Jon Gruden, Raiders Reportedly Issued Fine & Loss Of Draft Pick For Repeated COVID Protocol Violations
Jon Gruden
Paul Rutherford-USA TODAY Sports

The 2020 NFL season has certainly been a unique one due to the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic, forcing teams to go through daily protocols to be able to play.

The Las Vegas Raiders are one of the teams that have struggled to follow the COVID protocols the most as they have been fined for multiple incidents.

Early in the season, head coach Jon Gruden and the organization were both fined for him not wearing a mask on the sidelines during a game. The team was also then fined for allowing an unauthorized media member into their locker room.

Perhaps the biggest incident of them all was when Derek Carr and a handful of other players were fined for not wearing masks at Darren Waller’s charity event.

Despite all of those lapses though, the team had not had a positive test until late October when Trent Brown and Damon Arnette both were placed on the Reserve/COVID-19 list. Because Brown was not wearing his league-authorized tracking device, the entire starting offensive line and a few other players were forced to miss a full week of practice.

Because the Raiders have broken so many protocols, the league came down hard on them with another fine as well as a loss of a draft pick, via Adam Schefter of ESPN:

The number of COVID cases across the league have been increasing weekly, so it is clear that the NFL is not going to tolerate teams not following proper protocols.

Gruden recently said that the Raiders are on the cutting edge of beating the coronavirus, although the league obviously feels differently with these latest punishments.

Brown was actually just placed back on the Reserve/COVID-19 list due to complications with the virus, so hopefully he is ok and back on the field soon.