“Harrison, Matthews, Neal and Peppers be given until Thursday, August 25 to provide interviews”, an official league statement was sent to the players involved.
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Green Bay Packers linebackers Clay Matthews and Julius Peppers are two of the more prominent players implicated in the report, but their former teammate Mike Neal and vagabond Pittsburgh Steelers linebacker James Harrison are also two National Football League players who face a potential ban.
While the league continues to poke around the edges of this story with the NFL players who face a ban in this particular instance, the most interesting man accused of using HGH from this report remains Manning, who Al Jazeera said used the substance to recover from neck surgery prior to winning the Super Bowl with the Denver Broncos. Harrison has declined all comments, while Matthews has simply said he finds the accusations rather annoying. “If that’s the case, somebody can come out and say that James Harrison is a pedophile. (Are) they going to suspend me and put me in an investigation for being a pedophile just because somebody said it?” His suspension begins next month.
He extended the invitation again on Tuesday.
It would seem to be a simple act for Harrison to allow the interview, deny everything as he did in his affidavit, be done with it and get on with his 14th season. Come to my house.
Roger Goodell doesn’t like that.
Obviously, Steelers coach Mike Tomlin would like to have his top outside linebacker on the field but said the matter is out of his hands. “That’s between him and the PA and the league”. “I think everybody’s going to have an opinion on things”.
But Harrison paused when asked if he would agree to the NFL’s request if the Steelers advised him to go ahead and do it.
The Packers had an open locker room session before Thompson spoke, but neither Matthews nor Peppers were present.
Any potential suspension would hit the Packers the hardest since Matthew and Peppers both play for Green Bay. “I’m not saying that we wouldn’t miss ’em” if they are not able to play. Charlie Sly, an intern at the clinic was recorded on tape by an Al Jazeerra reporter working undercover as a track hurdler seeking drugs.
Retired quarterback Peyton Manning, the most prominent player fingered by Sly, was exonerated last month by the NFL, which said Manning and his wife, Ashley, cooperated fully with the league’s investigators.
Adolpho Birch, the NFL’s senior vice president of labor policy and league affairs, sent a memo to the NFL Players Association warning that suspensions will go into effect on August 26 if the players fail to cooperate, USA Today reported.
But here’s the thing: The league doesn’t have to show “credible evidence”. Birch also said the league determined that an assertion made in Neal’s affidavit was “demonstrably false”.
The Al Jazeera documentary named the four players as having received performance-enhancing drugs. After the interview, Commissioner Roger Goodell will make the determination on if and when each suspension should be lifted.
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“We can not accept your unilateral assertion that the cursory, untested statements you have submitted satisfy the players’ obligation”. As previously stated, we will make every effort to accommodate the NFLPA’s availability, within the outlined time period.
