BOCA RATON, Fla.: The Browns expect to learn whether the NFL will reinstate former All-Pro wide receiver Josh Gordon any day now, but they don’t know exactly when the verdict will come.
On Feb. 25 at the NFL Scouting Combine, head of football operations Sashi Brown made it clear the team was willing to welcome Gordon back, but he didn’t seem as enthusiastic about the possibility Monday during the NFL owners meetings.
“If Josh comes back, great,” Brown said at the Boca Raton Resort and Club. “And if he doesn’t, we’re ready.”
News of Gordon filing his application for reinstatement broke Jan. 20. Commissioner Roger Goodell is supposed to render a decision within 60 days of receiving it, but the NFL leaves itself wiggle room.
“There is no requirement that a reinstatement decision be made in 60 days,” a league spokesman wrote in an email. “We endeavor to develop the necessary information to make a decision in that timeframe, but the actual decisions are made when appropriate.”
The league banished Gordon for the entire 2015 season because of recurring violations of its substance-abuse policy. To be reinstated, he must convince the league he remained abstinent from substances of abuse throughout the entire banishment.
Questions remain
At the combine, Brown said, “By all signs, he’s on a path to come back and be reinstated.”
Are those signs still pointing to reinstatement? Brown didn’t sound as sure Monday.
“I think everything that we knew at that point [during the combine], things were moving forward,” he said. “We don’t have a lot of communication back and forth. There’s no, you know, ‘This is how it’s going,’ or regular updates. From what we heard in terms of Josh being reinstated, as far as we know. We don’t have a lot of information on it.”
Perhaps Gordon attending UFC 196 two weeks ago in Las Vegas with former Browns quarterback and notorious partygoer Johnny Manziel has given Brown pause.
Brown said he wouldn’t comment on Gordon hanging out with Manziel because “until he’s reinstated nothing is definite.”
Gordon is only 24, and the Browns would control his contract for two more seasons if he were reinstated. He’d be scheduled to become a restricted free agent in March 2017 because he has dropped a grievance objecting to a one-game suspension he received from the Browns at the end of the 2014 season that would have affected his contract status had he won it.
With or without him
Still, the team is preparing to move on without Gordon in case it never gets him back.
“I always learned something a long time ago — you never worry about something you never had,” coach Hue Jackson said. “I’ve never had any contact with him, so I’m going to plan on what’s in our building now and go from there.”
Gordon’s cryptic posts on Twitter have led some to wonder whether he wants to resume his career elsewhere. The only communication the Browns are allowed to have with him is through their manager of player engagement, Ron Brewer.
“I’m not going to comment on Josh’s Twitter,” Brown said. “But Ron has been in touch with Josh. He’s working out in L.A. Beyond that, I’m not going to comment.”
Brown later added, “From everything I’ve heard, Josh is eager to get back and start playing.”
A reporter pressed Brown about whether Gordon wants to start playing with the Browns.
“Start playing, and you shouldn’t read anything into that one way or the other,” he answered. “We had some discussions with his representatives at the combine, so we would sit down with him and see where his head is and go from there. The first step, though, obviously is he’s got to be reinstated.”
Nate Ulrich can be reached at nulrich@thebeaconjournal.com. Read the Browns blog at www.ohio.com/browns. Follow him on Twitter at www.twitter.com/NateUlrichABJ and on Facebook www.facebook.com/abj.sports.