Why NFL removed Josh Gordon from Seahawks roster 1 day after he went on it, what’s next
Josh Gordon is back where he’s been for the last 12 months.
In limbo.
The Seahawks are hoping he’s not back to where he’s been eight times before.
Out of nowhere, the NFL’s official transactions for Tuesday listed the former All-Pro wide receiver as back on commissioner Roger Goodell’s exempt list, off of Seattle’s active roster.
The Seahawks do not know exactly why the NFL put Gordon back to exempt status and off their roster a day after he went on it. The team was only told by the league Tuesday that Gordon could not practice or play this week because he had failed to meet all the NFL’s terms of his conditional reinstatement.
A league source confirmed to The News Tribune Tuesday night Gordon is back to being prohibited from practicing with or playing for the team. For now, it appears he will not play in the Seahawks’ attempt to win the NFC West title Sunday against the Los Angeles Rams.
Seattle had just reinstated him from the commissioner’s exempt list to the 53-man roster on Monday. That was per terms of Goodell’s reinstatement of Gordon from his seventh league suspension for drugs.
Tuesday, the NFL said Gordon did not fulfill every one of those terms, after all. He reverts to the status he had from Dec. 11 through Sunday. He is able to attend team meetings, but he cannot practice or play.
That status is unlikely to change until at least next week, before Seattle’s regular-season finale on the road against San Francisco. It’s the Seahawks’ last game before they begin postseason play. It’s unlikely the league would reinstate Gordon for the second time in a matter of days, for whatever new reason, in time for him to play against the Rams this weekend.
Then again, almost everything about this reinstatement has been unlikely.
Report of ‘a setback’
Coach Pete Carroll had said Monday he expected Gordon to contribute right away for the offense in Sunday’s game. He was to practice for the first time since his latest suspension in December 2019 for violations of league policies on substances of abuse and performance-enhancing drugs.
Carroll was asked Monday if he has any expectations for Gordon against the Rams, days after he begins his second go-round with the Seahawks following a year away.
The coach chuckled.
“Yeah!” Carroll said, “as a matter of fact I do.
“We are planning the week like he has a chance to contribute. So, we’ll see. We’ll hold out good hope and thought, and see where he fits.”
The News Tribune could not confirm Tuesday night a report Tom Pelissero of NFL Network posted on Twitter hours earlier, that Gordon “had a setback in his battle with substance abuse and now won’t be allowed to practice or play indefinitely, per sources.”
It’s unclear why the league would only put Gordon back on exempt status and not suspend him again if he indeed “had a setback in his battle with substance abuse” that was a relapse. One possibility would be if Gordon is appealing a latest positive drug test, but that is speculation.
Conditions of his reinstatement remain confidential to the team, as are details of the league’s confidential drug-treatment program for every suspended player for reasons of patient privacy. Those conditions could include continued, required testing x number of times per week or month, reporting to assigned counseling and outreach sessions or any other term, administrative and otherwise, agreed to between Gordon and the league as part of his reinstatement process.
Asked for some clarity as to how to characterize why Gordon is back off the Seahawks roster and on the NFL exempt list, a league spokesman reiterated to The News Tribune Wednesday morning: “He did not satisfy all requirements of the conditional reinstatement.”
One can only hope this is a relatively administrative issue, for the sake of the 29-year-old father of two kindergarten-aged children.
Gordon is an ultra-talented player who’s said he began abusing substances when he was in middle school.
Long road
This isn’t a story about football as much as it is about addiction.
It’s about Gordon trying, and re-trying, to finally restart his life for the better. For the best.
It’s about that man believing he has finally in Seattle has found a place to help him.
“I think, optimistically, that’s anybody’s goal, any player’s goal, to try to find a place you can call home — in all aspects,” Gordon said in December 2019.
“The culture’s just different. I think it’s something that felt more like a fit, I guess, to me. It’s pretty natural. It’s pretty smooth.
“It’s just my pace, I guess.”
He’s battled substance abuse that he told GQ in 2017 he began with Xanax, codeine and marijuana—while he was in seventh grade. He told GQ he played almost all his games while under the influence of drugs or alcohol when he was in college at Baylor, and in the NFL through multiple chances in Cleveland.
Gordon’s reinstatement was also about a 69-year-old coach who seeking people needing second chances. In Gordon’s case, a ninth chance.
Carroll believes his program can be the support system Gordon’s life needs. Help that so far, for most of Gordon’s 29 years, has eluded him.
The Seahawks first signed Gordon in November 2019 after the New England Patriots had waived him. He played six games for them last season before the league suspended him again.
Carroll, quarterback Russell Wilson and other players said they stayed in contact with Gordon to check on his well-being and encourage him. Gordon remained in the Seattle-area during his suspension, posting pictures on his social-media accounts periodically last offseason of him training and catching passes at fields in Bellevue and elsewhere in King County.
The Seahawks signed him again in September, with the belief Goodell would soon reinstatement. The commissioner did—three months later, on Dec. 5.
The conditions of that reinstatement included Gordon completing a six-day entry protocol for COVID-19 testing to get into the team facility, more than a week of conditioning work away from the team practicing and playing, attending team and position meetings during that time, and then a Dec. 21 date in which he could fully re-join the team and begin practicing with it.
Wednesday was to be his first practice.
Now, he’s back where he’s been for most of his NFL career, most of football life: in doubt.
“Hopefully he does it this time the right way,” Wilson said Dec. 9. “And it’s challenging. There’s real things in the world, and there is real challenges in life.
“He’s an amazing receiver. A guy who was great for us last year, made some great plays...But I think more than anything else, (his reinstatement) is a testament, hopefully, to his growth in life.
“You always want to see people overcome. ...I’m rooting for him to overcome. Hopefully this time is better than the last time.
“That’s the reality you pray for.”
This story was originally published December 23, 2020 at 12:04 AM.
