When players are cut by NFL teams, they remain subject to the testing requirements of the substance-abuse policy. If they dont show for the tests (after all, theyre no longer NFL employees), they become subject to the various steps and stages of the substance-abuse program.
Its wrong and its unfair, but thats just the way it is, as agreed to by the NFL Players Association.
Browner played for the Broncos in 2005. Cut in 2006, Browner surfaced the following year in the CFL. Unless Browner violated the substance-abuse policy enough times in one-plus year with the Broncos to land in Stage Three, theres a chance he fell victim to the unfair expectation that players who have been dumped by the NFL still have to submit to NFL-implemented drug tests, and that he returned to the NFL in 2011 with a lifetime membership in Stage Three.
Thats how Stage Three works. Once a guy enters Stage Three, he never gets out. And if he makes one false move while in Stage Three, via a positive test or a failure to show up for a test, hes done for at least a year.
If thats what happened with Browner if he landed in Stage Three because he didnt show up for drug tests when he wasnt an NFL employee his suspension needs to be scrapped. And if the NFL wont reverse the suspension, Browner needs to load up the legal cannon and aim it at anyone and everyone.