Rejoice! Today's ESPN Report Just Sank The NFL's Appeal Case!

Think about what "NFL owners forced Goodell's hand in punishing Brady/Patriots because of Spygate 8 years Ago" means for the appeal case.

It means nada.

The appeal before the Second Circuit will (a) be based only the official case record and nothing else, and (b) will be solely about whether or not Berman interpreted law and precedents correctly.

The only way this even potentially comes into play is if (a) CA2 finds for the NFL and remands to Berman, (b) Berman decides he needs to reach the "evident partiality" claim, and (c) the agreement that the NFL and NFLPA made to confine the case to the arbitration hearing record and not seek discovery is allowed to be revoked.

Stephanie Stradley‏@StephStradley
Is there a transcript of Goodell on @MikeandMike? They sounded odd, will look worse on paper. Not advisable to answer qs w/pending appeal.

The appeal wasn't going anywhere anyway.

QuantumMechanic said:

It means nada.

The appeal before the Second Circuit will (a) be based only the official case record and nothing else, and (b) will be solely about whether or not Berman interpreted law and precedents correctly.

The only way this even potentially comes into play is if (a) CA2 finds for the NFL and remands to Berman, (b) Berman decides he needs to reach the "evident partiality" claim, and (c) the agreement that the NFL and NFLPA made to confine the case to the arbitration hearing record and not seek discovery is allowed to be revoked.

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Legally, yes.

I think shmessy's point was, this officially ends the joke of an idea that the NFL would actually appeal.

There will be no appeal - it's back to the PR game.

It was a main piece of the Vincent penalty. But completely missing from Goodell's appeal ruling. Yet Goodell said this morning that the Deflategate penalties had nothing to do with Spygate. But these reports indicate it had everything to do with it.

I'm confused.

The NFL is corrupt, Goodell handled cameraplacementgate so, SO poorly--he probably was trying to protect Kraft, to be honest, but he's a boob and made things way, way worse destroying everything. Kraft put his faith in the wrong man and has backed him come hell or high water. We're seeing the pushback from 31 pissed off owners who are paranoid because the big, bad Patriots keep winning and they truly can't believe it can be done just because of a GOAT QB and coach combo. And they're angry because of the Goody/Kraft relationship, which feeds their paranoia.

Goodell has to go, period. I want the next commish to have zero ties to Kraft (or the Jets), this buddy-buddy relationship is doing no one in the Pats organization a favor, and this deflategate nonsense is a direct result of spygate and all the jealous owners finding conspiracies where there aren't any because of it.

never in my life has a team been penalized first round picks and fined millions of dollars, and it has been critized as being a "light penalty"

The patriots have "gotten off easy" twice now, no other team in the league has been docked a #1, despite constant issues with cheating throughout the league.

chasa said:

never in my life has a team been penalized first round picks and fined millions of dollars, and it has been critized as being a "light penalty"

The patriots have "gotten off easy" twice now, no other team in the league has been docked a #1, despite constant issues with cheating throughout the league.

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They want BB's head. Thats what it has been since 2007.

More wins and much more BB being condescending and terse should do it. What, we got 4 more years of this hopefully? Brady should be around at least that long I think?

Love it.

SVN said:

They want BB's head. Thats what it has been since 2007.

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Maybe he will coach into his 70's after all, just to spite those that want him gone?

Any appeal case was sunk, more precisely DOA, the moment Berman ruled in Brady's favor in the way he did.

Today's coordinated attack (Goodell interview, SI, ESPN) is an indicator the NFL believes the appeal is all but useless. Hence they are going back to a place they believe, or know, they can win, propaganda and media.
Put another way, if they won before Berman would this coordinated attack happen? If they felt confident in their appeal case would this coordinated attack happen? Why would it if they won or confident they are going to win? No need to stick their necks out in the unlikely case the propaganda backfires. They can just sit back and let the win do the talking.

Time to check the old junk for that "He hate me" XFL jersey.

shmessy said:

Think about what "NFL owners forced Goodell's hand in punishing Brady/Patriots because of Spygate 8 years Ago" means for the appeal case.

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what they said was all off the record. doesn't mean anything for the appeal.

If Goodell's statements were to be used in a court of law, under a lawsuit of some sort, I would bet on

-- The continued description of the Wells-Pasch investigation as "independent" for misleading the public

-- Claiming Jastremski and McNally were not suspended under pressure from the League in individual suits for defamation or wrongful termination

TheBostonStraggler said:

Any appeal case was sunk, more precisely DOA, the moment Berman ruled in Brady's favor in the way he did.

Today's coordinated attack (Goodell interview, SI, ESPN) is an indicator the NFL believes the appeal is all but useless. Hence they are going back to a place they believe, or know, they can win, propaganda and media.
Put another way, if they won before Berman would this coordinated attack happen? If they felt confident in their appeal case would this coordinated attack happen? Why would it if they won or confident they are going to win? No need to stick their necks out in the unlikely case the propaganda backfires. They can just sit back and let the win do the talking.

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I think we would still see these articles today. The authors of the ESPN piece claimed to have interviewed 90 people for the article. They didn't just start that process last Thursday afternoon. I think these articles were prepared in anticipation of the league winning in court. When they lost, they had to re-write them to downplay the current "gate" and emphasize the one from 2007.

memento said:

If Goodell's statements were to be used in a court of law, under a lawsuit of some sort, I would bet on

-- The continued description of the Wells-Pasch investigation as "independent" for misleading the public

-- Claiming Jastremski and McNally were not suspended under pressure from the League in individual suits for defamation or wrongful termination

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I can't help but sense that some lawsuits are coming soon after the appeal is resolved. Goodell seems to be posturing and preparing for that inevitability. ESPN seems to be digging it's own grave if the Patriots finally decide to fight back in court.

Koma said:

I think we would still see these articles today. The authors of the ESPN piece claimed to have interviewed 90 people for the article. They didn't just start that process last Thursday afternoon. I think these articles were prepared in anticipation of the league winning in court. When they lost, they had to re-write them to downplay the current "gate" and emphasize the one from 2007.

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Yes. This was supposed to be a pile on piece about how everything pats do is cheating .

Rejoice?

Screw that. I want the appeal to happen. The only time anyone with any degree of impartiality looks at what the NFL is doing, and the only time we get any facts that aren't filtered through the NFL's PR machine is when a judge gets involved. Bring it on...

Not so fast..Coach Bedard on F&M said the NFL can hang its hat on several items in Berman's ruling...there's a good chance Berman will be overruled... What what what??????

fgssand said:

Maybe he will coach into his 70's after all, just to spite those that want him gone?

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I could easily see Belichick coaching into his early 80's, just like a **** Lebeau & Joe Paterno. Coaching is more then a job for Bill, Its his love in love, his passion, and his hobby. You don't read reports of coaches staying late at night, and working 18 hour work days all year, simply because its part of their job, He does it because he loves football. Only way I see him retiring before the age of 70 is if he wins like another 5 superbowls in the next 7 years and just plain gets bored of the game.