The more time that goes on, the more I have trouble rooting for Kraft

sb1 said:

But if Kraft's decision gives people a good reason to call our team cheaters....and it forces us to defend them all the time - then it becomes our business.

I will always love this team and appreciate his ownership but he screwed up, big time. Period. And I think he understands that now.

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I couldn't care less about what other fans say. Haters are gonna hate regardless. What I care about is the narrative once Brady steps foot into Canton. You can bet that part of the narrative about Deflategate is going to be the fact that ownership stepped back and accepted the penalties without so much as a whimper, which a lot of people took as a partial admission of guilt in the media. Hell, Kraft knew this which is why he put out that half assed attack before the season openers (I would suspect also because he didn't want to get booed). You'll notice that, in that speech, he never once openly attacked Goodell or even mentioned him by name. Instead, he attacked everyone else in the league office. He's spineless.

sb1 said:

Kraft's screwup damaged the perception of this team in a big way.

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There wasn't an NFL forum, besides this one, that didn't have asterisks after the Patriots name long before Deflategate.

KontradictioN said:

I couldn't care less about what other fans say. Haters are gonna hate regardless. What I care about is the narrative once Brady steps foot into Canton.

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If you're not concerned about the fans, whose narrative are you talking about?

tom444 said:

If you're not concerned about the fans, whose narrative are you talking about?

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The people that vote Brady in and the pundits, Tommy Boy. You don't think Deflategate is something that's going to come up when the time comes?

Joker said:

meh..I'm unimpressed. I broke into a rundown closed up Holiday Inn last night and slept on the floor..

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How was the coffee?

tom444 said:

Stop paying to go to his house than.

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You missed the point. Because I do that I have an interest in what happens, while it is none of your business if some dude cheats on his wife.
Are you seriously telling me that Kraft has no obligation to his paying fans?

IllegalContact said:

I think Kraft started the process extremely naive......He took the penalty believing it they would back off of Brady......The situation is still one that bizarrely has 2 entities penalized as though they are both primary perpetrators

Kraft set himself up ...... and now all he can do is piss in the wind

it's a sucky spot to be in which is why I prefer to move on and just accept the fact that the picks are gone

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I disagree. Kraft knew what he was doing. He had 2 separate agendas.
1) What is best for the Patriots
2) The owners maintaining their power over their competition, the NFLPA and the players.

The backroom discussions were the other owners reminding Kraft that an owner challenging the authority of the commissioner weakens 'the 32' because it gives the players more opportunity to challenge him and weakness the strangehold the league has on the NFLPA.

Kraft could have easily demonstrated to the other owners that this was an exception, that they were being penalized for nothing, and that 'the 32' needed to reign in Goodell. If he had done that, then appealed the penalty, citing his own science, 'the 32' could have instructed Goodell to overrule Wells, and find no violation actually occurred.

Kraft chose not to do that, but instead, to stop the rhetoric.

tom444 said:

Apparently you couldn't grasp my analogy. Let me repeat it. If you want to cheat on your wife that's your business. If Kraft wants to go along with the league office, that's his business. Your marriage. His team. Get it?

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That's as idiotic as it gets. Sports teams rely on their fans for support and wouldn't exist without them so they have a responsibility to those fans and standing up for the franchise when it's under attack is one of those responsibilities. Comparing that to an interpersonal relationship is ridiculous.

AndyJohnson said:

I disagree. Kraft knew what he was doing. He had 2 separate agendas.
1) What is best for the Patriots
2) The owners maintaining their power over their competition, the NFLPA and the players.

The backroom discussions were the other owners reminding Kraft that an owner challenging the authority of the commissioner weakens 'the 32' because it gives the players more opportunity to challenge him and weakness the strangehold the league has on the NFLPA.

Kraft could have easily demonstrated to the other owners that this was an exception, that they were being penalized for nothing, and that 'the 32' needed to reign in Goodell. If he had done that, then appealed the penalty, citing his own science, 'the 32' could have instructed Goodell to overrule Wells, and find no violation actually occurred.

Kraft chose not to do that, but instead, to stop the rhetoric.

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You are assuming that the other owners actually are open-minded and legitimately interested in ensuring that Goody demonstrate fairness towards the Patriots.

