Brady will be suspended by Roger Goodell for role in DeflateGate, announcement expected next week

IllegalContact said:

yeah......I think it is going to be very interesting if this bears out.........brady can inflict near unlimited damage with an appeal

I think goodell doesn't know what to do

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I think Goodell could "split it up" or itemize it or whatever you want to call it. It's a semantic game, and pretty lame, but probably effective.

Since the evidence for the tampering is flimsy, and the evidence of his knowledge of tampering is very flimsy Goodell could do something very minor "for that charge". Like the $25K fine like rulebook mentions.

But for the failure to cooperate, which is an ironclad case, I'm afraid Goodell could lower the boom. I would imagine Goodell really wants to send a message that failure to cooperate is a really big deal in his eyes. He hates when someone doesn't say "how high" when he says "jump". He sees it as a challenge to his authority and overreacts.

If Brady took the deflation penalty it to court or an outside entity, he's seen as basically arguing about a $25K fine. Kinda petty and not a good look for him. And if he took the "failure to cooperate" penalty to an outside entity he doesn't have a leg to stand on.

This is seriously exhausting. I have about had it with this ****ing league. I just really can't believe all of this is happening.

Peachhead said:

I think Goodell could "split it up" or itemize it or whatever you want to call it. It's a semantic game, and pretty lame, but probably effective.

Since the evidence for the tampering is flimsy, and the evidence of his knowledge of tampering is very flimsy Goodell could do something very minor "for that charge". Like the $25K fine like rulebook mentions.

But for the failure to cooperate, which is an ironclad case, I'm afraid Goodell could lower the boom. I would imagine Goodell really wants to send a message that failure to cooperate is a really big deal in his eyes. He hates when someone doesn't say "how high" when he says "jump". He sees it as a challenge to his authority and overreacts.

If Brady took the deflation penalty it to court or an outside entity, he's seen as basically arguing about a $25K fine. Kinda petty and not a good look for him. And if he took the "failure to cooperate" penalty to an outside entity he doesn't have a leg to stand on.

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Interesting. I hadn't put much thought into how they can punish Brady for "failure to cooperate".

Is the original email from the Colts member of staff that is in the Wells "report" sufficient probable cause to trigger the sting?

If not, malicious prosecution is the angle we should be looking at, not defamation.

festy1986 said:

The nfl is foolish if they think they can win this.

Brady has the union behind him and 0 evidence of any cheating.

So it'll be interesting to see them try and win a actual battle in court vs brady.

Assuming it goes that far. I think brady will take 1 game. Anything more and he's going balls out

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Thread winner for the bolded part. Deep down the NFL cannot believe they can win this with the evidence that is currently presented. However, the "punishment" handed down will not be about what is right or what they can win, it will be about what they believe sits best with the media-public-business-other. These dopes may even hand out a year's punishment with full knowledge they believe they have no chance of it being upheld. Again it's all about the mob and the PR...

Big-T said:

Is the original email from the Colts member of staff that is in the Wells "report" sufficient probable cause to trigger the sting?

If not, malicious prosecution is the angle we should be looking at, not defamation.

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Is it? IMHO an actual court of law is immaterial here. A court of law is so bogged down in minutia, so slow and plodding, it has little effect on what battle is transpiring. The only angle of a formal legal proceeding that should pique Brady's team's curiosity is discovery. Get a judge to order the NFL to hand over communications and we'd see a lot of Hugo Boss suits getting coffee spilled on them in panic. Somehow get a judge to open discovery up with a wide net?? Call the paramedics!

What matters to the NFL is the court of the public. They appear to have abandoned any system of values beyond that.
Someone mentioned cheating, cheating by the team that wins all the time, cheating by the team that already "cheated", so the NFL threw red meat to the wolves. Great! If that's the MO and the arena they fight in then fight it there. Remember, while the NFL has its media lackeys (ESPN) and are not easily beat, the NFL is a VERY easy bunch to be disliked by the court of the public. People are primed to dislike and believe they are nefarious. So even as the public currently sees Brady negatively, they can somewhat easily be made to like him while disliking them. Just takes the right team to do it.

So will Brady take it laying down or is he formally preparing a declaration of war? I can see arguments for both avenues especially if the NFL hands down a financial only punishment. One would have to walk in Brady's shoes to know what is best for him. From a fan's perspective I hope he is currently preparing an all out land, sea and air bombing campaign that will make 1972 Hanoi look like a pack of firecrackers being thrown out of a tourist plane window.

Kdo5 said:

Interesting. I hadn't put much thought into how they can punish Brady for "failure to cooperate".

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The NFL did this to Favre when he didn't turn over his phone, but in that case the phone was essential since it was the starting point of the claim.

