Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/23pdf/23-5572_l6hn.pdf
Page Number: 23

Cite as:  603 U. S. ____ (2024) 

3 

JACKSON, J., concurring 

attack, assault, or harm any player,’ ” should not be inter-
preted as being directed at hurt feelings, because the listed
“prohibited actions all concern dangerous physical conduct
that might inflict bodily harm; trash talk is simply not of 
that kind.”  Ante, at 6.  I agree.  I would add that it is like-
wise clear from the listed prohibited acts that such a rule is 
also not addressing far more serious and unexpected con-
duct than the kinds of acts that the preceding examples de-
scribe, which can result in serious and foreseeable physical
injuries during a rough-and-tumble football game.  By con-
trast, if a player were to shoot or poison another player, the
rule’s  drafters  would  expect  the  police  to  be  called,  not  a 
referee.  Thus, we conclude that the rule is best understood 
to be inapposite with respect to conduct at both extremes of 
the universe of harmful acts in which a player might con-
ceivably engage.

We recognize this intuitive fact—that there is a certain
category  of  conduct  the  rule  is  designed  to  prohibit—be-
cause  we  recognize,  albeit  implicitly,  that  the  drafters  of
this rule have included these particular examples for a rea-
son.  We understand that, given the preceding list of exam-
ples, this rule was adopted with a clear intent concerning
its scope.  So, though a broad conception of “harm” is “liter-
ally covered by the language” of the rule, ibid., we appreci-
ate that the rule’s drafters did not intend for that term to 
take on its most expansive meaning.  Instead, the examples 
help illuminate what the drafters actually intended the rule 
to cover.  From the preceding list, we can confidently dis-
cern that the drafters meant to proscribe only conduct that
risks  injuries  with  severity  akin  to  facemask  pulling,  not
trash talk or murder.1 

—————— 

1 The majority invokes the canons of noscitur a sociis and ejusdem gen-
eris to support this inference.  See ante, at 5.  Those canons are useful 
interpretive tools, but in my view, they are ultimately only devices used 
in furtherance of achieving our goal of determining “the intent of Con-
gress.”  United States v. American Trucking Assns., Inc., 310 U. S. 534,