Pre-season Week 3 Fine Blotter

This'll be quick.  Only five for the week.

Point of Emphasis, both for helmet fouls:

• Buffalo:  Jalen Kilgore, $5,560
• New Orleans:  Danny Stutsman, $7,011

All the others:

• Indianapolis:  Cam Taylor-Britt, Striking, etc., $7,791
• Minnesota:  Jermar Jefferson, Face Mask, $5,583
• Pittsburgh:  Donelko Slaughter, Taunting, $4,917

Pre-season Week 2 Fine Blotter

Forgot to do this -- Week 3 should be out later today.  I doubt, again, that any incidents here will count as strikes on the new policy until regular-season Week 1.

Policy-level fines first:

Helmet fouls:

• Arizona:  Karson Sharar, $5,372, on the opening kickoff
• Dallas:  Malik Davis, $6,735
• Las Vegas:  Dre Ogunbawale, $7,222

Hip Drop Tackle:

• Cincinnati:  Shaka Heyward, $5,972

Defenseless Player:

• Arizona:  Dadion Taylor-Demerson, $7,148
• Arizona:  Wydett Williams, $4,935 (all three Arizona fines in the first half, only Taylor-Demerson's was flagged)

Blindside Block:

• Kansas City:  Jake Briningstool, $4,972

Outside the Points of Emphasis:

Conduct, all this week for Taunting:

• Buffalo:  Chase Lundt, $5,868
• Las Vegas:  Jermod McCoy, $6,729
• Tennessee:  Cedric Gray, $7,131

Striking, etc:

• Tampa Bay:  Ted Hurst, $6,985

Sounds like the big loser of the preseason week was facemasks:

• Indianapolis:  Trey Washington, $5,583
• New Orleans:  Treyton Welsh, $5,583
• Seattle:  Andre Fuller, $5,112
• Seattle:  Aaron Smith, $4,917 (the two Seattle fouls were three minutes apart in the fourth quarter, but to the NFL's credit, both of these were flagged)
• Tennessee:  Oluwafemi Oladejo gets the biggest fine of the week, $10,625.

Throw the Clippers out of the NBA

Said the same thing on the Kevin McHale situation in Minnesota a lot of years back, and I think that might pale to this.

The repeated salary-cap transgressions of the Clippers mean:

• Owner Steve Ballmer and President of Business Operations Gillian Zucker are banned from the league for at least one year.
• President of Basketball Operations Lawrence Frank for at least six months. 
• The team is fined $30,000,000
• And they lose their next five first-round picks.
• Leonard is fined $700,000.

Throw em out.  Go one team fewer, all non-involved players become immediate free agents.

The rest of the preseason NFL suspension blotter...

Source:  MSN.

Already covered:

• New Orleans:  Brock Rechsteiner, six games, PED policy.
• Atlanta:  James Pearce, eight games, personal conduct, attempted murder
• Buffalo:  Phidarian Mathis, three games, apparently an alcohol-related personal conduct offense from 2025.
• Washington:  Dorrance Armstrong, one game, personal conduct, assault charge in 2025.

Here are the rest that we know of:

• Tennessee:  Nazeeh Johnson, six games, PED policy -- according to his admission, sounds like it was a fertility drug banned by the league.
• Minnesota:  Jeshaun Jones, three games, PED policy, unknown.  Might be alcohol like Mathis, might be failure to cooperate several times with the program.
• Indianapolis:  Probably the highest profile one, Cam Taylor-Britt, one game, personal conduct, reckless driving arrest in 2025.

There is a 2026 Fine Blotter up for Week 1 of the preseason. And also the fine schedule for 2026-27.

Now, if I had to make a guess, since today was the day they announced the new policies, I don't think any fines from the preseason (or, at barest minimum, the first two weeks of the preseason) are going to count on this new policy.

Before we note of the fines for Week 1 of the preseason, here's the fine schedule:

A first offense of physical contact with an official will cost you not only the rest of the game, but a minimum of almost $42,000.  Double that for any subsequent offense.

Fighting will also carry the same penalties, including ejection ($42K and $84K)

They're upping Bench Involvement in an altercation significantly:  First one is a little more than $12K, the next one costs you $18K.

