NFL

NFL suspends Saints coach for season over bounties

The NFL suspended New Orleans Saints head coach Sean Payton for the 2012 season Wednesday and fined the team $500,000 as punishment for operating a bounty program in which defensive players received cash bonuses for injuring opponents.

In the most severe set of penalties ever leveled by the NFL against one of its teams, Saints general manager Mickey Loomis also received an eight-game suspension, while former Saints defensive coordinator Gregg Williams, who is now with the Rams, will be suspended indefinitely.

The Saints will also be forced to surrender a second round draft pick in 2012 and 2013.

“A combination of elements made this matter particularly unusual and egregious,” commissioner Roger Goodell said in a statement.

“When there is targeting of players for injury and cash rewards over a three-year period, the involvement of the coaching staff, and three years of denials and willful disrespect of the rules, a strong and lasting message must be sent that such conduct is totally unacceptable and has no place in the game.“

Saints assistant head coach Joe Vitt was also hit with a six-game ban for his participation in the program.

Payton’s suspension without pay will begin April 1, while Williams’ ban goes into effect immediately. The 48-year-old Payton, who has coached the Saints since 2006 and guided the team to victory in Super Bowl XLIV, was set to make about $7 million next season.

Quarterback Drew Brees, who has become one of the NFL’s most prolific passers under Payton’s tutelage, was shocked by the news.

“I am speechless,” Brees wrote on Twitter. “Sean Payton is a great man, coach, and mentor. The best there is. I need to hear an explanation for this punishment.“

The coaches can choose to appeal the suspensions, but it is unclear whether any will do so.

The NFL announced March 2 that an investigation had uncovered the existence of the bounty payments, which are explicitly banned under league rules.

The NFL said Williams offered the bounties from 2009 to 2011, including a $1,500 cash bonus for hits that knocked opposing players out of the game.

The league said Payton knew about the existence of the bounty program and failed to stop it despite the NFL making inquiries about the matter.

Instead of stopping the program, the NFL said Payton told his assistant coaches to “make sure our ducks are in a row” and falsely deny the bounties were being offered.

In an interview with the NFL Network, Goodell explained that the Saints’ attempt to cover up the bounty payments were an even worse offense than setting up the system in the first place.

“Clearly, we were lied to,” Goodell said. “We investigated this back in 2010, we were told it was not happening, it continued for another two years until we got credible evidence late in the 2011 season and we were able to identify significant information that verified from multiple sources that this was going on for a three-year period.“

Goodell said he does not think the penalties are too harsh, adding that the continued risk to players called for a “very significant and clear message.“

The league said it found bounties were placed specifically on quarterbacks Brett Favre, Kurt Warner, Aaron Rodgers and Cam Newton in the past few years.

Saints linebacker Jonathan Vilma is accused of offering $10,000 to the teammate that could knock Favre out of the NFC Championship Game against the Vikings in 2010.

Goodell said punishment against individual players for participating in the bounty program is still being reviewed with the NFL Players Association and will be addressed at a later date.

The sanctions against the Saints surpass the penalties leveled by the NFL against the New England Patriots and head coach Bill Belichick for the 2007 “Spygate” scandal.

Belichick was fined $500,000 for videotaping the signals of Jets coaches, while the team was docked a 2008 first-round draft pick and fined an additional $250,000. No members of the organization received a suspension.