KontradictioN said:

I couldn't care less about what other fans say. Haters are gonna hate regardless. What I care about is the narrative once Brady steps foot into Canton. You can bet that part of the narrative about Deflategate is going to be the fact that ownership stepped back and accepted the penalties without so much as a whimper, which a lot of people took as a partial admission of guilt in the media. Hell, Kraft knew this which is why he put out that half assed attack before the season openers (I would suspect also because he didn't want to get booed). You'll notice that, in that speech, he never once openly attacked Goodell or even mentioned him by name. Instead, he attacked everyone else in the league office. He's spineless.

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And when Brady gets on the HOF ballot, be ready for a vast wing of Patriot-hater voters to play the "we need to send a message" and prolong Brady's enshrinement......and a common theme will be....."Bob Kraft knew the truth about Brady's role in Deflategate and quickly accepted guilt and punishment.....but Brady never admitted the truth."

robertweathers said:

You are assuming that the other owners actually are open-minded and legitimately interested in ensuring that Goody demonstrate fairness towards the Patriots.

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Of course they would be if he made a case.
Kraft is their partner. Goodell is their employee.
People on this board act as if the owners work for Goodell.

Do you honestly think there is an owner out there who, if he knew that the Patriots were being punished for doing absolutely nothing wrong, would put up a fight against getting it right?

Kraft was very lazy in this. He thought sound bites would handle it.
He should have inserted himself into the Wells investigation. He should have never stood for the crap the league office was pulling on his legal staff. He should have conducted his own independent review. He should have had a report ready months before the Wells report came out that proved nothing happened, and the Wells report would have been dead on arrival.
Do you really think the owners would have teamed up against Kraft in order to make sure he got penalized for something he didn't do?

KontradictioN said:

I couldn't care less about what other fans say. Haters are gonna hate regardless. What I care about is the narrative once Brady steps foot into Canton. You can bet that part of the narrative about Deflategate is going to be the fact that ownership stepped back and accepted the penalties without so much as a whimper, which a lot of people took as a partial admission of guilt in the media. Hell, Kraft knew this which is why he put out that half assed attack before the season openers (I would suspect also because he didn't want to get booed). You'll notice that, in that speech, he never once openly attacked Goodell or even mentioned him by name. Instead, he attacked everyone else in the league office. He's spineless.

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Exactly. The Brady to Canton narrative will undoubtedly mention psi and columnists & voters will cite the owner's non-defense in their passive-aggressive writings.

Many of us saw Kraft's latest 180 degree spin back to vague league criticism as a self-serving means to deflate rising fan criticism pre-season. Kraft's manipulation of fan attitude worked brilliantly. They fell for it.

AndyJohnson said:

I disagree. Kraft knew what he was doing. He had 2 separate agendas.
1) What is best for the Patriots
2) The owners maintaining their power over their competition, the NFLPA and the players.

The backroom discussions were the other owners reminding Kraft that an owner challenging the authority of the commissioner weakens 'the 32' because it gives the players more opportunity to challenge him and weakness the strangehold the league has on the NFLPA.

Kraft could have easily demonstrated to the other owners that this was an exception, that they were being penalized for nothing, and that 'the 32' needed to reign in Goodell. If he had done that, then appealed the penalty, citing his own science, 'the 32' could have instructed Goodell to overrule Wells, and find no violation actually occurred.

Kraft chose not to do that, but instead, to stop the rhetoric.

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Both agree & disagree with the bold. Kraft should have done so. But he knew and we know that the other 31 would never have turned to support him. Still, the gesture would have supported the reputations of BB and TFB.

The WORST thing about this is that Bob "Please Sir, May I Have Another?" Kraft has set 2 precedents that he will passively let molehills made into mountains and blatant nonexistent accusations rob his franchise of picks and destroy the public reputations of his beyond excellent hard working employees.

He has served notice to the still vengeful Other 31 that he is still open for business as their willing target.
We self-destructed on our own this season but should the Pats Jugernaught re-emerge in 2016, be prepared for the Other 31 to take Kraft's lunch money again.

KontradictioN said:

The people that vote Brady in and the pundits, Tommy Boy. You don't think Deflategate is something that's going to come up when the time comes?

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This is what you said: "once Brady steps foot into Canton." So if he has stepped into Canton at that point the people who vote him in have spoken. As for the pundits? Most of them know deflategate was BS, and those that don't aren't worth listening to.

Now, if you meant they'll hold back on voting him in because of deflategate, nonsense.

Ivan said:

Comparing that to an interpersonal relationship is ridiculous.

