Brady's legal team expands

[YOUGOTMOSSED]

Legal/procedural question: Does anyone know whether team Brady has to formally request a stay of the suspension until the appeal is finally decided or does Judge Berman just simply wait until appeals are exhausted before he complies with CA2's directive to reinstate the suspension? Or something else?

 

[Patsfanin Philly]

The longer that this goes on,the more I see it as a Curt Floodesque case. Flood was a baseball player with the St Louis Cardinals who was traded to the Philadelphia Phillies and refused to go ( do you blame him?)
He fought and the case was decided by the US Supreme Court after he retired and it essentially ended the reserve clause. That was "just a sports case" with larger ramifications as is true here.

You have a player and an organization on both sides with deep pockets and stubborn resolve ( save a certain owner) determined to fight to the end....... While en banc is considered a long shot, everything in this is upside down and bringing in Olsen is like bringing in Winston Wolfe in Pulp Fiction (I would link the clip but it is NSFW )

 

[Patsfanin Philly]

Yep. It's mine as well.

great minds think alike......

 

[XLIX]

When you boil it all down, bad decision after bad decision after bad decision by Goody led to all this.

Rozelle, Tags...would have been over in 5 minutes.

I agree. Heck, it probably wouldn't have even taken that long. A smart commissioner gets the complaint from the Colts and calls the Patriots Saturday before the game (or walks over to Bob Kraft at the party Kraft had) and says "look, we got these complaints so we're going to be checking so make sure everything is 100% A-J-squared-away."

Then none of us have even heard of any of this.

 

[Froob]

I have my own theory that Bill , after all these years know where all the proverbial bodies are buried and the has plenty of dirty laundry that he has threatened to release if they try to scapegoat him. This dovetails with my belief that the Spygate tapes were destroyed not to protect the Patriots (as alleged b the haters) but because they showed other teams doing the same thing and that the Pats were singled out. By keeping them, they could come out some day. By destroying them and swearing the Pats to secrecy, the NFL could control the narrative. Belichick learned from this and likely vowed never to be victimized again so he collected evidence.
This would explain why the NFL come out early on in Deflategate and cleared him...the knew not to F with him.....Sort of like J Edgar Hoover's files,..............

Couldn't he protect Brady and Patriots that way tho?

 

[The Gr8est]

I have my own theory that Bill , after all these years know where all the proverbial bodies are buried and the has plenty of dirty laundry that he has threatened to release if they try to scapegoat him. This dovetails with my belief that the Spygate tapes were destroyed not to protect the Patriots (as alleged b the haters) but because they showed other teams doing the same thing and that the Pats were singled out. By keeping them, they could come out some day. By destroying them and swearing the Pats to secrecy, the NFL could control the narrative. Belichick learned from this and likely vowed never to be victimized again so he collected evidence.
This would explain why the NFL come out early on in Deflategate and cleared him...the knew not to F with him.....Sort of like J Edgar Hoover's files,..............

Hope he has it already written and has it distributed to reliable people.

 

[RobertWeathers]

I agree. Heck, it probably wouldn't have even taken that long. A smart commissioner gets the complaint from the Colts and calls the Patriots Saturday before the game (or walks over to Bob Kraft at the party Kraft had) and says "look, we got these complaints so we're going to be checking so make sure everything is 100% A-J-squared-away."

Then none of us have even heard of any of this.

...and even if something was fishy it would have been a slap on the wrist or a small fine.

Why piss off one of your most powerful owners and biggest supporters?

Why denigrate the career of one of the league's GoATs and model players?

Because of ego? Hatred?

Its sad. Really sad.

 

[RobertWeathers]

Hope he has it already written and has it distributed to reliable people.

I bet a small group of people (his children, maybe Ernie) have the ability to leak info on his behalf.

Bill has the goods and several get out of jail free cards in his vault when he needs to use them.

With that said there is no reasonable need to ever use them....unless hes under attack.

 

[PatsFanSince74]

Well Joker if this was poker it would mean, unfortunately, TB has a king and a jack while Goodell has two queens. We need another king or another two queens or the pot is his....

Two queens? I though we were keeping this politically correct.

But the client is Dee Smith. He's a fmr USDA. Would think it was his call?

Well, none of us were in the room so we will never know. It was either a battle of egos between two lawyers or a bad decision by management, interfering in a matter that should have been left to the lawyers. Either way, the wrong guy argued the Appeal.

 

[Froob]

I bet a small group of people (his children, maybe Ernie) have the ability to leak info on his behalf.

Bill has the goods and several get out of jail free cards in his vault when he needs to use them.

With that said there is no reasonable need to ever need to use them.

I don't know if I buy that, why wouldn't he save Brady and the picks then? But, you're right, there must be some reason they haven't nailed him because it'd be too easy and he'd have noway to appeal.

 

[Patsfanin Philly]

Hope he has it already written and has it distributed to reliable people.

As long as Ernie has a copy. we're all set................

 

[RobertWeathers]

I don't know if I buy that, why wouldn't he save Brady and the picks then? But, you're right, there must be some reason they haven't nailed him because it'd be too easy and he'd have noway to appeal.

Clearly its a theory we are all throwing around....

I may be in the minority but I would not be surprised if BB and Tom had a very private conversation that went something like this....

