Last Friday, Colts defensive end Robert Mathis was suspended for the first four games of the regular season for violating the league’s performance-enhancing drug policy.
Mathis released a statement in the wake of the suspension saying that the suspension was triggered by his use of Clomid for fertility purposes, which led his agent to slam the NFL as “unjust and unfair” and the NFL to say that Mathis broke a “crystal clear” policy without going through the proper channels before testing positive. Mathis spoke to his teammates on Wednesday and made his first public comments after addressing the rest of the Colts.
“Sorry, and I’ll be back,” Mathis said, via the Indianapolis Star. “I shouldn’t have (done) it. My bad. There’s no question I’d like a re-do, but I can’t take it back.”
Mathis’ teammate Cory Redding said that he didn’t need to hear the apology from his teammate, but that hearing it left him with “no doubt what kind of man [Mathis] is” because he owned up to his mistake. That won’t make it any easier on the Colts defense to play without him for the first month of the season, but, based on the comments from Redding and other Colts players, at least he knows he’ll have the back of his teammates when he does return.