Yo. This is Steph who wrote the article. Just created an account just for this comment. Happened to see reddit on a drive by google when I was looking up something else.
You are right, arxndo. I was talking about a huge amount of other cooperation that nobody seems to recognize, and Wells even acknowledged.
The Patriots and Brady DID A METRIC BLEEPTON of cooperation, in comparison to most litigation. The only things they didn't cooperate on wouldn't have been a big deal, IF THE WELLS REPORT PEOPLE hadn't bleeped up the interview process, which looks like is what happened from public reports.
Discovery disputes among parties isn't something that most non lawyer folk know much about, but they happen all the time. Compared to most cases, this sounds like amazing cooperation. Like zillions of dollars of time worth of help.
And (from the outside it appears) the things that Wells got so upset about could have been prevented had they communicated better with the parties during the process, informed them more clearer on consequences, and had prepared properly for the interview by finding the text message before the interview. The parties had originally agreed to one interview.
Why? Not to inconvenience people and to make sure everyone gets it right before the first and only time.
Most humans have no idea how horrible it can feel to be deposed/or questioned in a deposition-like setting.
It suuuuucks. Clients can sometimes really freak out about it. And you have to talk them down from that, that there aren't lions in the room just people. Even if you aren't accused of anything and are just giving information, people can be scared.
Context Report says the interview was with 4 Big Firm lawyers, for a long time, and some in an accusatory tone. Does Wells or Goodell or anyone care how crappy that must of been? I mean, it's not like fighting wars and stuff, but it is extremely uncomfortable.
I once made a lady weep in a deposition, and I wasn't even trying. Like I'm pretty nice as lawyer type people go. I was just asking basic questions. May have been RBF. Digression.
No tiny violins for McNally, though I wouldn't want to be in this bleep storm for anything. Just saying, discovery disputes happen, and this is some of the reasons for it.
I give no fs about the McNally texts. He denied he did any thing on everything. So what, if Wells talks to McNally again during the investigation. No matter what McNally says, Wells is going to claim he is a liar.
NFL says the equipment guys are lying because of inferences Wells' makes out of text messages. NFL says that Brady is a liar, even though he was under oath at his arbitration.
They can pretend like they'd give a damn about the stupid phone contents or what McNally would say about the texts, but you know that wouldn't have changed ANYTHING. NOT ONE THING. /yelling in my brain sound.
(Technically, the Wells Report did not call these people liars. Because that is not polite. Those are rightfully fighting words. And if you don't know that lying happened for sure, you shouldn't say that in those words. Defamation and whatnot. And they don't know they lied for certain. But that is what they mean, or at least they mean it enough to damage people's reputations and take their money)
To be clear, I do not know what really happened, whether there was tampering or just people stupidly spending millions on the natural deflation of footballs during NFL games. I have no idea. Maybe after the punishment is done, we learn a more fuller accounting of events (or nonevents) as it may be.
!!!! But what I know for a fact is the PROCESS the NFL uses for team and player discipline is whatever is the term that is worse than the dumbest, most expensive in the history of mankind. !!!!
Even the US Government wouldn't spend this much money investigating something this inconsequential. I find it repulsive as a human being, and vulgar and inartful as a lawyer. You can have all sorts of strict policies and still have better, fairer processes to deal with player and team punishment.
And the evidence that definitively proves it is Deflategate. It's existence. There have been other terrible abuses of process in NFL discipline before, but this one is profoundly stupid. If you don't think it is, try explaining it to someone who doesn't know anything about football.
That an equipment violation suspicion turned into this legal mess means they need to have a better, less random, more fair system for dealing with allegations and how they are investigated and disciplined.
I can't think of any of sports league that is so reactive and random on how they handle this bleep. Goodell treats all alleged allegations like the player did disrespectful things to his female family members. Like it's personal. Other leagues just take care of business. Quick. Done.
If you have any more questions, please leave them at my blog post comments. And following my own personal commenting guidelines (I am my own mod lol) I don't mean this to be spammy, I'm just saying I don't have time to hang out here and chat, but would like to answer people's questions on this stuff. Like helping contribute to helpful conversation. Events keep changing on this story, and people think of new stuff with the changing events.
This is obviously me. But I may screenshot this and put it on my @StephStradley twitter to prove it.
For real, sorry for Patriots fans going through this stuff even though that's not my team. Fans like who they like. I would be losing my mind if this was my team coming off a Super Bowl. Can't fathom that. /drives on by
