Cardinals three-time All-Pro receiver DeAndre Hopkins has been suspended without pay for six games for violating the NFL’s policy on performance-enhancing substances.
The league announced the suspension Monday.
It's a stunning blow for the Cardinals, who finished with an 11-6 record last season but faded down the stretch when Hopkins was out of the lineup because of injuries. Now they'll be without the 29-year-old for a big chunk of the upcoming season.
Hopkins played in 10 games last season, catching 42 passes for 572 yards and eight touchdowns. He missed much of the last half of the season — including the team’s playoff loss to the Rams — because of hamstring and knee injuries.
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The Cardinals added a receiver during last week’s NFL Draft, acquiring Marquise Brown from the Ravens for the No. 23 overall pick. Brown was a 1,000-yard receiver last season and college teammates with Arizona quarterback Kyler Murray when the two were at Oklahoma.
Hopkins’s suspension also likely means a bigger role for Brown, veteran A.J. Green and second-year standout Rondale Moore, along with tight end Zach Ertz.
Hopkins has been one of the league's most productive receivers during his nine-year career, which includes six 1,000-yard seasons. He played his first seven seasons with the Texans before being traded in 2020 to the Cardinals.
Hopkins is allowed to participate in the team's preseason games.
Flores’s lawyer calls arbitration process ‘unconscionable’
A lawyer for a Black NFL coach who sued the league alleging racist hiring practices told a judge arbitration is the wrong way to resolve the lawsuit in part because NFL commissioner Roger Goodell would be the arbitrator and that would be “unconscionable.”
Attorney Douglas Wigdor said the league was trying to force “behind closed doors” the claims of Brian Flores and two other Black coaches. None of the coaches was present for the Manhattan federal court hearing.
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It was the first hearing for a lawsuit Flores filed in February, when he claimed the league was “rife with racism” even as the NFL publicly condemns it.
Flores was fired in January as head coach by the Dolphins after leading the team to a 24-25 record over three years, with two straight winning seasons including the most recent, when a 9-8 record left them out of the playoffs. He has been hired since as an assistant coach for the Steelers.
His lawsuit was joined last month by two other coaches, Steve Wilks and Ray Horton.
There are six minority head coaches currently in the NFL, a league where the majority of the players are Black.