Dominic Raiola Reportedly Won't Be Fined for Comments After Loss to Patriots

As the Detroit Lions were taking a knee to close out their 34-9 loss to the New England Patriots in Week 12, center Dominic Raiola went low for a cut-block on New England defensive tackle Zach Moore and admitted in his postgame comments that the move was retaliatory in nature. On Wednesday the NFL announced he would not be fined for the play.

Continue for updates.

Wednesday, Nov. 26

Raiola Fined For Unnecessary Roughness on Separate Play

Jason La Canfora of CBS Sports and Michael Rothstein of ESPN.com report that while Dominic Raiola wasn't fined for his cut-block to end Sunday's game against the Patriots, he was fined for a separate play:

Monday, Nov. 24

Dominic Raiola Admits to Retaliatory Cut-Block vs. Patriots 

Now, the NFL is reviewing the incident, according to Dave Birkett of the Detroit Free Press:

Ian Rapoport of NFL.com is reporting that the review won't result in a fine for Raiola:

Lions head coach Jim Caldwell told reporters Monday that the team won't discipline Raiola, per Paula Pasche of The Oakland Press.

"He and I talked, we addressed the issue. What we talked about is a private matter, he knows how we like to do things around here,'' Caldwell said. "That’s the end of story.''

After the game, Raiola admitted to Birkett and Jeff Seidel of the Detroit Free Press that he went for the low block in response to the Patriots scoring a late touchdown rather than running the clock down at the end of the contest.

"I cut him," Raiola said. "We took a knee, so I cut the nose [tackle]. They went for six [a touchdown]. They went for a touchdown at two minutes. They could have took three knees and the game could have been over. It's football. He wants to keep playing football, let's play football. Not a big deal. It's football."

New England defensive tackle Vince Wilfork called Raiola's play "stupid," per the Detroit Free Press report, while Patriots coach Bill Belichick took a subtle dig at the center after the game, per Tom E. Curran of CSN New England:

While the block itself wasn't illegal, the fact that Raiola publicly said he did so in retaliation will likely be frowned upon by the league.