It looks like non-physical abuse of the officials has become a very serious problem, as they are upping the fines toward physical-abuse levels as well:  $33,523 for first offense, over $67,000 for anything further.

The player-safety list:

First, the five Points of Emphasis, all of which, once confirmed, carry a strike toward suspension after three, all carry first-offense fines of almost $18,000.  About $24,000 for a second offense, which carries a league meeting.  And a third is a one-game suspension, on top of the potential of any further suspension for the offenses themselves.

That's for Horse Collar, Hip Drop, Launching/Helmet, Blindside Block, or Defenseless Player fouls.

Striking and variants, low block, or chop block:  About $12,500 and $18,500.

Face mask or late hit without other aggravation:  About $12K and $18K

The rest (Leg Whip and Roughing the Passer):  About $18K and $24K

The straight conduct list (if I had to guess currently, this is probably the one-time full-rebate at the end of the season list):

Straight unsportsmanlike conduct costs you about $15K and $21K.

Taunting will get you the same fine as a Face Mask or Late Hit:  $12K and $18K

And a football into the stands costs you $8300 and $14300.

And here's the dress code stuff (probably also one-time full-rebate at the end of the season with no other offenses):

Any minor uniform violation (from visor tint to illegally-worn pads to foreign substances to the more standard ones of socks and the like you hear about):  $6K and $12K

Major violations (personal branding and illegal/unauthorized intellectual property):  Personal is $12K/$18K.  Intellectual property is $12K/$24K.

And one more section I see every year but I'm not sure it's ever called:  If a player ever flashes gang signals during a game, it is conduct detrimental to the league and goes to the Personal Conduct Policy directly for whatever penalties deemed appropriate.

----------------------

Now, Week 1 of the Preseason:

Striking and variants:

• Buffalo:  Landon Jackson, $8,190
• Cleveland:  Tytus Howard gets the full $12,537
• Las Vegas:  Tommy Eichenburg, $6,441

Conduct:

• Miami:  Ollie Gordon, $5,962, taunting

Facemasks:

• Detroit:  Thomas Harper, $5,972
• Tennessee:  Jerrick Reed, $6,361

And now what WOULD BE under the Points of Emphasis -- but with the policy announced today, I seriously doubt these will be treated as "strikes":

• LA Chargers:  Kendall Williamson, $5,972, impermissible use of the helmet
• LA Rams:  Darryl Peterson, $4,935, horse collar
• Tampa Bay: David Walker, $6,254, blindside block

Jokes aside, the NFL put out a far larger notice today.

And it is endemic to the Fine Blotters I used to post here.  We'll see if I get the time and want this year.

An OFFICIAL NFL Points of Emphasis For Supplemental Discipline has been released.

The NFL has put out the following five Player Safety Fouls for Point of Emphasis this year:

• Horse Collar
• Hip Drop
• Launching
• (Illegal) Hit on a Defenseless Player
• Blindside Block

The big news?  Any player who receives a Supplemental Discipline (and gets it to stand -- fine or suspension) for at least three of these fouls gets an automatic one-game suspension on top of any other suspension accrued.

I think I have a lengthy project ahead of me, if the NFL still has the data on its website from last year.

EDIT TO ADD:  Rats.  No, they took the 2025-26 ones down.

There is, of course, something the players get in exchange:

First, if a player commits only a single offense in certain other Supplemental Discipline categories, their fine will be returned, 100%.

If a player receives only a single offense in the Player Safety Fouls Point of Emphasis, their fine will be half-returned.

And all players, at least with respect to the Player Safety Fouls Point of Emphasis suspension, will start the 2026-27 season on a clean slate with respect to the current policy.  Not 100% sure whether that means long-time situations might get increased fines for a "first offense" of these fouls, but they will not already be counted against for THIS policy.

I will want to see if the league actually publishes the policy, as there are two other important parts:

1) Increased team fines for "excessive" Player Safety Points of Emphasis violations by a given team.  This is probably on top of the other team fines for excessive violations -- though those fines now are going to be more malleable, given possible rebates.

2) Any player receiving two violations under the Player Safety Points of Emphasis will require that the player and his coach submit to a meeting with the NFL.  No word on whether those meetings will be in-person or virtual.

The rampant sacrifice to football -- THEY ALL HAVE CTE!!! ALL OF THEM.

