Aldon Smith suspension will not be reduced, per Ed Werder

ESPN's Ed Werder has tweeted that a source told him Aldon Smith's suspension will not be reduced. This is not really news so much as confirmation of what was quickly becoming apparent. A couple weeks ago, Mike Florio reported that there was a possibility Smith's suspension would be reduced. That was followed by Matt Barrows, Chris Mortensen and Ian Rapoport all saying it was possible in some form or fashion.

So much for that.

Once we got midway through today, it seemed pretty apparent this was not going to happen in time for the San Francisco 49ers Week 10 matchup with the New Orleans Saints. This means Smith will be back in time for next week's New York Giants game. I don't know exactly when the NFL will announce that Aldon Smith is reinstated. My guess is an official announcement would happen either next Monday or Tuesday. But given that we know the suspension will officially end next week, the announcement will be a formality.

Plenty of people called BS on the initial rumor that Smith would be back, and that number rose when he was not reinstated for the St. Louis Rams game. As I said with the Harbaugh rumors, I don't think this was entirely made up. Some people were willing to be a little more confident Smith would be back, but it did not play out that way. The whole thing is more just odd than anything else. There were reports Aldon Smith dropped his appeal option in order to get a chance at leniency later in the suspension. We don't know for certain how true that is, but we do know he did not get any leniency. The whole thing was just a weird situation.