Tom Brady has leapt to the defense of Azeez Al-Shaair after arguing that Trevor Lawrence put himself in danger before he was wiped out by the Houston Texans linebacker.

Al-Shaair sparked fury on Sunday after flying into Lawrence with his elbow first when the Jacksonville Jaguars quarterback had already slid to the ground to give up the play.

Lawrence was left motionless on the floor while all hell broke loose on the field, with both teams involved in a bench-clearing melee as Jaguars players and staff lost their cool over the hit.

In the wake of his late tackle and the brawl that followed, Al-Shaair has been hit with a three-game suspension by the NFL, who criticized his ‘lack of sportsmanship and respect for the game of football’ in a strongly-worded statement when issuing his ban on Tuesday.

Yet according to Brady, the onus should not have been on the Texans defender to prioritize Lawrence’s safety after his late slide, instead claiming that the quarterback risked being hurt when he ran with the football.

‘The only aspect that I think is very challenging, and certainly for Trevor Lawrence, nobody wants to see anybody get hurt but it is also the reality of a very physical sport that we play,’ the seven-time Super Bowl winning quarterback said on The Herd with Colin Cowherd.

Tom Brady has leapt to the defense of Azeez Al-Shaair over his tackle on Trevor Lawrence

‘Defensive players have to be aggressive. That’s their nature. I was trying to be aggressive on offense, we tried to block aggressively, and at the same time the defense tries to tackle aggressively.

‘I don’t know, there’s an aspect to me that I think the quarterbacks need to take better care of themselves. I see Josh Allen run it a lot, I see Lamar Jackson run it a lot – and it’s a great skillset to have. A lot of times I wish I had that skillset.

‘At the same time, when you run you put yourself in a lot of danger. And when you do that I don’t think the onus of protecting an offensive quarterback who’s running should be on a defensive player. I don’t think that’s really fair to the defense.’

Brady also pointed to the timing of Lawrence’s slide before Al-Shaair came in with the tackle, suggesting quarterbacks should also be penalized for producing them too late in an effort to protect them going forward.

‘There’s more designed runs for quarterbacks ever now than in the history of the NFL,’ he added. ‘So are we really trying to protect quarterbacks? Because if you are trying to through the rules, then why are the offensive coordinators not protecting their quarterbacks by keeping them out of the pocket and not designing as many quarterback runs?

‘I think it’s gone to a point where everyone will label a certain player as a dirty player, I don’t like that one bit.

‘Maybe they [should] fine or penalize a quarterback for sliding late and say, “If we don’t want these hits to take place, we’ve got to penalize the offense and the defense rather than just penalize a defensive player for every single play that happens when there’s a hit on a quarterback.”‘

Brady argued that Lawrence put himself in danger before he was wiped out by Al-Shaair

Al-Shaair has received a three-game NFL suspension after his late tackle on the Jaguars star

Lawrence was carted off the field after suffering a concussion but is now ‘feeling a lot better’

Earlier on Tuesday, Texans general manager Nick Caserio dubbed the NFL ‘hypocritical’ and ’embarrᴀssing’ in a furious rant over Al-Shaair’s three-game suspension.

Caserio first argued that the league’s ᴀssessment of their player’s conduct ‘couldn’t be further from the truth’ and that ‘nobody has a lot of respect for that’.

‘The picture that’s been painted about Azeez, his intentions, who he is as a person… I mean quite frankly, it’s bulls***,’ he fumed. ‘And it’s unfair to the individual, it’s unfair to the organization.

‘Nobody embodies our program more than Azeez; what he’s about, what he’s been through… you all know his story. There’s not a more selfless individual who’s more about the team and earned the respect that represents everything we want this program to be about.

‘For the league to make some of the commentary that they made about lack of sportsmanship, lack of coachability, lack of paying attention to the rules… quite frankly it’s embarrᴀssing. They’re talking about a player that’s never been suspended and never been ejected.’

Texans general manager Nick Caserio dubbed the NFL ‘hypocritical’ for suspending Al-Shaair

He argued their ᴀssessment of the player’s conduct ‘couldn’t be further from the truth’

Caserio also accused the NFL of hypocrisy over its stance on player welfare.

‘If the league says they care about the wellbeing of their players, and I would say at a time like this Azeez is probably going through a lot of things, we can’t even provide support on a mulтιтude of levels,’ he continued.

‘So it’s a little bit hypocritical to say, “We want to support the players, but do you know what, the organization can’t have contact with him for four weeks.”

‘Ok, so what do you want [him] to do, just go and float by himself?’