The National Football League (NFL) has suspended five players for violating its gambling policy, which prohibits any form of gambling in league facilities or venues. The players involved are Quintez Cephus and C.J. Moore of the Detroit Lions, Shaka Toney of the Washington Commanders, Stanley Berryhill, and Jameson Williams. The NFL's review found no evidence that the players used inside information or that any games were compromised as a result of their gambling. Three of the players, Cephus, Moore, and Toney, will be suspended indefinitely until the end of the 2023 season, while the other two will miss the first six regular season games. The players can petition for reinstatement at the end of the season.
The NFL's crackdown on gambling comes as 33 states, including Michigan, and Washington, D.C., have launched legal betting markets since a 2018 U.S. Supreme Court case paved the way for states to offer legal sports wagering. Recently, the NFL, NBA, NHL, MLB, WNBA, NASCAR, and MLS, along with media companies NBCUniversal and Fox, formed a coalition to regulate sports-betting advertising.
The Detroit Lions have released Cephus and Moore following the suspensions. The team had been aware of the NFL's investigation for about a month. The Commanders said they were cooperative with the NFL's investigation and support the league's findings and actions. Toney's suspension is the latest hit for the Commanders, who settled a $625,000 lawsuit last week for failing to return fans' ticket deposits. The organization had promised to return the deposits for premium seating but instead kept the money and spent it, according to the former D.C. Attorney General Karl Racine, who sued the team last year. The Commanders said they haven't collected security deposits in more than a decade and have been working to return any remaining deposits since 2014.