Great Washington Post Column

Kdo5 said:

Fortunately I think Kraft's betrayal will be good for Tom in a way. It'll mean this thing is going to court and the league will have egg on their face. No compromises, no reductions, no letting it go.

Bruschi publically expressed disappointment in Kraft. You can bet Tom is feeling that even stronger. Brady isn't going to fall in line w/Kraft's actions.

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it certainly clarifies things.......I know Brady is a big boy and he's got the front offices biggest nightmare as his counsel......

in the end, though, just remember that the league could have avoided this mess and still fixed the problem....if there was a problem to begin with

PATS16N0 said:

This `debate` is boiling down to intelligent people versus ******s.

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One of my buddies (who is a Packers fan) was hanging out at my place drinking beers the other day. We were watching the US women's soccer team vs. Mexico, and he asked me how I felt about the Pats being caught cheating. What I said to him was pretty simple:

"The fact that you think that tells me one of two things. Either you didn't read the report or you're stupid. So let me ask you: did you read the report?"

He confirmed that he hadn't read the report. I recommended that he do that, and he said he would read it and get back to me.

I've found the best way to reason with these people is to skip past reasoning with them. You can't reason someone out of an opinion that they weren't reasoned into. Just call them on forming an opinion on a report that they didn't even read.

We can hope, I hope Brady takes it all the way and digs Goody's grave, Ill dance on the freaking thing

"And this is where Brady can blow the commissioner out of a courtroom. And perhaps out of his job."

And yet Kraft chose to lay down like a dog for the appeasement of his fellow owners.

NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell predetermined guilt in DeflateGate; that’s clear now. He has smeared Tom Brady and the New England Patriots without proper evidence or a competent investigation....

The commissioner needed a big case to restore his authority and prestige, after a series of judicial embarrassments. Federal judge David Doty reversed him on Adrian Peterson’s suspension. Arbitrator Barbara Jones overturned him (and found him not credible) for suspending Ray Rice twice for the same offense. And former commissioner Paul Tagliabue issued a stunning rebuke in the New Orleans Saints BountyGate case, when he not only reversed player suspensions but found a pattern of “arbitrary” as well “selective, ad hoc or inconsistent” punishments by Goodell.

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This article NAILS it in under a page and a half. I'll link it to any clown that tries trashing my team about this nonsense.

Sadly, Kraft laying down will be all anyone remembers from this debacle. Thanks you clown.

raduray said:

Gotta love Sally Jenkins.
http://tinyurl.com/mwk557j

If you run into the paywall, go incognito.

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Jeez, ive been posting goodell used this as a way of regaining his authority and public image from day one. Goodell knew how hated the pats were/are, he knew it was safe to go after them, that he opposing fans and media would eat this up especially after camera gate. I don;t think goodell orchestrated the thing, but when it broke he viewed it as a chance to redeem himself after the ray rice and a peterson fiascos.

This should be a "stickied" atop ......

reflexblue said:

Jeez, ive been posting goodell used this as a way of regaining his authority and public image from day one. Goodell knew how hated the pats were/are, he knew it was safe to go after them, that he opposing fans and media would eat this up especially after camera gate. I don;t think goodell orchestrated the thing, but when it broke he viewed it as a chance to redeem himself after the ray rice and a peterson fiascos.

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I do think he orchestrated it. The leak of the original story to the Indy reporter Kravitz may have come from the Colts or the league office. But, the 2 lbs per ball of 11 out of 12 balls almost had to come from Goodell's office. The fact that this was intentional misinformation and was never corrected when a simple correction from his office would have gone a long way towards containing the Lynch mob that followed. Goodell knew that after "spygate" the fans of all other teams would immediately believe that we were guilty, regardless of the facts. The reality is that his investigation revealed how poorly the NFL operates in enforcement of its own rules. The bias of the report is well documented by this article. My conclusion is that Goodell either started the whole controversy or fanned the flames as soon as he saw the opportunity to play hard ass with a team everyone would hate. Kraft pissed him off by demanding an apology, rightfully so, and that's why the team is getting screwed with the picks. Again, the opportunity for Goodell is that he quiets those who feels he is too close to Kraft. The suspension for Brady makes him look tough and he is able to smear Brady too based on the cellphone demand. I'm shocked that anyone would think a player, represented by a players association with a CBA in place, should turn o ver his phone. That's crazy and especially noting the leaks from Goodell. Of course, our own "sports writers" are quick to blame the victims here, the Pats, for being arrogant and bringing this on themselves. In doing so, they ignore the logic exhibited by Sally Jenkins and the errors and contradictions in the highly biased Wells report. Jenkins has it right. The discussion should be on Goodell and his agenda and lack of competence and integrity. Too bad she is unheard while ESPN lines up every veteran player that ever lost to the Pats to come on the air and spout their unfounded suspicions as facts. "They knew what we were going to run." "We always knew they were cheating." "They're always pulling something illegal."
I don't know what Kraft got for selling us out, but Myra has got to be spinning in her grave.