And the article in MSN from Amy Tennery deliberately obfuscates the situation.

878 former NFL players have died between the years of 2016 and 2021.

The article states at least one in four -- 215 of them -- had their brains tested and found CTE within them.

There's only one problem with the findings.

Not all of the brains were donated to science.

235 of them were.

That means almost 90% of the donated brains were found to have CTE -- an effective finding that every one of the brains donated had the disease.

That the basic finding should be that THEY ALL HAVE CTE.

EVERY LAST ONE OF THEM.

ALL OF THEM.

The findings also assert that the players are already beyond brain-damaged before they even hit the NFL -- that the players are fucked by youth football and high school football and college football too.

DraftKings being deceptive again...

A DraftKings ad came across my Twitch viewing of the ongoing Race To World First in World of Warcraft tonight.

San Francisco, San Jose, Sacramento, Riverside, etc. and so forth...

DraftKings Sports is in California, starting September 2nd.

It's the prediction-market workaround bullshit...

Discipline Blotter: I wonder if this means the end of joint practices...

The viral brawl in which the Steiner kid who's already suspended for PED's German suplexed a player has gotten both the Dallas Cowboys and New Orleans Saints $500,000 league fines for lack of sportsmanship.

Once again, I must remind you:  One of the things that the believers state with respect in their belief the NFL is not rigged is the fact that the league's largest cash-cow, the Cowboys, hasn't won a title or sniffed one in decades.

Again, a champion (not unlike some of the rigged music competition shows) represents the brand -- and it's as true for the NFL as it is for American Idol.

EDIT TO ADD 5:05 PM PDT:  Sounds like the Giants and Dolphins are probably next.  Big brawl today at a joint practice.

Sports To The Right, Part Four: Enemies of Baseball

(No, this was not originally scheduled.)

I hope you all have something to do next year, around the first of April and onward.

Because, after last night, there is now effectively zero chance (outside of an owner- or Trump-enforced season) that there will be any professional baseball of the regular stripe.

The fact that the Dodgers are getting two-time defending American League Cy Young award winner Tarik Skubal is bad enough.  What makes it even worse (and makes me wonder if the upcoming lockout is going to be just one season) is that they gave effectively nothing in return.

And that MLB is going to stand for this is indicative of some very ugly political realities...

MLB is MAGA.  There's a very real chance they've gotten through to the Dodger ownership and they're MAGA too -- and that now the brass of Major League Baseball is rigging a dynasty to kill the game as you knew it.

The Dodgers are now enemies of baseball.

So are Rob Manfred and the MLB leadership.

MAGA League Baseball wants to bleach itself, wherever possible.  MAGA League Baseball wants rid of LGBTQ support.  MAGA League Baseball wants there to be one elite team or a small group of elite teams -- which will create the same illusion of competition the NBA fails to purport.

And the Dodgers are now in full economic and political lockstep.

I do genuinely wonder how many people, last night and today, have finally given up on the National Pastime of Delusion.

You want to talk about common sense? Here you go...

Not a good week for the prediction markets.

Nevada has banned Kalshi and has put a bill on the docket to ban sports prediction markets entirely.  New York is suing Kalshi, because it believes that the prediction markets are using circumvention methods to allow sports gambling in manners and ages to which it is not allowed.

Well, DUH...

To my understanding, the prediction markets are, for example, legal to trade in in the state of California.  A state which rejected all sports gambling by 3-1 and 4-1 margins two years ago when the situation was placed on the ballot in various forms.

And guess which side Donald Trump is on...  Take a fucking guess -- in the face of over 20 such lawsuits now, Trump has come down on the side of the prediction markets.  Markets which have been seen as markedly conservative and large-scale crypto operations.

This is something which should be obvious to anyone with an IQ above that of kumquat.  The sports predictions markets are sports gambling.  Period, end, full fucking stop.  And many of them are done without the safeguards and controls that the states which do legalize it have -- and they also conduct themselves in states in which no such gambling is allowed in any stripe.

It is becoming obvious, with the passing days and weeks, that the expansion of sports gambling (or, many would say, any sports gambling at all) is/was a very bad idea.  The question is:  Can you unwind the situation without killing American sports (pro and college), and, if so, how?

