The NFL's interviews with the players named in the Al-Jazeera report on performance-enhancing drugs have begun, and so far they have gone as the players expected.
A source close to the situation said Packers linebackers Clay Matthews and Julius Peppers, whose interviews were Wednesday in Green Bay, and Steelers linebacker James Harrison, whose interview was Thursday in Pittsburgh, remain annoyed that they had to submit to the interviews but were not confronted with any new evidence or allegations during their interviews.
Free-agent defensive end Mike Neal is the other player the league plans to interview in connection with its investigation into last winter's Al-Jazeera report. The league interviewed retired quarterback Peyton Manning, who also was named in the report, earlier this offseason and issued a statement last month clearing his name.
The expectation of Matthews, Peppers, Harrison and Neal -- as articulated by Harrison on Wednesday -- is that the NFL's investigation will conclude that the players did nothing wrong and that the league will issue the same statement for them that it did on Manning's behalf. Major League Baseball players Ryan Howard and Ryan Zimmerman, who also were named in the report, were publicly cleared by MLB last week after it concluded its investigation.
