Devon Witherspoon’s celebration of the Seattle Seahawks’ season-opening win over the New England Patriots came with a price.
The NFL fined Witherspoon $11,941 for taunting, according to the league’s Week 1 accountability report. The league lists the violation at the 0:26 mark of the fourth quarter — the same game-clock mark at which Josh Jobe intercepted Drake Maye in the end zone to seal Seattle’s 13-10 comeback victory.
The NFL did not provide additional detail about exactly what Witherspoon did, beyond classifying it as unsportsmanlike conduct for taunting.
Seattle made its biggest defensive play of the night with 26 seconds left, and Witherspoon’s reaction to that moment apparently cost him nearly $12,000.
Devon Witherspoon Fine Came on Seahawks’ Game-Sealing Sequence
Jobe’s interception ended a Patriots drive that had reached the Seattle 16-yard line with New England trailing by three.
Maye tried to find Mack Hollins in the end zone on third-and-5, but Jobe came down with the pass for a touchback. The Seahawks called it a “game-sealing” interception, and Jobe said afterward that Seattle’s defense had emphasized creating takeaways all week.
Witherspoon did not record one of Seattle’s three interceptions that night, but he rarely left the field.
He played 70 defensive snaps in Week 1, lining up 41 times in the slot, 16 times at outside cornerback, 12 times in the box and once on the defensive line, according to Pro Football Focus. Seattle also sent him after Maye nine times as a pass rusher.
That is increasingly the point of Witherspoon in Mike Macdonald’s defense. “Cornerback” covers the roster designation. Not much else.
Witherspoon Has Been Fined for Taunting Before
This also is not Witherspoon’s first bill from the league office.
He was fined $11,593 for taunting following Seattle’s Week 4 victory over the Arizona Cardinals last season. Spotrac lists four previous fines in his first three NFL seasons totaling $44,702, including that 2025 taunting penalty.
The latest fine is small relative to the contract Seattle gave him in August.
Witherspoon signed a four-year, $132 million extension after helping the Seahawks win Super Bowl LX, a deal that briefly made him the NFL’s highest-paid cornerback by average annual value.
The $11,941 deduction will not change his life. The timing is more memorable.
Seattle’s defense had just completed a second-half shutout, intercepted Maye three times and survived a drive that reached its own 16-yard line with the game hanging in the balance. Witherspoon apparently had something to say about it.
The NFL sent the invoice.
Witherspoon and the Seahawks now turn to a Week 2 road game against the Arizona Cardinals on September 20. Seattle enters that matchup 1-0 after a very expensive final 26 seconds for its star cornerback.
NFL Fines Seahawks Star Devon Witherspoon After Patriots Win