Cardinals linebacker Markus Bailey is pushing back against his six-game ban by the NFL as both the player and his legal team labeled the league’s performance-enhancing substances policy “unforgiving strict.” 

Bailey was found to have violated that policy, and the punishment by the league will keep him out until at least Jan. 5.

The linebacker accepted the punishment, but denied knowingly taking any substance that was banned by the NFL.

“I would never have intentionally taken a banned substance,” Bailey wrote in a post on X. “This was clearly a contamination issue with only 0.05 nanograms found but due to the NFL’s strict liability policy, it was best for the team and myself to accept the suspension now.” 

In a statement released earlier in the evening, Bailey’s lawyer Rick Collins used similar language to describe the league’s policy. 

“The NFL has an unforgiving strict liability policy,” Collins said. “Each athlete is responsible for whatever banned substance is detected no matter how it got there. Unlike some other sports, NFL offers no reduced sanction for food or supplement contamination, which is a common concern. There is no threshold for most banned substances below which results are partially or fully excused in cases of inadvertent ingestion. We are investigating the source of the trace contaminant. Meanwhile, Markus has opted to accept the suspension.”

Bailey appeared in one game for the Cardinals this season, with it coming on Oct. 21, when Arizona defeated the Chargers 17-15.

He played 73 percent of the special teams snaps. 

Prior to that, Bailey had played the last four seasons with the Bengals, getting 73 tackles in 60 games.

He had been a part of the Cincinnati squad that went to the Super Bowl in 2021. 

Bailey was selected by the Bengals in 2020 in the seventh round out of Purdue.