NFL Defers 'StarCaps' Suspensions

Saints, Vikings Linemen Allowed to Play While Case Is Pending

The NFL has announced that it will not enforce its four-game suspensions of New Orleans Saints defensive ends Charles Grant and Will Smith "at the present time."

Grant and Smith were among the players who were to be suspended for testing positive last year for a banned diuretic contained in a weight loss product called StarCaps.

But two other players with possible suspensions pending, Minnesota Vikings defensive ends Pat Williams and Kevin Williams, took legal action that has resulted in their suspensions being put on hold, and the NFL decided not to suspend the two Saints players while the two Vikings players are permitted to play.

"This situation presents several unique and narrow aspects that I believe call for us to put the good of the game ahead of questions of discipline," NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell said in a written statement released by the league. "Considerations of fairness, uniform application of our policies, and competitive integrity all support deferring the suspensions at this time. I am not prepared to treat players differently when the same conduct is involved."

Goodell faulted the NFL Players Association in his statement for failing to support the league's position that the two sides' collectively bargained steroid-testing program should take precedence in the case.

The Players Association issued a written statement that said, "We respect the commissioner's decision to be in the best interest of the game and our players, but we will never be silent when our players are mistreated by a system that operates unfairly."

The case involving the two Vikings players has played out in federal and state courts. A federal appeals court most recently upheld a previous decision by a federal judge that sent two issues involving Minnesota workplace laws back to a state court. The state court has indicated that it's unlikely to conduct a trial during the current NFL season, meaning that the two Vikings defensive are to remain eligible to play all season.

"Our primary goal is to maintain the effectiveness and integrity of our program, which has repeatedly been recognized as among the finest in all of sports," Goodell said. "An important part of that program has been a tradition of fairness for players and clubs, with all players knowing they are held to a common standard."

The players tested positive for the diuretic bumetanide, which is on the league's list of banned substances as a possible masking agent for steroids.

The players said they ingested the diuretic unknowingly by using the weight loss product StarCaps. They charged that representatives of the NFL's steroid-testing program had known that StarCaps contained bumetanide and had failed to properly warn players. The league contended that it had fulfilled its notification obligations under its testing program and that the players were responsible for what was in their bodies, even unknowingly.