I am still reminded of the fate of KGO in San Francisco.  After various incursions with the law, including it's most prominent host getting nailed for child porn (released in 2014, Bernie Ward is now a sex offender for life -- he apparently IS still alive), KGO was forced to pull the plug on it's news-talk format, and became, briefly, a competitor to all-news KCBS in San Francisco, just up the dial.

That didn't work out too well for them, and, a few months before the ballot initiatives on California sports gambling, KGO was converted to "The Spread", a sports-gambling based national radio station.

KGO no longer exists.  In fact, it has been completely flipped into it's conservative rival, KSFO, and the fascists now broadcast on KGO's former 810 AM.

Two related stories, both gambling:

USA Today:  DraftKings and FanDuel have already spent $72,000,000 on the midterm elections -- making gambling the third highest campaign contributor behind crypto and tech.

And, in the "no coincidences" file...

Fortune:  Gambling on sports (and this probably is only the legal handles, and does not include states which do allow Indian casinos to do sports-gambling (Wisconsin and Florida are two), nor the prediction markets which have muscled into sports-betting and can do so in states where sports-betting is illegal...) now is not only the largest entertainment method in the country at $166 billion, it outspends music, concerts, books, museums, and movies, by more than double -- combined!!  ($70 billion between the five, none above $20 billion)

Fuck off, Donald Trump (Day 3)

Dana White has said that tonight's christening of a probable execution chamber on the grounds of the White House should draw Super Bowl-level numbers.

No joke:  Here it is.

Donald Trump has said that the 80th birthday spectacular will be the most-viewed sporting event of all time.

During the World Cup.

Let that idiocy process.

So how much longer before college sports completely goes blammo with the legalized gambling?

Not this just-past year, but last year before it, Alabama State HAD won it's first NCAA Tournament game in men's basketball history.

That win will be revoked.

For $500 a person, apparently.

The FBI has contacted the NCAA and stated the 2024-25 team's top three scorers and a reserve were paid $2,000 to throw a game (result and spread) to Southern Mississippi.

How many more before we get the explosion, and we find out that national championships and the like were also thrown?

(Source:  ESPN)

Why we can't just stick to sprots, Part II...

The rest of the political-registration survey from earlier was found by our friends at Close Call Sports and they published the findings on their Discord.  They finally also allowed me to find the link to the article with all of the information.

None of what at least the charts they publicized should be of any degree of surprise... 

A side chart on the NFL first...

Among NFL players, defensive and skill-position players tend to lean the most Democratic, while special teams players are the most Republican. Quarterbacks fall somewhere in between the two. pic.twitter.com/QcioxpdKDR

— VoteHub (@VoteHub) January 20, 2026

Defense usually scales Democratic (by well over 30 points), offense and special teams Republican.

And don't fall for VoteHub's trying to sugar-coat it:  Quarterbacks skew Republican by about 13 points.

But the bigger lack of surprise is in the general findings:

• One of the things I really felt would start happening is the abolition of the NBA and WNBA, in the favor of MAGA League Baseball and the NHL.
• MLB is the most Republican-skewing of the major sports, with over 53% of those found registered Republican, only 7.8% Democrat. 
• And I don't believe your rant at all, Firefox Pocket or SB Nation or whoever it was:  The NHL has been actively trying to position itself as The Winter Sport under Trump.
• The NHL has the smallest Democratic registration of all the sports at less then 6%.  Republican?  Almost 44%.
• I don't believe for a second that US MAGA celebration with the FBI director was either against what you believe in or a bad thing for the league.  It probably came at Bettman's direction!
• The reason I think the NBA and WNBA are doomed if Trump ever gets around to being the President they REALLY voted for?  NBA:  42.9% Democrat, 10% Republican.
• WNBA:  2.3% Republican.  13 teams in the WNBA, assume 15 roster spots (as in the NBA) per team.  That would mean, if a representative sample were found, precisely FOUR Republican players in the WNBA.
• Democrat?  67.5%.  Or about a hundred and forty.

 

$uper Bowl $eahawks: MAGA thinks Nielsen is lying in a BIG WAY...

Well, I will say one thing for them, even though my first glance of this would be "This is what this nation has to deal with with MAGA.", it certainly does fall under the purview of this website.

