.

Right after the game, Joseph took to social media and apologized and said he wasn't trying to hurt the former Lion. Hockenson said he had nothing against Joseph but was more concerned about the league allowing some of the lower tackles. Everyone was adults about this except Vikings fans. They went on a giant crusade to prove that the Lions are dirty, and then someone jumped on Wikipedia and noticed that Dan Campbell was in New Orleans in 2009, and a narrative began.

Dan Campbell was not a participant in the 2009 Saints Bountygate team

For those who are not familiar or just don't remember, Bountygate was a thing where the 2009 Saints defense paid each other bounties for injuring players. Like a player would get $1,000 for knocking another player out or $1,500 for getting a player carted off the field. The whole scandal was believed to have been started by then-Saints defensive coordinator Greg Williams. A bunch of punishments came down, including an indefinite suspension for Williams and a one-year suspension for then-Saints head coach Sean Payton.

Saints' offensive players and personnel received no punishments because they had nothing to do with it. Dan Campbell, who had signed with the Saints the previous February, suffered a career-ending knee injury in early August of that season and never actually played for the Saints. In fact, he was never in he building outside of those first couple of weeks of camp. He didn't even get a Super Bowl ring. He was part of the Saints team on essentially a technicality.

I highly doubt there was a huge team meeting on day one of camp where Payton instituted the bounty program in front of everyone, and Campbell heard it and then it stuck with him to the point where he brought it to Detroit. The more realistic scenario is that it was something happening in just the defensive room, where Campbell was never at because he's a tight end, and he was only there for like two weeks.

Ok, well then you might say something to the effect of "Bountygate wasn't just a one-year thing. They tracked this from 2009 to 2011." You'd be totally right about that. The problem with that is that Campbell was on the Dolphins coaching staff during that time. He didn't join the Saints coaching staff until 2016. Everyone who was involved with Bountygate wasn't even there anymore. So just stop it. It was an accident. Get over it.