BB-What is going on?
TB-No friggan clue
TB- Are they coming after you?
BB-Probably. Goodell, Kensil and Gardi want me out of the league.
TB- Will Bob fight for you?
BB- Not really. He'll pretend to.
TB- Well. I didn't do anything.
BB- I know you didn't. It doesn't matter. Theyll find something and try to bring us down. They always do.
TB- I can defend myself. I have nothing to hide. Just deflect it to me.
BB- Are you sure?
TB- Yea I can handle it.

 

[Rusty Griswold]

Honestly, I'm kinda surprised that the league hasn't dismissed the suspension on its own. It now has the second circuit on record as saying that Goodell can do whatever he wants, whenever he wants, up to and including breaking labor law, and they won't do anything about it. They've also established a process by which they can ensure that any future arbitration disagreement end up being argued in the second circuit.

Seems like enough of a win that they should eliminate any incentive for Brady to continue the fight, purely on the slim chance that he gets an en banc appeal or makes it to the SCOTUS and wins.

If I was commissioner, I would drop Brady's suspension yesterday, and make a statement to the effect of "while I am pleased that the second circuit has affirmed my authority as both commissioner and arbitrator in all cases relating to the integrity of the game, I also wish to extend a hand in cooperation to the players' association and the Patriots organization. While I stand by the Wells Report, I have decided to reduce Tom Brady's punishment to the maximum fine allowable under the collective bargaining agreement". Then again, if I was the commissioner none of this nonsense would have happened in the first place, because this was a ridiculous case and a witch hunt from day one.

Too late. Brady was never going to settle last year either. Goodell lied about that, too. I believe the rumor the owners want it now because they are scared ****less of what Brady is now doing, which is getting the big guns in and finishing Goodell off for good.

Goodell has always thought he's been untouchable, but he's barked up the wrong tree here.

 

[QuantumMechanic]

If they try to get it to the SC, does anyone know how long the SC decides whether to take the case ? As slow as the legal system is, I am wondering if the entire 2016 season could be played before the SC even decides not to take it, if that's the choice.

It can take a while. It could take months or it could be rejected right away. In any event, the current term is almost over (ends in June) and SCOTUS has already been granting cert petitions for next term (which starts in October). So even if they granted a cert petition right after it was filed, I'd be pretty surprised if the case was even heard before the beginning of 2017 and any decision would almost certainly be after the end of the 2016 season.

So if Brady completes the hail mary and SCOTUS takes the case he'll buy himself another suspension-free season. But I still don't think it's very likely SCOTUS will.

 

[QuantumMechanic]

No idea, to be honest. I sure hope so.

I can't see how SCOTUS would both grant cert but refuse to stay the suspension. It would be pointless to grant cert and allow the suspension because Brady can't get the games back once he's missed them so one would think him serving the suspension would moot the case.

That said, I do recall someone elsewhere pointing out that even if he served the suspension he'd still have an interest in the lost game checks and that could be enough to keep the case live. So if SCOTUS were to think that way they could refuse to stay the suspension (especially if they thought Brady was not likely to win).

 

[TheBostonStraggler]

Two queens? I though we were keeping this politically correct.

Well, none of us were in the room so we will never know. It was either a battle of egos between two lawyers or a bad decision by management, interfering in a matter that should have been left to the lawyers. Either way, the wrong guy argued the Appeal.

What's happening under the robe stays under the robe...

 

[QuantumMechanic]

Honestly, I'm kinda surprised that the league hasn't dismissed the suspension on its own. It now has the second circuit on record as saying that Goodell can do whatever he wants, whenever he wants, up to and including breaking labor law, and they won't do anything about it. They've also established a process by which they can ensure that any future arbitration disagreement end up being argued in the second circuit.

Seems like enough of a win that they should eliminate any incentive for Brady to continue the fight, purely on the slim chance that he gets an en banc appeal or makes it to the SCOTUS and wins.

If they dropped the suspension Brady couldn't fight (other than a separate defamation case) even if he wanted to. The federal courts are limited to hearing "actual cases or controversies". If the NFL announced they dropped all punishment the case would be moot and that'd be the end of any further appeals.

What I don't know is if mooting the case leaves the precedent they just won in place or if it undoes the entire case.

 

[Gronkowski123]

keep fighting tommy boy

 

[RelocatedPatFan]

Olsen's bio says he's argued 62 times before the Supreme Court and has won more than 75% of them.

So this means 3 out of 4 cases he argues wins. So, damn.

That's a Brady-BB-esque winning percentage.

 

[Patsfanin Philly]

I can't see how SCOTUS would both grant cert but refuse to stay the suspension. It would be pointless to grant cert and allow the suspension because Brady can't get the games back once he's missed them so one would think him serving the suspension would moot the case.

That said, I do recall someone elsewhere pointing out that even if he served the suspension he'd still have an interest in the lost game checks and that could be enough to keep the case live. So if SCOTUS were to think that way they could refuse to stay the suspension (especially if they thought Brady was not likely to win).

It would be the equivalent of Sen. George Aiken's comment during Vietnam, " declare victory and get the troops out". Goodell could end the court case ( by dropping the suspension) and claim the precedent stands....It's a win-win ( which means it will never happen) for the league and Brady/Pats. It's Goodell's ego which prevents him from negotiating or admitting the league made a mistake or acted out a vendetta.