That said, a YouTube video I was presented with this morning basically lays a charge which would not only end the Nielsen company for massive orchestrated fraud, it might finally break the national chokehold of the National Religion, because, if the Nielsen company did as this video charges, the Nielsen company would be exposed as being "on the take" with at least the NFL, if not far more companies.

Not only that, but the numbers would be utterly devastating, and many advertisers would be left asking a LOT of questions.

So here's the video:

Sure. They were lying about the game. 29% less viewership than last year. And more ditched af halftime. Nielsen fessed up and you can check the Samba or Luminate data. Look up Forbes. They concur with VR. https://t.co/c3SINCTHGW

— Istaphobos (@IstaPhobos) February 12, 2026

The level of MAGA victory alleged by this video, using Forbes, Samba, Luminate, or whatever other numbers you would have would be devastating.

Istaphobos did the work for me on the key number I was looking for, but the charge is basically that they overreported the game ratings by over a quarter.  At that point, almost 40% of the viewers left for Terrorist Point USA.  Istaphobos, in another post, actually claims the walkaway rate was over 50%.

But let's go with the 38% walkaway rate alleged, use the numbers at least from last year's game numbers, and show how devastating this charge is, and what could probably result:

Nielsen alleges 127.7 million watched last year's Super Bowl.

If this is the case, and Istaphobos' claims as to the success of the MAGA/Terrorist Point boycott are valid, this would mean that the number of people actually watching the Super Bowl itself would be (and this is if you believe last year's Nielsen number -- which you then CAN'T!) only 90.7M.

That's for starters, then we get to the main event.

If, from that number, you then have a 38% (and I'm using the conservative number, pardon the pun -- Istaphobos claims the walkaway was half, if not more) walkaway rate, then Bad Bunny, et. al. would have performed in front of only 56.2 million viewers.

So, (bolding for emphasis so that if someone doesn't want to read my supporting claptrap, he or she can at least get to the money numbers here) for comparison (and, again, this is using numbers from LIX which would then be almost-instantly discredited!):

Game:  Nielsen:  124.9 million  Samba/Luminate/Forbes alleged:  90.7 million.

That would be an overreport of 34.2 million viewers, or an overreport of 27.3% -- on the game.

Halftime:  Nielsen:  128.2 million  Samba/Luminate/Forbes alleged:  56.2 million viewers...

... a staggering overreport of SEVENTY-TWO MILLION VIEWERS, or 56.1%! 

I have already told Interphos that the person needs to be in contact with relevant lawyers.  The level of fraud being alleged here would kill Nielsen.  It would end the company. 

Every company who paid a reported $8-10 million for 30 seconds would be left scratching their heads -- including, almost certainly, companies who laid their entire corporate futures on the line for the 30 seconds (which we know has happened in past Super Bowls).

This might finally break the chokehold that The National Religion of Football would have on the nation, because it would expose a deliberate conspiracy between the NFL and relevant companies.

I have little doubt that the numbers could well be somewhat cooked -- but to this extent?  27% overreport on the game, 56% on the halftime? 

And the discrediting wouldn't end there.  It would raise an even bigger question:  How much does the NFL pay on a weekly basis to cook the books on the ratings it reports week to week? 

Someone needs to contact lawyers with this information.  NOW. 

$uper Bowl $eahawk$: MAGA thinks Nielsen is lying...

I've already seen this three times this morning from White Right influencers.

This should scare the NFL. pic.twitter.com/4qbiFX9BaA

— The American Girl (@TheAmericanGrl) February 11, 2026

It's a chart from a group called Samba, an alternate TV ratings situation to Nielsen, which is openly charging that Nielsen is blatantly lying about it's numbers for Super Bowl LX, especially as they relate to the Bad Bunny halftime show.

Remember that Nielsen has stated that viewership was going up into the halftime show and peaked during it.

Samba is charging a flagrant 10% drop in the number of people watching Bad Bunny vs. the previous part of the game.  If this is the case, it would mean that Nielsen is actually overcounting the halftime show by at least a factor of 15-20%.

They're saying 110M (at best! -- because I can't think they then believe the Super Bowl numbers are accurate either!) saw Bad Bunny. 

NBA Discipline Blotter: Monday brawl leads to one of the longer recent suspensions...

