The NFL fined the Atlanta Falcons and their defensive coordinator, Jeff Ulbrich, a total of $350,000 for their roles in allowing Ulbrich’s son to access the draft contact phone number of quarterback Shedeur Sanders for a prank call.
The league fined the Falcons $250,000 and Ulbrich $100,000 for their failure to prevent the disclosure of confidential information distributed to the team in advance of last week’s draft.
The team said it accepted the penalties.
“We appreciate the NFL’s swift and thorough review of last week’s data exposure and the event that transpired due to it,” the Falcons said in a written statement. “We were proactive in addressing the situation internally and cooperated fully with the league throughout the process, and accept the discipline levied to Coach Jeff Ulbrich and the organization. We are confident in our security policies and practices and will continue to emphasize adherence to them with our staff whether on or off premises. Additionally, the Ulbrich family is working with the organization to participate in community service initiatives in relation to last week’s matter.”
The NFL continues to look into prank calls made to other players during the draft but those calls were unrelated to the prank call made to Sanders in which Ulbrich’s son was involved, a person familiar with the deliberations said Wednesday. The NFL believes that about six to seven prank calls were made during the draft to players including Penn State tight end Tyler Warren and Syracuse quarterback Kyle McCord. Warren was chosen by the Indianapolis Colts with the 14th overall pick Thursday night. McCord was selected by the Philadelphia Eagles in the sixth round Saturday.
The draft contact numbers of about 40 players, including those on hand at the draft venue in Green Bay, Wisconsin, and those who were participating virtually like Sanders, were distributed to teams’ general managers, head coaches and personnel directors in memos marked confidential, according to the person with knowledge of the matter, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because the process is not public. It was at the discretion of the teams whether the phone numbers would be shared beyond GMs, head coaches and personnel directors. Thus, the Falcons were held responsible for Sanders’s number being shared with an assistant coach such as Ulbrich and then being improperly accessed.
The Falcons said Sunday that Jax Ulbrich, the 21-year-old son of Jeff Ulbrich, accessed Sanders’s contact number for the draft “off an open iPad” while visiting home and “wrote the number down to later conduct a prank call.”
Jeff Ulbrich, who was hired by the Falcons in January following a 12-game stint last season as the New York Jets’ interim head coach, was not aware of the data exposure or the prank until after it occurred, the Falcons said Sunday.
A video of the incident posted to social media showed a caller, with another person seated nearby, impersonating New Orleans Saints General Manager Mickey Loomis and telling Sanders, “We’re going to take you with our next pick right here, man.” After Sanders responded, the caller said, “But you’re going to have to wait a little bit longer, man.”
Sanders, widely expected to be a first-round choice, went unpicked Thursday and Friday night. The Cleveland Browns selected Sanders with the sixth pick of Saturday’s fifth round, the 144th overall choice.
Jax Ulbrich issued a public apology Sunday on social media in which he wrote that he’d made “a tremendous mistake” Friday night and called his actions “completely inexcusable, embarrassing, and shameful.” He thanked Sanders for “accepting my call earlier today” and added: “I hope you can find it in your heart to forgive me.”
Sanders said in a conference call with reporters Saturday that the prank call “didn’t really have [an] impact on me,” and added: “Of course, I feel like it was a childish act. But everybody [does] childish things here and there.”
Browns Coach Kevin Stefanski said at a news conference Saturday that prank calls “happened a lot” to players who were on-site in the draft’s green room, waiting to be selected, in Green Bay.
“Guys were getting calls,” Stefanski said. “So it’s silly. But onward and upward.”
Talk to us
> Give us your news tips.
> Send us a letter to the editor.
> More Herald contact information.