As for Brady, his agent has already stated that Brady fully cooperated with the Wells investigation, answering questions for a full day. Why should he have to turn over his phone ? I mean, reading the Wells report, all of this is coming from a Colts trainer that said 'it is well known the Pats are using underinflated balls'. It does not seem reasonable to me that everybody should have to turn over their personal phone over every accusation like this, especially when the guy could have been making it up.

Now, if the PSI was way under what the science tell you it should have been, then yes, a point could be made to turn this into an in-depth investigation requiring to look into Brady's personal data. But the PSI that was measured at halftime was within reasonable reach of where it should have been given the condition. Furthermore, if the footballs had been deflated in the bathroom before the game, let's say to 11.5 PSI, then the results at halftime should have been lower than what the refs measured...so I don't understand on what ground the NFL can request to turn over personal data when there is absolutely no material proof that tampering was done.

I feel they're gonna suspend him. He needs to win the appeal though.

RDS11 said:

The NFL did this to Favre when he didn't turn over his phone, but in that case the phone was essential since it was the starting point of the claim.

As for Brady, his agent has already stated that Brady fully cooperated with the Wells investigation, answering questions for a full day. Why should he have to turn over his phone ? I mean, reading the Wells report, all of this is coming from a Colts trainer that said 'it is well known the Pats are using underinflated balls'. It does not seem reasonable to me that everybody should have to turn over their personal phone over every accusation like this, especially when the guy could have been making it up.

Now, if the PSI was way under what the science tell you it should have been, then yes, a point could be made to turn this into an in-depth investigation requiring to look into Brady's personal data. But the PSI that was measured at halftime was within reasonable reach of where it should have been given the condition. Furthermore, if the footballs had been deflated in the bathroom before the game, let's say to 11.5 PSI, then the results at halftime should have been lower than what the refs measured...so I don't understand on what ground the NFL can request to turn over personal data when there is absolutely no material proof that tampering was done.

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If you listen to some people ie Gasper on F&M that Brady was the last person interviewed. They already had the texts (wow, don't need TBs phone for those. Ditto for emails.) so they wanted to ambush Brady and rebuke anything he said. His phone was worthless by that point. They used it as a catch all to back TB in a corner.

Why can certain people see that clear as day, yet others cannot?

farn said:

Let's play along for one minute. What if Brady is suspended one game. Thursday Night at Foxborough to unravel banner #4 while the iconic SB mvp is watching from home. Wow. That would make for a weird scene.

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it will be more than just one game.

goodell is a clown, he wants the country to like him again so brady will get 6-8 games...which is totally ridiculous.

4 games then appeal reduced to 2 is what I think will happen. I hope like everyone says he fights tooth and nail but I dont know if he will go beyond an appeal unless its 8 or 10 games.

I do think Brady wins on appeal. There's no way Wells Report holds up under any kind of impartial scrutiny.

Gronkowski123 said:

it will be more than just one game.

goodell is a clown, he wants the country to like him again so brady will get 6-8 games...which is totally ridiculous.

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Kinda hard to believe he's making 44 million A YEAR. Give me 50k a year. I'll be a better commissoner than him. Maybe I'll even hire some of you guys on as advisors and make you watch me eat pizza. And only watch Jets games. In Jets onesies. <<never mind, that's what I'd make Goodell do.

ViperGTS said:

Kinda hard to believe hes'so making 44 million A YEAR. Give me 50k a year. I'll be a better commissoner than him. Maybe I'll even hire some of you guys on as advisors and make you watch me eat pizza. And only watch Jets games. In Jets onesies. <<never mind, that's what I'd make Goodell do.

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Ugghh..I just got the image of Ridley sitting somewhere in his NYJ onesie, rubbing salve on his new Jets tattoo.

supafly said:

Ugghh..I just got the image of Ridley sitting somewhere in his NYJ onesie, rubbing salve on his new Jets tattoo.

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So hot! Mmmmmmmm...

Danger Zone said:

I do think Brady wins on appeal. There's no way Wells Report holds up under any kind of impartial scrutiny.

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I gave up on the idea of "fair play," which is really ironic since that's exactly what the opposition is complaining about.

.Deep down the NFL cannot believe they can win this with the evidence that is currently presented.

It's not "they"...it's HIM.

Back in 2007 I was the voice in the wilderness on this board screaming that Goodell trumped up the "spygate" garbage because it was directly counter to HIS stated mission objective...ABSOLUTE LEAGUE PARITY. The NEP were an outlier then to his most fervent desire for "different season, different champion". I was villified, called a paranoid, delusional, crazy...break out a thesaurus and pick a freakin' synonym.

Today it's a "plain as broad daylight" issue. You all KNOW now what I've known since he was named commissioner. He has a constant, focused plan of attack to tear away at the very fabric of Patriots football and the Patriot philosophy of "team". Goodell IS an insular, detached, little spoiled rich kid all grown up elitist with nearly ZERO understanding of the fans and absolutely no regard for the players. He is a pimp for the members of the billionaires Boys Club and nothing more.

