NFL Lowers the Boom on Brady

Tom Brady is hit with suspension and fine while the Patriots are fined 1 million and lose the first draft pick for 2 years.

O’Connor says, “Brady needs to come clean now.”

To salvage his reputation, Tom Brady’s best path at this point is to tell the truth about Deflategate, skip the appeal and accept the NFL’s firm but fair punishment, Ian O’Connor writes.

The NFL finally lowered the hammer and has suspended Super Bowl MVP Tom Brady without pay for the first four games of the season, fined the New England Patriots $1 million and taken away two draft picks as punishment for deflating footballs used in the AFC title game, the league said in a statement Monday.
The NFL also indefinitely suspended the two equipment staffers believed to have carried out the plan, including one who called himself “The Deflator.”
Brady will miss the season’s showcase kickoff game Sept. 10 against Pittsburgh, Week 2 at Buffalo, a home game against Jacksonville and a game at Dallas.
He will return the week the Patriots face the Colts in Indianapolis.
The Patriots will also lose a first-round pick in 2016 and a fourth-round pick in 2017.
As we watch this play out in the news I couldn’t help but think about how light the punishment seems when compared to that given the Jackie Robinson Little League Team who were stripped of their title and trophies. How cruel it was to take away the title and the trinket that represented the hard work each of the young boys put into the game and teamwork. They were disgraced and stripped of their honor based on the choices their coaches made regarding who qualified to play on the team based on residence. Theirs was a technicality. But if it’s true that Tom Brady deflated his balls he cheated is the real sense of the word in relation to the game.
It has donned on me that in the professional games where it’s more about money than integrity cheating is accepted as part of the game. Play smart or better said, cheat smart and you won’t get caught. So if you pay attention to what went down. The punishment given Tom Brady and the Patriots is argued as too harsh by some and others have pointed out that it isn’t even about the cheating or the possibility of Brady having cheated, but rya her about his lack of cooperation.
In a statement released Monday night, Patriots chairman and CEO Robert Kraft criticized the investigation on which the punishment was based and said Brady had the team’s “unconditional support” and that its “belief in him has not wavered.”
“Despite our conviction that there was no tampering with footballs, it was our intention to accept any discipline levied by the league,” Kraft said. “Today’s punishment, however, far exceeded any reasonable expectation. It was based completely on circumstantial rather than hard or conclusive evidence.
“We are humbled by the support the New England Patriots have received from our fans throughout the world,” the statement said. “We recognize our fans’ concerns regarding the NFL’s penalties and share in their disappointment in how this one-sided investigation was handled, as well as the dismissal of the scientific evidence supported by the Ideal Gas Law in the final report.”
On Tuesday morning, the Patriots changed their Twitter avatar to Brady’s No. 12 jersey.
“We are humbled by the support the New England Patriots have received from our fans throughout the world,” the statement said. “We recognize our fans’ concerns regarding the NFL’s penalties and share in their disappointment in how this one-sided investigation was handled, as well as the dismissal of the scientific evidence supported by the Ideal Gas Law in the final report.”
On Tuesday morning, the Patriots changed their Twitter avatar to Brady’s No. 12 jersey.
Brady’s agent said Monday that he would appeal the suspension to commissioner Roger Goodell, which the quarterback has three days to do.
Brady will be replaced by Jimmy Garoppolo, a 2014 second-round selection from Eastern Illinois who won the Walter Payton award as the best player in the FCS. He has thrown 27 NFL passes, including one touchdown.

Brady’s agent, Don Yee, said “the discipline is ridiculous and has no legitimate basis.”“And if the hearing officer is completely independent and neutral, I am very confident the Wells report will be exposed as an incredibly frail exercise in fact-finding and logic,”Yee said in a statement.

The Patriots also postponed on Monday this week’s previously scheduled media availability with their rookie draft class.
The punishment was announced five days after the release of the lengthy Wells report that found that Patriots personnel deliberately deflated footballs before the AFC Championship Game on Jan. 18, 2015, and that Brady “was at least generally aware” of the violations.
“With respect to your particular involvement, the report established that there is substantial and credible evidence to conclude you were at least generally aware of the actions of the Patriots’ employees involved in the deflation of the footballs and that it was unlikely that their actions were done without your knowledge,” NFL executive vice president Troy Vincent wrote in a letter to Brady.
The 243-page report by league-appointed attorney Ted Wells said it was “more probable than not” that Brady was aware of plans to prepare the footballs to his liking, below the NFL-mandated minimum of 12.5 pounds per square inch.
The report identified two Patriots employees — officials’ locker room attendant Jim McNally and equipment assistant John Jastremski — as the ones who executed the plan. The Patriots suspended both indefinitely last week. Neither can be reinstated without the approval of the NFL, the league said.
Reaction in the NFL was widespread in the aftermath of the news.
Suzanne Johnson, wife of Jets owner Woody Johnson, tweeted the Brady news alongside a happy-face emoji before quickly deleting the tweet.
Patriots running back LeGarrette Blount tweeted his objections to the discipline, while San Francisco 49ers defensive tackle Darnell Dockett also used it as an opportunity to take a jab at New England.

Read entire Wells report

Ted Wells’ 243-page report on the “Deflategate” scandal concludes “it’s more probable than not” that Patriots personnel “participated in a deliberate effort to release air from Patriots game balls after the balls were examined by the referee.” Warning: Some language in the report might be objectionable to users.

Inside Slant: Deflategate will march on

The penalties have been announced, but Deflategate is far from over. In typical NFL fashion, a long and unwieldy legal process is about to ensue.
MacMullan, . . .”Tom Brady’s penalty doesn’t add up.”

Compared to other NFL infractions, a four-game suspension for Tom Brady in Deflategate is a gross overreaction, Jackie MacMullan writes.
O’Connor says, “Brady needs to come clean now.”

To salvage his reputation, Tom Brady’s best path at this point is to tell the truth about Deflategate, skip the appeal and accept the NFL’s firm but fair punishment, Ian O’Connor writes.