The NFL put Packers running back Josh Jacobs on paid administrative leave Sunday via placement on the commissioner’s exempt list, rendering him ineligible to play while he faces misdemeanor charges related to alleged domestic abuse.
The league’s decision came as NFL teams faced a 6 p.m. ET deadline Sunday to reduce their rosters to 53 players for the season. On Saturday, the NFL said it would place Seahawks cornerback Terrion Arnold on the exempt list once his contract was filed with the league office.
Jacobs faces misdemeanor charges of battery and criminal damage to property. The Brown County (Wis.) District Attorney’s Office announced the charges Thursday after Jacobs was arrested in May on initial charges related to domestic abuse, including felony strangulation and suffocation.
“Josh Jacobs has been placed on the Commissioner’s Exempt List, which is an administrative procedure used by the NFL while a matter is being reviewed,” Jacobs’s attorneys David Z. Chesnoff, Richard A. Schonfeld, and Clarence F. Duchac III said in a written statement Sunday provided to Front Office Sports. “It is not a final determination. Josh respects the NFL process, the Packers, and his Coaches and Teammates. He looks forward to his return to the team and the NFL.”
He will be paid his salary while on the exempt list but cannot practice with the Packers or attend games. The NFL’s personal conduct policy for players says that “upon request and with the club’s permission,” a player on the exempt list “may be present at the club’s facility on a reasonable basis for meetings, individual workouts, therapy and rehabilitation, and other permitted non-football activities.”
Jacobs and the NFL Players Association have three days after Jacobs is formally notified of his placement on the list to appeal the league’s decision. The conduct policy says that a player’s paid leave will “generally last” until a disciplinary ruling is made on a prospective fine or unpaid suspension. That usually comes after the player’s criminal case is completed. Any games that a player misses while on paid leave are ultimately credited toward a possible unpaid suspension, with the player returning pay for the appropriate number of games.
The conduct policy says that paid leave may be used when a player is charged with a felony or violent crime, when an investigation leads the commissioner to believe the policy may have been violated in that manner, or when a violent crime has been alleged but further investigation is required.
Jacobs is entering the third season of a four-year, $48 million contract with the Packers. He is a three-time Pro Bowl selection over seven NFL seasons with the Raiders and Packers and ran for 929 yards and 13 touchdowns last season. The Packers traded for a running back, the Steelers’ Kaleb Johnson, earlier Sunday.
The Seahawks signed Arnold on Saturday after previously agreeing to contract terms with him and after he’d been released by the Lions. Arnold was arrested in Tampa and faces felony charges related to a kidnapping and robbery in February. He has denied the allegations through his representatives.
