Pete Carroll, Seattle Seahawks hit with $300k fine by NFL

The Seattle Seahawks have found themselves in some trouble a little more than a week before the 2014 NFL season is set to begin.

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The NFL fined Carroll and its reigning Super Bowl champions $300,000 because the team violated the “no-contact rules that govern NFL teams offseason practices,” according to ESPN’s Chris Mortensen. The Seahawks will also have to forfeit two 2015 minicamp practices due to their violation.

Additional details from Mort:

"Carroll’s fine was “at least” $100,000 and the Seahawks were docked “in excess of $200,000” while the team will lose at least two minicamp practices in 2015 because they had excessive contact between players during a June 16 practice, per sources.(…)The 2011 collective bargaining agreement bans physical contact between players during the offseason. A Seahawks spokesman declined immediate comment, as did a league spokesman."

There’s an argument to be made that the ban on physical contact should be removed, considering just how important that aspect of the game is to football. But rules are rules and Carroll and Co. broke them and deserve to be punished.

Also, as Mortensen notes, this is a second violation for them. So Seattle and Carroll obviously had to know they were in violation this time around.

"The Seahawks had been fined an undisclosed amount in 2012 by Goodell for a similar violation under Carroll’s supervision and lost their final two OTA practices, sources added."

But if the extra contact makes Seattle a better football team and helps them even slightly in their quest to repeat as champs, Carroll and the team likely won’t be that upset about the fine at the end of the day.

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