TheBeers said:

Great article! Reads like it was written by one of us!

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Don't kid yourself we may have had some responsibility or should I say Pat fans could have had some responsibility in that article. How many Pat Fans have been posting thorough, well though out rebuttals on Deflate articles in the last few months? Plenty. Maybe some of those are starting to sink in.

That article is just full of AWESOME!! She really gets it. She actually used critical thinking.

A huge difference from the run of the mill mediot who just jumped on the witch-hunt train without even bothering to read the Wells Report or the numerous public domain information on the Ideal Gas Law.

A voice of reason amidst a chorus of nimwits. Sadly, most of the haters will just choose to ignore the nuggets that she presents in logical, and well-thought out fashion. Hopefully her conclusion will be proved right in the near future, and Kesler, the federal courts, and the independent arbitrator embarrass Commissioner Goodell who is surely overreaching at the height of his arrogance and power right now.

raduray said:

Gotta love Sally Jenkins.
http://tinyurl.com/mwk557j

If you run into the paywall, go incognito.

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A couple of weeks ago I posted here that I believed deflategate was Goodell's Get Out of Jail Free Card with the other owners and the public and that I believed he was going to crush the Pats. I had no idea it would be this outrageous. Watching him at the podium these days is nauseating. He really thinks he's the **** of the walk. He's so full of himself. When this dink goes down, and he will, it'll be party time. I think now it's gonna take a while, but it'll happen.

Jackson 2 said:

A couple of weeks ago I posted here that I believed deflategate was Goodell's Get Out of Jail Free Card with the other owners and the public and that I believed he was going to crush the Pats. I had no idea it would be this outrageous. Watching him at the podium these days is nauseating. He really thinks he's the **** of the walk. He's so full of himself. When this dink goes down, and he will, it'll be party time. I think now it's gonna take a while, but it'll happen.

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Brady's Legacy: Pick 199. 4 time super bowl champion. 3 time superbowl MVP. First Unanimous League MVP. And the man that crushed Roger Goodell.

BradyFTW! said:

One of my buddies (who is a Packers fan) was hanging out at my place drinking beers the other day. We were watching the US women's soccer team vs. Mexico, and he asked me how I felt about the Pats being caught cheating. What I said to him was pretty simple:

"The fact that you think that tells me one of two things. Either you didn't read the report or you're stupid. So let me ask you: did you read the report?"

He confirmed that he hadn't read the report. I recommended that he do that, and he said he would read it and get back to me.

I've found the best way to reason with these people is to skip past reasoning with them. You can't reason someone out of an opinion that they weren't reasoned into. Just call them on forming an opinion on a report that they didn't even read.

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That wasn't Felger was it?

This article should be required reading.

Awesome. It's like the last 5,000 or so posts here boiled down into one coherent package. Gets to the bottom of it.

Tremendous. And while I do wish someone like Reiss had written something similar, I am glad he linked to it--national fools like Peter King read everything Reiss puts out, so it will definitely be read (and of course it's the Washington Post, so that helps too).

It's incredibly bracing when someone "out there" gets it. Somewhat OT, but I see--in my admittedly very limited viewing of other fan boards--that there are essentially no fans from other teams being objective/rational about this. And maybe I'm being a naive homer, but I do think this board/fan base would be if another team were the target (which we all know is impossible, but just play along). Interesting.

IllegalContact said:

as much as people want to believe, goodell does not have ultimate power in the appeal process......

top it off with the total clusterf*ck that the whole video thing was with ray rice, the front office and none of the owners should be feeling very good about what is to come holes get torn open in the whole deflategate thing......

the fallacy here is Kraft's belief that this thing is somehow going to go quietly now that he is out......he's still going to get dragged through it, he and the league are still going to be pounded.....

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Agreed. The only thing Kraft accomplished was to make himself the New England equivalent of Art Modell.

Leaving Fenway last night, i heard two chants: "Free Tom Brady" and "**** you, Bobby."

I did a quick search on Jenkins to see what she's had to say about the Patriots in the past. This was a nice read:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/10/31/AR2007103102746.html

Reiss has reproduced as much of the article as he can, on his blog- sounds as if he is trying to get one past ESPN and show the readers what he really thinks.