Screw You Manish Mehta!

[BradyManny]

If the investigation found hard evidence of them tampering, I think the punishment will be severe. I didn't think so before, but this is a reactionary league and the league is upset that so many teams gave the league office the middle finger about tampering rules and published deals before they were legally allowed to even negotiate deals. They may want to make an example of the Jets.

They may, but from reading the article, it makes it sound like the league was pretty open about their investigation into the Jets that week. If anything, this action prevented wrongdoing by the Jets, rather than trying to set them up for punishment. The Jets know got away with one with Woody's comments mid-season. You aren't going to peel out & speed away from a cop who lets you drive off with a warning.

 

[Galeb]

If the investigation found hard evidence of them tampering, I think the punishment will be severe. I didn't think so before, but this is a reactionary league and the league is upset that so many teams gave the league office the middle finger about tampering rules and published deals before they were legally allowed to even negotiate deals. They may want to make an example of the Jets.

I hope you're right, but if that was the NFL's intent, it almost surely would have been a significant topic in Peter King's weekly MMQB article. Perhaps they wanted to wait until they had more evidence before having their puppet report on it?

 

[Gator Mike]

Doesn't matter if it's the Jets or the Jags... You don't send the message to the rest of the league that you don't care if they blatantly tamper with your players.

 

[RobertWeathers]

So let me get this straight:

NFL suspects Patriots of wrong-doing. Don't let them know. Send goon league official to ensnare them in a trap.

NFL suspects Jets of wrong-doing. Send league official to babysit them so they can't do something they'd need to punish them for.

Got it.

It's maddening...

 

[Rob0729]

They may, but from reading the article, it makes it sound like the league was pretty open about their investigation into the Jets that week. If anything, this action prevented wrongdoing by the Jets, rather than trying to set them up for punishment. The Jets know got away with one with Woody's comments mid-season. You aren't going to peel out & speed away from a cop who lets you drive off with a warning.

IDK, the only thing I saw in the article that even suggests the league didn't find anything was Mehta calling it a witch hunt.

The league has never prevented a team from signing a player. Don't even know if they have the power to do that. So I don't know if the fact that they let the Jets sign Revis is a statement of innocence or no evidence found. I think if the league blocked Revis from signing with the Jets, the NFLPA would be up on their arses and they would lose any challenge. They won't let the league punish the player for the team violating the tampering rules.

Odds are still good that they didn't find anything and the Pats will get a mid round pick, but who knows. The one thing I do know is the Jets have a tampering investigation on them at the wrong time because the league wants to send a message to the rest of the league.

 

[BradyManny]

I think if the league blocked Revis from signing with the Jets, the NFLPA would be up on their arses and they would lose any challenge. They won't let the league punish the player for the team violating the tampering rules.

Absolutely. I wouldn't expect the NFL to prevent a player from signing either. But if it were a witch-hunt, the NFL would've been more surreptitious about the whole thing. Sending an investigator there just means the Jets had to do everything on the level. It's a means of forcing compliance, not of finding evidence needed to punish.

 

[The Gr8est]

They may, but from reading the article, it makes it sound like the league was pretty open about their investigation into the Jets that week. If anything, this action prevented wrongdoing by the Jets, rather than trying to set them up for punishment. The Jets know got away with one with Woody's comments mid-season. You aren't going to peel out & speed away from a cop who lets you drive off with a warning.

That is a good point. Were the Rats investigated like the Pats were for Deflategate - ie was it a "gotcha" - or a case where they were warned up front that they were being watched?

 

[Rob0729]

Absolutely. I wouldn't expect the NFL to prevent a player from signing either. But if it were a witch-hunt, the NFL would've been more surreptitious about the whole thing. Sending an investigator there just means the Jets had to do everything on the level. It's a means of forcing compliance, not of finding evidence needed to punish.

What was missing from Mehta's piece was that the Jets were one of several teams that were investigated at the same time. So were the Dolphins with Suh and the Eagles with several players. It wasn't a case of babysitting. It was a case that the tampering was ridiculous during the "legal" tampering period and the league got fed up and went to investigate the most likely offenders.

You really think the Jets haven't been in contact with Revis and his agent before the 8th?

I don't think the Pats had anything to do with the league coming to the Jets' offices. I think they were just part of a bigger issue that the league wanted to address.

 

[Ivan]

The most serious aspect of the Jets tampering was the Woody Johnson press conference. The reason that Revis did not return to the Jets in 2014 was because Woody Johnson made it clear he didn't want him back and wouldn't pay him after the repeated holdouts when he was there before.

Once Woody did a public about face and declared he really wanted him back there was no way the Patriots could re-sign Revis because he knew the Jets had unlimited cap space and a billionaire owner who would give him whatever he wanted and would keep going up on his bids until the Patriots couldn't match it. Johnson knew he had tampered and tried to apologize for it. Then the Jets repeatedly leaked that they were having high level internal discussions about signing Revis, despite the fact that he wasn't slated to be a free agent, which culminated with leaking the actual details to their beat writer a week before free agency began, and then signing him to that deal just hours after free agency began.

Regardless of Mehta's attempt to obfuscate all of this now it is by far and away the worst case of tampering in league history and Kraft should make it clear he has no desire for anything in 2016 because the real damage was done to this seasons team and demand the Jets first rounder this season.

SUCK ON THAT JETFANS

 

[Rob0729]

That is a good point. We're the Rats investigated like the Pats were for Deflategate, ie was it a "gotcha" or a case where they were warned up front that they were being watched?

