Charlotte, NC (SportsNetwork.com) – Changing course, the Carolina Panthers deactivated defensive end Greg Hardy for Sunday’s home opener against the Detroit Lions.<\/p>\n
Quarterback Cam Newton was active after missing the season opener with a fractured rib.<\/p>\n
Hardy played last week despite being found guilty by a judge on domestic violence charges in July and was expected to be in uniform again.<\/p>\n
But while his appeal of the ruling was enough to avoid a suspension — he is currently awaiting a jury trial — the Ray Rice saga and the NFL’s subsequent decision for a tougher policy against domestic violence apparently forced the Panthers to bench the defensive star.<\/p>\n
According to a police report, Hardy assaulted girlfriend Nicole Holder and threatened to kill her during an altercation in May.<\/p>\n
Holder said Hardy choked her with both hands around her throat and threw her onto a couch covered with assault rifles and shotguns. She said Hardy told her all the weapons were loaded.<\/p>\n
Hardy tied a franchise record with 15 sacks in 2013. The Panthers placed the franchise tag on him at a cost of $13.1 million this season.<\/p>\n
A sixth-round pick by the Panthers in 2010, Hardy has 34 sacks in 63 career games with Carolina.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Charlotte, NC (SportsNetwork.com) – Changing course, the Carolina Panthers deactivated defensive end Greg Hardy for Sunday’s home opener against the Detroit Lions. Quarterback Cam Newton was active after missing the season opener with a fractured rib. Hardy played last week despite being found guilty by a judge on domestic violence charges in July and was […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[162,161,163],"class_list":["post-23480","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-nfl","tag-carolina","tag-carolina-panthers","tag-panthers"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.stub.com\/hq\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23480","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.stub.com\/hq\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.stub.com\/hq\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.stub.com\/hq\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.stub.com\/hq\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=23480"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.stub.com\/hq\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23480\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":23509,"href":"https:\/\/www.stub.com\/hq\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23480\/revisions\/23509"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.stub.com\/hq\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=23480"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.stub.com\/hq\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=23480"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.stub.com\/hq\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=23480"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}