NFL Player Fined $10K for Watching Daughter Dance

A San Diego Chargers safety has been fined $10,000 for "conduct detrimental to the team" during the Dec. 20 game against Miami. What did he do that was so detrimental? Watched his daughter dance in the halftime show, USA Today reports, calling it "one of the more bizarre bridge-burning events of the 2015 NFL season." True, Eric Weddle did not ask permission to miss the team's halftime meeting in order to watch the show, but the game was "meaningless" and the Chargers led 23 to zip, writes Chris Chase for USA Today. More importantly, Weddle is "a consummate team player" who is about to be a free agent: "So, uh, probably not the time to start negotiations on a new contract then?"

At the San Diego Union-Tribune, Kevin Acee agrees with Chase. Weddle, a five-time All-Pro, "is a different kind of dude," sure, but he's also "the guy who makes plays and makes up for others missing plays and who so often plays when his body is telling him to not play," Acee writes. The Chargers didn't just fine him; they placed him on injured reserve (perhaps unnecessarily) and then announced the injured reserve players wouldn't be attending the last game of the season, in Denver. They did all of this publicly when they could have handled the incident quietly. The team's relationship with the nine-year veteran "was salvageable," Acee writes. "Now it is in ashes." (More San Diego Chargers stories.)