I've been reading a lot of opinions on our board the past few days and I get an overwhelming sense of rage, betrayal, confusion and outright disbelief. I share it all with every one of you. None of you fine people, intelligent, well spoken and fair minded to a man(woman) deserves to have that part of your lives that gives you pleasure enjoyment and escape from the drudgery of the everyday rat race ripped to shreds by this insensitive , malignant insult to the human gene pool. Roger Goodell SHOULD have been removed as commissioner after that sham of a Super Bowl fix in 2007, a fix HE orchestrated and took visible pleasure in. Mike Carey should have been switched with Charlie McCarthy the minute that game ended and Puppeteerdell should have been exposed for the blatant rigging of that contest.

It took years for people here and elsewhere to begin to come around that this league and this national media machine was in lockstep with some kind of agenda or directive aimed at solely maximizing profits for all concerned, at the expense of credibility. The Ray Lewis Retirement Show in 2013...here's a brief snippet from a cursory Google topic search...
"
espn.go.com/.../2013-super-bowl-ray-lewis-baltimore-ravens-ends-...
ESPN
Feb 4, 2013 - Ray Lewis went out a winner, capturing the second Super Bowl title of his career, which ended with Sunday night's win and a wild celebration ..."

WILD!!! CELEBRATORY!!!...Torrey Smith ripping a defender's arms on a sure INT at the 2:00 mark of the 1st half in front of hundreds of millions of viewers...no call. A game changer for S.F. Denied by referee refusal to call the blatantly obvious. Then the mystery "blackout" for 15 minutes giving the Ravens D a much needed blow as they were getting slashed by the 9ers offense....and the outrageous pass interference in the end zone at the end of the game on Crabtree by Jimmy Smith. You ALL saw it.

I told everyone here WELL BEFORE the game was played that this was going to be a Goodell special sanitizing Ray Lewis and his image and that there would be an immediate transfer from NFL to ESPN analyst post game. Again I was vilified by some as a paranoid, others as a "tin foil hat". We all saw what happened.

Throughout it all, however, there has been ONE constant. The relentless attack on the NEP, the "hold to a higher standard" league strategy used solely on the NEP, the constant revising and changing of the rules of NFL football aimed directly at the NEP and now THIS...an outright, ultra-preposterous witch hunt that has already pronounced sentence on the NEP without even the merest hint of any democratic sense of due process, fairness or legality.

OK, I'm going to wander back out into the wilderness again when I say this to all of you...in my opinion, the only recourse we have, as fans, as hard working, righteous , intelligent human beings is an organized "fan action". I would call for a ground swell of NEP fans to begin to protest the abomination that this league has become by fighting back using the same media THEY use to spin their lies. I would ask that the segment of this fanbase that pays for season tickets and attends games at Gillette hold a "game action". One game, with the "media" notified in advance. Our fans with PAID tickets, paying the exhorbitant parking fees, arriving in normal fashion, tailgating, throwing footballs around, doing THAT which all NFL fans do every Sunday and which forms the backbone of this league. Show up! DO NOT ENTER the game. Remain in the lots and the lawn chairs and grills going strong...and let that game be played out in front of NO ONE. Let ESPN,NFLN,the Boston media and press sit inside by themselves and commentate on national TV while the country sits in their living rooms watching an empty stadium. If this moron Goodell is going to suspend Tom Brady, let US join him in that suspension until this ignoroid, this utter lying, despicable weasel of a human being notices his emperor's new clothes are nothing more than transparent cellophane.

We can no longer hope to enjoy our chosen pastime if this monocular, mongoloidal rhinocerous-like commissioner is allowed to run amok with impunity, trampling our relaxation time and our life long pastime. Only action will work now. THAT is only my opinion of course, but I see no toher option.

Danger Zone said:

I do think Brady wins on appeal. There's no way Wells Report holds up under any kind of impartial scrutiny.

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I would think so but with lawyer speak and lawyers you never know. The whole thing is just a frustrating mess. But this is what the nfl wanted. To create news during the dead period in the offseason after the draft.This is not a 100 investigation. Quite sure they finished it a while back. And I heard it on Dan Patrick it cost them 5 million. For this.

Can someone explain me why people like Patriots workers use their phones to text sensitive information and not thinking that someone from the league will get hold on to that text message, common man!
You must be Aaron Hernandez you stupid to use your cellphone nowadays.

The problem it seems is that most of us are trying to use some semblance of Logic (me too) ..as we perceive it at least. From the rule as stated it would seem max penalty would be something over 25k...maybe 100k , For something that is at best a suspicion of wrong doing.

Is there some rule that says if you lie or dont cooperate the penalty will be maxed? I could even understand that if the wells investigation was impartial. Anyway its just sickening.
One fact that came out of the investigation is that the refs are not doing their job.