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If you follow the thread you'll see that I wasn't the one who brought up the interpersonal relationship analogy.

AndyJohnson said:

Of course they would be if he made a case.
Kraft is their partner. Goodell is their employee.
People on this board act as if the owners work for Goodell.

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When it comes to discipline players and even franchises as long as he doesn't go completely off the rails (see Bountygate) the owners give Goody absolute power.

AndyJohnson said:

Do you honestly think there is an owner out there who, if he knew that the Patriots were being punished for doing absolutely nothing wrong, would put up a fight against getting it right?

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I'm sure that there are some owners out there who believe that the Patriots were railroaded, but for fear of "not going along" or not supporting Goodell they chose to remain silent.

AndyJohnson said:

Kraft was very lazy in this. He thought sound bites would handle it.
He should have inserted himself into the Wells investigation. He should have never stood for the crap the league office was pulling on his legal staff. He should have conducted his own independent review. He should have had a report ready months before the Wells report came out that proved nothing happened, and the Wells report would have been dead on arrival.

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I agree 100% You fight the fights worth fighting. He chose to be cowardly and take the path of least resistance.

AndyJohnson said:

Do you really think the owners would have teamed up against Kraft in order to make sure he got penalized for something he didn't do?

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I think that is what happened. You had some owners who thought that Goody was soft on the Patriots re: Spygate. You had some that suffer from Patri-hate and sick of getting their asses kicked and you have some who go along with Goody and the other influential owners. The rest most likely sympathized with Kraft but were ambivalent to the entire situation.

KontradictioN said:

I couldn't care less about what other fans say. Haters are gonna hate regardless. What I care about is the narrative once Brady steps foot into Canton. You can bet that part of the narrative about Deflategate is going to be the fact that ownership stepped back and accepted the penalties without so much as a whimper, which a lot of people took as a partial admission of guilt in the media. Hell, Kraft knew this which is why he put out that half assed attack before the season openers (I would suspect also because he didn't want to get booed). You'll notice that, in that speech, he never once openly attacked Goodell or even mentioned him by name. Instead, he attacked everyone else in the league office. He's spineless.

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I agree, I have a big problem with the way he has continued to take the slander coming out of the league office, some of it as recent as Super Bowl week. Kraft only issued his mea culpa because he was worried about getting booed heavily at the opener and once he got that out of the way he went right back to turtling whenever the league issued another attack, and he continues to excuse Goodell from the responsibility of being behind all that has happened over the past year. It's time for Kraft to step down and let his son take over.

tom444 said:

This is what you said: "once Brady steps foot into Canton." So if he has stepped into Canton at that point the people who vote him in have spoken. As for the pundits? Most of them know deflategate was BS, and those that don't aren't worth listening to.

Now, if you meant they'll hold back on voting him in because of deflategate, nonsense.

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Nobody denies he'll get into Canton. He will. He's the GOAT. But that narrative will definitely follow him into the Hall and it will be something they discuss, probably at length, before, during, and after they vote him in. Part of it will be ownership simply accepting the punishments. If you don't believe that, I have a beautiful piece of beach front real estate in Nevada to sell you.

KontradictioN said:

Nobody denies he'll get into Canton. He will.

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Case closed. We're onto the 2016 season.

robertweathers said:

When it comes to discipline players and even franchises as long as he doesn't go completely off the rails (see Bountygate) the owners give Goody absolute power.

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He went completely off the rails...again.

I'm sure that there are some owners out there who believe that the Patriots were railroaded, but for fear of "not going along" or not supporting Goodell they chose to remain silent.

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If Kraft took his case to them, if Kraft fought like a reasonable person should have, a vast majority would know.
Look Goodell looks like a total buffoon with his understanding and statements regarding this. He speaks for them. I'm sure they would rather have a representative who is viewed as smart, fair and thoughtful than this.

I agree 100% You fight the fights worth fighting. He chose to be cowardly and take the path of least resistance.



I think that is what happened. You had some owners who thought that Goody was soft on the Patriots re: Spygate. You had some that suffer from Patri-hate and sick of getting their asses kicked and you have some who go along with Goody and the other influential owners. The rest most likely sympathized with Kraft but were ambivalent to the entire situation.

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Totally agree they were ambivalent and it was his job to get them involved, and show them why it was in their best interest.
I don't buy the idea that the owners hate us cuz they aint us.

That's disgusting to cheat on spouse no matter what is the age of the relationship

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