The Dallas Cowboys will walk into State Farm Stadium on Saturday already answering for what happened hundreds of miles west in Oxnard. On Thursday, the NFL fined the Cowboys and the New Orleans Saints $500,000 apiece for unsportsmanlike behavior at their Tuesday joint practice, NFL.com and the Associated Press reported.
Owner Jerry Jones said Dallas will appeal and will also fine Cowboys players involved in the fights. The next public snaps arrive before that appeal is resolved: a preseason Week 2 game at the Arizona Cardinals.
What the league said
"The Dallas Cowboys and New Orleans Saints have each been fined $500,000 for the actions that took place at the joint practice between the teams earlier this week," the league said in a statement carried by NFL.com.
The Competition Committee has made sportsmanship — including at joint practices — a point of emphasis for several years, the NFL said, and clubs were reminded by a pre-camp memo of their duty to prevent behavior that could lead to injury.
AP reported that the league requested video of the Oxnard workout before announcing the penalties. Joint practices are not televised like games; the league reconstructed the session from club footage and attached a six-figure price to what it saw.
The flashpoints in Oxnard
AP's account of Tuesday's workout described punches in several skirmishes, a body slam by Saints tight end Brock Rechsteiner on Cowboys safety Jalen Thompson, a Cowboys helmet thrown by Saints center Erik McCoy, and an ejection for Cowboys linebacker Donovan Ezeiruaku — his second of camp, AP noted.
Cowboys coach Brian Schottenheimer and Saints coach Kellen Moore at one point discussed whether to end the session early, NFL.com reported. Schottenheimer called the workout "a little chippy" and said the team did not handle the discipline element well. Moore later described "non-football stuff" in the joint practice.
