ORCHARD PARK, N.Y. -- Buffalo Bills defensive back and special teams captain Sam Franklin Jr., doesn't want to fixate on the incident that briefly landed him a suspension that was reduced to a fine upon appeal.
"I really don't have much to say about the situation," Franklin told reporters after Bills practice Wednesday, the team's first day back at the facility since his suspension, appeal and reversal. "The NFL did what they did. We won the appeal. That's all I really have to say. I'm not trying to shine no light on it, as much as has been shined already. I'm just here to play football. I know I'm a clean player. My teammates know that, and that's all I have to say about it."
The NFL initially suspended Franklin for one game as a result of what the league described as a spitting incident on a fourth-quarter extra point against the Las Vegas Raiders in Week 6. Franklin and his representation were adamant that no such incident took place, and no publicly available video replays showed such an act.
After the appeal, Franklin's penalty was reduced to a fine of $14,926 with no suspension. He'll be eligible to play when the Bills take the field in Week 8 against the visiting Baltimore Ravens.
The allegations against Franklin came in the shadow of Bills safety C.J. Gardner-Johnson being ejected from that game at Las Vegas and subsequently suspended for spitting in the direction of Raiders tight end Brock Bowers.
"He's suspended for it, and that's part of it," Bills coach Joe Brady acknowledged, drawing a distinction between Gardner-Johnson's incident and Franklin's. "But an accusation on a player without evidence, without him being hearsay, I think it sets a bad precedent. It's my job to back my players, and look, if the same situation happened and you saw it and it happened, then I'd be saying the exact same things. But it's unfortunate that [Franklin's] name gets thrown out there. It's unfortunate that he has to kind of go about that as if he's a dirty football player, or doing an act without actually knowing about it."
When asked what the toughest part of the 48-hour window between being suspended and having his suspension overturned was, Franklin brought up two family-related matters. First, there was the matter of clearing his name with his parents. Franklin said he went over every video with his mom and dad showing them every angle he had to show he didn't spit at anyone. And second, the appeal came on his son's birthday, which soured the occasion.
Nevertheless, Franklin won't have to sit out.
"It's going to happen. Things are going to happen," Franklin said. "At the end of the day, I'm still going to have my family. I don't have social media, so I didn't see comments or anything like that. It really doesn't matter to me. I'm just happy I'm able to play this week."