And the numbers came down today:

• Jalen Duren (DET) got two games for starting it. 
• Miles Bridges and Moussa Diabate (CHA) got four each for escalating it.
• But the big one was a repeat offender, Detroit's Isaiah Stewart, who, for coming off the bench to flare up the confrontation, put one of the Hornets in a headlock and repeatedly punch him, and his lengthy record, got seven games.

Duren is an Eastern Conference All-Star reserve.  As of right now, that has not been removed.  It should be.  Not only because of the nature of the event, but he started the damn thing too!

First off, I think all the suspensions are low.  This had multiple flare-ups and the very real possibility the game should've been terminated.

Second, here's Stewart, from Spotrac, in his six-year NBA career:

• November 22, 2021:  Two game suspension, escalating a fight.
• February 22, 2024:  Three games, starting a fight.
• January 31, 2025:  $50,000 fine for obscene gestures following an ejection.
• Also suspended a game, because he had committed his sixth flagrant foul in just 47 games that season.
• April 1, 2025:  Two more games for escalating another incident.
• February 11, 2026:  He now gets seven.

That should be at least TWENTY.

Enough with "The Show Must Go On". 

That's three high-level suspensions in basically a calendar year.  He leaves the bench to join the altercation.  Headlock.  Punches.  Police are involved in the altercation (which should've terminated the game immediately and for the night -- that's a general pet peeve of mine, that any time the cops get involved, that's it for the night). 

NFL and Politics: A Curious Fact came up today...

A survey came out of 24 states worth of NFL players.

752 voting registrations were looked at, about the equivalent of 14 NFL rosters, slightly less than half of the league.  The company doing the survey, VoteHub, probably couldn't gain access -- legally or otherwise -- to the others.

The team with the highest skew of each party may surprise you, both ways.

The Republican winner?  The San Francisco 49ers, making the team itself probably one of the least representative parts of their city.

The same can be said for the Democratic winner:  The Green Bay Packers, in a very Trump-loving part of Wisconsin with a very rural fanbase.

Overall, of at least the 752 they could find:  44% independent, 34% Democrat, 20% Republican.

One more thought:  Could this be one reason that two 49er players have been shot in their city in the last couple of years.  Asking for a friend. 

$uper Bowl $eahawk$: And the most important numbers of the day just came in...

The Ratings Report.

This is usually true every year, because the Super Bowl is, and largely by a multiplicative amount, the most-watched event of the television year.

More so this year with the Terrorist Point USA and MAGA screaming.

Well, the verdict came in late this afternoon.

And, per Sports Media Watch:

If there was a boycott, then MAGA and TPUSA can claim a fair, if not substantial, victory in the ratings numbers (that is, the percentage of all television sets viewing the given event).

Super Bowl LX, with a comparative game structure (basic non-competitive blowout throughout), lost 6% of that percentage of TV sets viewing.

LIX:  41.7

LX:  39.4

The share was also down 4 points -- 83% of all television sets turned on during the game were watching the game at LIX.  LX?  79%. 

It is the first non-COVID Super Bowl to fall below a 40 since 1990.  To give a comparison, once you go back from 1990, you'd have to go back to Super Bowl IV to get a rating that low.

That's the good news for TPUSA and MAGA.

There is some bad news however, and it comes in two flavors.

First, the viewer total for Super Bowl LX was 124.9 million, a decline of slightly over 2%.

LIX:  127.7M

LX:  124.9M

TPUSA/MAGA may still attempt to claim a victory here as well, but they might have a bit of a problem here more than above.  Two reasons:

First, the number still represents the second-highest Neilsen viewership in Super Bowl history (behind LIX).

And second is this little thing called Taylor Swift.  One COULD make the case the entire almost three million could've been the Swifties tuning out because their girl's fiancee was not in the game.

And then the main event:  The halftime show.

LIX claimed 133.5 million, a Super Bowl record.

LX did fall down about 4%, to 128.2 million.  Far below claims of 10, 20 million -- I heard one claim on their social media saying half the viewers of the game left before the show.

They can claim a victory here too, maybe.  But there's one problem:

Almost three million of that would've had to have been a full boycott of the game, leaving the real departure to the Charlie Kirk Satanist Memorial Event somewhere around 2 - 2 1/2 million.

So, verdict?

It might well be a victory for MAGA, but it will be very overstated on their part.