Jeffery Simmons ejected from Titans practice after punch

Training camp scuffles are usually background noise — pads pop, somebody shoves somebody, coaches blow the whistle and everyone moves on. This one didn't. Jeffery Simmons threw a punch early in a Titans team drill Tuesday morning and was pulled from the rest of practice, sent off to a side field to work alone with a strength coach while everyone else kept going.

Adam Schefter broke the news, and SleeperNFL followed with the line that actually explains why this wasn't just a shrug-it-off moment. Robert Saleh's policy is blunt: throw a punch and you're gone, whether it's a game or a Tuesday in shorts and helmets. No warning, no verbal, straight to the sideline.

That's a notable stance for a first-year head coach to enforce on his best defensive player in the middle of camp. Simmons isn't just a rotational piece getting a gut check — he's coming off a first-team All-Pro season in 2025, when he racked up a career-high 11 sacks and broke the franchise's Titans-era single-season sack record for a defensive tackle, previously held by Jurrell Casey. He's also the richest player at his position in the league, having signed a 3-year, $105.8 million extension with $100 million guaranteed that runs through the 2030 season.

None of that buys him a pass under Saleh's rule, and that's kind of the point. A zero-tolerance policy only means something when it applies to the guy making $35.3 million a year, not just the roster fringe fighting for a job. Getting yanked mid-drill in front of the entire team, even briefly, is as much a message to the locker room as it is a consequence for Simmons.

Camp fights happen every August across the league and rarely carry over. The bigger storyline here isn't the punch itself — it's whether Saleh's willingness to bench his own All-Pro for a rules violation sets the tone for how this team is run heading into a season with real expectations built around Simmons anchoring that defensive line.