All professional sports leagues want their fans to enjoy watching their favorite team and supporting their favorite players. The NFL is the most popular sport in the United States, and it gathers family and friends like no other game in the country
However, in sports just like life, there are bound to be a few bad apples who drag down a league’s reputation. Often, players who cross this line by too much, or too many times, are banned from the league, even the NFL.
An off-field issue that dies down after a couple of weeks or a one-week suspension because of an on-the-field melee are one thing, but some actions have much more profound consequences. These instances are not given any sort of leeway.
We have very recent examples of this with Indianapolis Colts players Isaiah Rodgers and Rashod Berry, as well as free-agent Demetrius Taylor, being suspended indefinitely through at least the 2023 season for gambling on NFL games in 2022. It’s plausible that these season-long suspensions ultimately turn into lifetime bans like some players in the past, but more likely they’ll at least get one more shot at this conclusion of the 2023 campaign. Not everybody is that lucky, though.
Now, let’s look at the seven NFL players permanently banned from the league as well as a couple honorable mentions who had their bans lifted but still never returned to the game.
The NFL banned Ray Rice indefinitely after a video surfaced in the 2014 offseason showing him assaulting his girlfriend. Rice was indicted for aggravated assault and the Baltimore Ravens released the star running back. While Ray Rice technically won reinstatement after being banned, no team signed him after he was reinstated, so the ban still ended his NFL career.
