I just hope that people really realize what has happened here in the context of the last fifteen years and not just since January of 2015.
The NFL has actively marketed to you this image of Tom Brady ever since 2001, and you've bought into it because, hey, why the heck not??? The imagine seems real. Tom Brady is a man I've wanted to use a shining example to my kids, someone I want to emulate, someone I truly respect and look up to. I freakin' love Tom Brady. I have basically never seen this guy do anything negative. The way he goes about his business, the way he respects his coaches and teammates - wow. What a competitor and an underdog story to boot. I am in the Bay Area, and someone in my neighborhood actually knows Tom Sr. very well. What a guy. What a son. Just a genuine person from a great family, someone who should all admire.
Tom Brady's face is on Sunday Ticket advertisements, along with the NFLs logo. His poster on NFL Network. He is the first face you see on almost every broadcast, the shining example of excellence. How many times do you think you've seen his image as an advertisement? 10,000? More?
Why wouldn't you buy merchandise, tickets, develop on obsession for the league that he dominates?
And after fifteen years of spending your money and devoting your time to Tom Brady, certainly with some help of the league's marketing department and numerous programs that make sure you love, no you LOVE Tom Brady, what would you expect in return?
Would you expect that, at the very least, you would have been able to see an independent investigation, as promised, rather than a hatchet job?
Would you expect that the league would seek the scientific expertise of virtually ANY university of scientific organization that is not-for-profit, rather than going to a sham organization that is notorious for junk science and creating very believable lies? Do you remember way back then, when your original wishes were that the university is somewhere in Massachusetts like MIT, rather than somewhere in New York, for fear of bias. That was enough for you, but you would have taken any answer that was the truth. Do you realize how badly they wanted to stab you in the heart? Turns out, every university in the United States was just waiting to exonerate Tom Brady. Robert Blecker is basically the face of this cause, a man who hates the Patriots but was willing to put aside his sports allegiance and just look at the science. The NFL could have chosen ANY organization to exonerate Tom Brady...even in their own backyard who are Jets fans. Do you think they owed it to you, as a long-time supporter and customer, to merely follow through on their pledge to be objective? Or you don't realize the monumental lengths they went to in order to deny you with a fair answer? Not a SINGLE objective study has supported Exponent. Exponent. E-X-P-O-N-E-N-T. You'd like to continue doing business with a company that used a notorious tobacco propoganda agency, disguised as a scientific organization, for the sole purpose of making you feel terrible about your team and favorite player, all so that Roger Goodell could get an uptick in his favorability ratings and Jim Irsay could smoke his meth in peace?
Would you expect that the league would not actively attempt to turn your hero (who they've been selling to you as a hero for fifteen years) into a Lance Armstrong /Alex Rodriguez cheater, who you actively despise?
Would you expect in return for your business and loyalty that they might release clear information right from the beginning that suggests that your hero is actually innocent? If this were a criminal proceeding, the NFL office would all be in jail right now for failing to turn over pertinent evidence that would help the defendant's case against prosecution. So, do you think that your hero Tom Brady (who you've paid dearly to watch and support, lining the pockets of these very men) should have at least treated him with the same level of decency as a criminal defendant who may have committed a crime?
That's just the legal side there - what about the ethical side? What about the side that just says, hey, we are all human beings here living in a world and should live with decency. Let's not lie about each other. Let's not frame someone. Let's not purposely spread rumors we know to be false to ruin a man's reputation, particularly if that man's reputation is very important to a large group of people who have been paying us, you know, since we've been promoting this man's reputation for a very long time.
While you winced as celebrities made jokes about Tom Brady, while Charles Hayley basically called him something worse than a pedophile, while you were ashamed to wear your Patriots jersey and not sure how loud you should have been during the Super Bowl lead-up, while you felt guilty to be a fan of this team and questioned the previous fifteen years, while one former quarterback after another called Brady a liar and a cheat, while scientists, one by one, botched the IDL, while talk show hosts berated your favorite passion, while national news hosts ran stories about conspiracies, while you basically felt like a cheat, or worse, someone duped by a cheat...during all of this time...Roger Goodell and many others in the NFL front office watched the same thing, strategically formulating when they should release PSI numbers that would exonerate the Patriots, and exactly how and when to downplay those numbers by first finding a red herring to feed the dumb public, especially to you, a very dumb member of the dumb public.
Would you expect that, even with all of these lies to propagate the myth that Brady cheated, they might at least refrain from falsifying testimony, outright lying to you that your hero's conversations? Do you think you deserve better than that? How about being told that Brady wanted to keep the evidence under seal, when in fact the opposite was true?
This was all an exercise to make people feel better and not have to answer for their problems. You feel like crap so that some ignorant, stupid Colts fan could feel better. Those Jets fans sure were rejoicing while you were feeling very depressed. Do you like avoiding the comments section of every Patriots article posted for the last eighteen months because you don't want to hear the same false, yet widely accepted, statements over and over again? You were on the wrong end of a math equation. What's one Patriots fans' misery and anxiety if a 31:1 ratio will love us!!! What, you didn't enjoy Seahawks fans writing a petition because they deserved the Lombardi in 2015? That after ten years of heartbreaking losses, Super Bowl fluke catches, undefeated seasons going up in flames at the last second...did you enjoy the aftermath of being a world champion, sticking with your team with unwavering passion? Were you rewarded for your loyalty? Did you liker a bunch of players comparing the Patriots to the most reviled, illegitimate teams in sports history? Was Andrew Luck salty because he deserved to win that game? Did Jim Irsay feel better, that sack of human garbage, after getting his pound of flesh? How big do you think John Harbaugh's smile was when the report came out?
They did it entirely at your expense.
And here's the thing: at any time, someone could have just stood up and done the right thing. Someone could have just said, "Guys, we've gone too far. We were wrong." And you would feel much better. And they still can. But they won't. Because. they. are. simply. pieces. of. human. garbage. And all this time, you can replay the thousand ways that Roger Goodell can smugly repeat himself, over and over again, over and over again, to every person who will listen, on every news site in the world, that he is protecting. the integrity. of the game.
Now you can talk to your kids about how you worship a man who is regarded by many as a cheater, in the same sentence as Barry Bonds or Ben Johnson. Sure, you'll get past it. In five years, maybe you'll forget about it or be able to minimize it. But you shouldn't have to. Because you deserve better.
