LAS VEGAS — Current NFL players who participated in the Pro Football Arm Wrestling Championship at a Las Vegas casino could be fined by the league.
More than 30 players were scheduled to compete at the weekend event held at the MGM Grand Hotel & Casino, according to a news release.
“We are looking into it, and we became aware of it as it was under way,” an NFL spokesman said Tuesday. “A long-standing policy prohibits any NFL personnel from promotional appearances at a casino.”
Any player who is in the league now would be in violation of that policy, which is laid out in a manual distributed to players and other employees before each season.
The policy prohibits “NFL personnel from engaging in any advertising or promotional activities that reasonably can be perceived as constituting affiliation with or endorsement of gambling or gambling-related activities.”
“We still haven’t confirmed which current players were on hand and that’s the concern,” McCarthy said.
The event came just a couple of weeks after owners gave the go-ahead, with a 31-1 vote, for the Raiders to move to Las Vegas from Oakland.
CARDINALS: The team is looking for a new naming-rights partner for its stadium.
The University of Phoenix wants to ends its 20-year sponsorship with about nine years remaining on the contract.
Apollo Education Group, the parent company for the University of Phoenix, has been hit with declining enrollment and regulatory scrutiny in recent years.
Ron Minegar, the Cardinals’ executive vice president and chief operating officer, said talks already are under way with a potential new naming rights partner.
JAGUARS: Jacksonville released veteran linebacker Dan Skuta.
Skuta, 30, has appeared in 112 games, 26 with the Jaguars. He signed a five-year contract worth $20.5 million in 2015 that included a little more than $8 million guaranteed.
He totaled 55 tackles in two seasons in Jacksonville. His role was marginalized after the drafting of linebacker Myles Jack last year. Skuta previously played for San Francisco (2013-14) and Cincinnati (2009-12).
He’s the latest in a growing list of defensive players Jacksonville has sent packing. The Jaguars released defensive linemen Jared Odrick, Sen’Derrick Marks and Roy Miller, and opted not to re-sign former first-round draft pick Tyson Alualu.
WASHINGTON: Linebacker Junior Galette was arrested and charged with disorderly conduct and failure to comply following a fight over the weekend in Biloxi, Mississippi.
A Biloxi Police Department spokesman said an officer saw the 29-year-old Galette strike another man during an altercation at a spring break event Friday night at MGM Park.
The spokesman said Galette was told to stop but fled on foot. The officer chased Galette, used a stun gun to subdue him and took him into custody.
The team said it’s aware of the incident and is gathering more information
JAGUARS-BENGALS: Jacksonville traded fourth-year defensive end Chris Smith to Cincinnati for a conditional pick in the 2018 draft.
A fifth-round selection in 2014, Smith was behind Yannick Ngakoue and Dante Fowler on the depth chart and unlikely to play much in the final year of his contract.
The Jaguars previously traded their 2018 seventh-rounder to Miami for left tackle Branden Albert, so this trade could help them regain a pick.
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