Getty Images

A miserable week for the NFL has ended with some potentially good news, as the league and the players have come to an agreement on a new drug-testing policy.

The 32 player representatives voted moments ago on an NFL Players Association conference call to accept the owners’ proposal on drug testing.

“We stood up and fought for what was right,” NFLPA executive director DeMaurice Smith said in a statement. “Twenty-five years ago it was NFL players that set out to make the game clean by asking for and collectively bargaining the first drug testing policy in professional sports. Today, this union and these player leaders have approved a policy that will serve the game well for generations of players to come.”

The most significant long-term aspect of the new policy is that players will be blood tested for the use of human growth hormone. Although that testing won’t begin immediately, once it is implemented it will represent a significant step forward in the NFL’s efforts to crack down on the use of performance-enhancing substances.

But the more immediate implication is that policies regarding the offseason use of amphetamines and the presence of trace amounts of marijuana in players’ urine will change. That policy will be applied retroactively for some players who are currently serving suspensions.

That means that if all the ‘i’s can be dotted and all the ‘t’s can be crossed immediately, suspended players including Broncos receiver Wes Welker and Cowboys cornerback Orlando Scandrick can be reinstated soon enough to play on Sunday.