The Ravens were fined $100,000 for their Lamar Jackson injury report snafu during Week 8.
The NFL found that the team violated the league’s injury report policy by listing the star quarterback as a “full participant” in last Friday’s practice despite taking reps with the scout team.
League officials found that the team violated the rule out of “negligence” and “not an attempt to gain a competitive advantage,” according to ESPN’s Adam Schefter.
Had Baltimore been found “intentional or competitive in nature” with the injury report mistake, the Ravens could have been facing a loss of draft picks, per Schefter.
“It is critical that the Baltimore Ravens always operate with integrity and in full accordance with NFL guidelines,” a statement from the Ravens, who reportedly fully complied with the league’s investigation, read. “We clearly made an error regarding player injury reporting and cooperated transparently with the league’s investigation. We accept the decision by the NFL that we violated the policy and have taken steps to ensure that we will be compliant moving forward.”
After missing the previous two games with a hamstring injury, Jackson appeared to be trending toward a return ahead of the Ravens’ clash with the Bears last Sunday when the team listed him as a full participant in their Friday practice.
The next day, Jackson’s practice status was retroactively downgraded from “full” to “limited” for the Friday workout and shockingly ruled out for Sunday’s game, which the Ravens ended up winning 30-16 with Tyler Huntley behind center.
The Ravens released a statement later on Saturday, stating that Jackson “was present and participated fully in [their] entire Friday practice,” but decided to make the designation change because he worked out with the backups.
“Upon further evaluation and after conferring with the league office, because Lamar didn’t take starter reps in practice, we updated our report to reflect his practice participation,” the statement read.
The league’s injury report policy states that “participation on the scout team” due to an injury “by a player whose normal repetitions would be with the starters” would require the team to list the player as “limited.”
Jackson returned after missing three games on Thursday night against the Dolphins in Miami, leading the Ravens to a 28-6 victory.
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