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Don Van Natta Jr.
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Don Van Natta Jr.
ESPN Senior Author
- Host and co-executive producer of the brand new ESPN collection, “Backstory”
- Member of three Pulitzer Prize-winning groups for nationwide, explanatory and public service journalism
- Writer of three books, together with New York Instances best-selling “First Off the Tee: Presidential Hackers, Duffers, and Cheaters from Taft to Bush”
- 24-year newspaper profession at The New York Instances and Miami Herald
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Tisha Thompson
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Tisha Thompson
ESPN
Tisha Thompson is an investigative reporter for ESPN primarily based in Washington, D.C. Her work seems on all platforms, each domestically and internationally.
A minimum of 100 gamers from roughly half of the NFL’s 32 groups face fines and doable suspension for allegedly promoting their allotted tickets to this yr’s Tremendous Bowl LIX above face worth in violation of league insurance policies, a number of sources advised ESPN.
Underneath an settlement between the league and the NFL Gamers Affiliation, gamers who violated the rule shall be fined 1½ occasions the face ticket worth and lose their allotted tickets to the following two Tremendous Bowls. If they’re enjoying within the recreation, the gamers can have the possibility to buy seats.
Those that decline the punishment might be suspended by commissioner Roger Goodell, league and union sources with direct information of the scenario stated.
The sources stated the variety of gamers concerned was “in extra of 100,” a few of whom have already accepted the fines to keep away from lacking video games. A league supply declined to determine the gamers and workers who had bought their Tremendous Bowl tickets or their golf equipment.
In accordance with an NFL memo despatched to all 32 groups and obtained by ESPN, an investigation revealed that group workers and gamers bought tickets to a “small variety of ‘bundlers’ who have been working with a ticket reseller.”
In accordance with media stories earlier than the February recreation in New Orleans between the Kansas City Chiefs and Philadelphia Eagles, ticket costs on secondary websites ranged from $2,588 to just about $3,500 for the most cost effective seats, with some tickets fetching over $10,000.
Gamers and workers who labored instantly with the bundlers or “in any other case had a larger position … will face elevated penalties,” the memo stated.
“Our preliminary investigation has decided that quite a lot of NFL gamers and coaches, employed by a number of NFL Golf equipment, bought Tremendous Bowl tickets for greater than the ticket’s face worth in violation of the coverage,” learn the memo from NFL chief compliance officer Sabrina Perel to the groups.
“This long-standing League Coverage, which is particularly included into the Collective Bargaining Settlement, prohibits League or Membership workers, together with gamers, from promoting NFL recreation tickets acquired from their employer for greater than the ticket’s face worth or for an quantity larger than the worker initially paid for the ticket, whichever is much less.”
Perel added that the league will improve obligatory coaching earlier than Tremendous Bowl LX for all league personnel to emphasise the foundations and “the broader precept that nobody ought to revenue personally from their NFL affiliation on the expense of our followers.”