No. This was in response to all the deals announced through rumors on Saturday. The league took action on Sunday targeting the worst offenders including the Jets, Dolphins, and Eagles.

This is why it is a spin job by Mehta. He doesn't mention the Dolphins and Eagles were investigated too. He doesn't mention that the fact that the league started to investigate teams was because other teams were blatantly tampering with no regards of the rules on Saturday. He made it look like the Pats called the league to ask them to investigate the Jets. It wasn't the case. They were just already on the radar because of Johnson's comments.

 

[Ivan]

It's maddening...

The league front office is riddled with former Jets employees. Regardless of that it's time for Kraft to use his influence on Goodell and slam the Jets.

 

[MitchKumstein]

Jerry Thornton pointed out yesterday that when San Fran tampered with Lance Briggs, the NFL made the 49ers switch 3rd round picks with the Bears and also took away their 5th round pick.

And that was the penalty even though Briggs stayed in Chicago.

Given that Revis ended up signing with the team that tampered with him, one would think that the penalty would be worse for the jets.

A switch of second round picks with the Patriots and the loss of the jets' 5th round pick sounds about right.

Then again, that would make sense in the real world. Probably not in the world where the league is run by a bunch of ex-jets employees

 

[ctpatsfan77]

Based on Goodell's history, the Pats are in line to get a Jets' draft pick for tampering. That is almost a given. Depending what the investigators found on March 8th or any time while Revis was under contract with the Pats of contact with Revis (if they found any), that draft pick could be a low mid rounder up to the #6 overall. To get the first, there would need to be hard evidence of the Jets contacting Revis before he became a free agent.

As a reminder, it would be a departure from past punishments if the Pats get a draft pick from the JEST.

In both of the previous cases, the offending team has forfeited a draft pick and swapped draft picks with the aggrieved team.

If the Pats get #6, they'll almost certainly be giving up #32 in the process (not that most of us would mind).

 

[BradyManny]

No. This was in response to all the deals announced through rumors on Saturday. The league took action on Sunday targeting the worst offenders including the Jets, Dolphins, and Eagles.

Perhaps, but how does that change the point about the nature of the two investigations, deflategate v tampergate? The action was much more pre-emptive in the latter.

 

[ctpatsfan77]

IDK, the only thing I saw in the article that even suggests the league didn't find anything was Mehta calling it a witch hunt.

The league has never prevented a team from signing a player. Don't even know if they have the power to do that. So I don't know if the fact that they let the Jets sign Revis is a statement of innocence or no evidence found. I think if the league blocked Revis from signing with the Jets, the NFLPA would be up on their arses and they would lose any challenge. They won't let the league punish the player for the team violating the tampering rules.

In extraordinary cases, the Commissioner has the right to terminate an existing contract, or even, IIRC, transfer players from one team to another, but he needs a 3/4 vote of the owners to do it.

 

[YOUGOTMOSSED]

The Ron Borges of the Jets' world seems to be sucking up to the Jets' base to win them back by writing a hack piece on the fact that the league investigated the Jets' offices on March 8th. To save you from clicking on the link, I will post the key points:



First Manish, who knows if the League investigated the Jets on the Pats request or possibly the fact you posted the Jets' contract offer on Twitter a full day before Revis was released. From his Twitter account a day before the Jets could legally talk to Revis:



https://twitter.com/MMehtaNYDN/status/575264683030102016

Now that was posted a day BEFORE Revis was a free agent and he signed with the Jets for $48 million over the first three years and $39 million fully guaranteed. Either Mehta is Nostradamaus or he was fed information by the Jets. Yet he is questioning the Pats' character.

Second, Deflategate right now is a nothing more than allegation that we have no idea has any truth.



The Jets' facilities are not much closer to Manhattan than either Boston or Providence. Sure you can argue the differences between NYC and Boston or Providence, but he acts like Foxboro is in Springfield.



Silly league rule?!? You mean like crying to the league about the Pats videoing something that was in plain view to 80,000 people in the Meadowlands that day?



First, Jason Lycht, the Bucs' GM, is a Belichick disciple. He may have given the Pats' permission to speak to Revis.

Second, it was widely reported he didn't turn to the Patriots until the Jets turned him down. So another case of the Jets tampering.

Third, yes the league looks the other way on tampering, but they do punish people who do it stupidly. If the Pats tampered, they did it the way the league looks the other way. The Jets did it stupidly.


http://www.nydailynews.com/sports/football/jets/mehta-petty-patriots-wrong-nfl-jets-revis-article-1.2156249?utm_content=bufferfbec0&utm_medium=social&utm_source=twitter.com&utm_campaign=mmehta twitter

Sounds like there might be a significant punishment coming for the Jets for tampering (and no not their first rounder unless they found evidence of tampering on the 8th) and they are going on the offensive to make the story the Patriots are being petty rather than them actually tampering with with Revis.

The problem isn't some hack reporter who writes for a daily NY tabloid for semi-literate NYC denizens. The problem is NY seems to be over represented in the NFL office resulting in wildly inconsistent rulings in matters involving the Patriots vs. matters involving the Jets. Throwing Goodell and Kensil out on their happy asses would be a good start. Moving the NFL offices out of that rat-infested sh*thole they call a city would be an even better start if it can possibly be done.

 

[ctpatsfan77]

Jerry Thornton pointed out yesterday that when San Fran tampered with Lance Briggs, the NFL made the 49ers switch 3rd round picks with the Bears and also took away their 5th round pick.

And that was the penalty even though Briggs stayed in Chicago.

Given that Revis ended up signing with the team that tampered with him, one would think that the penalty would be worse for the jets.

A switch of second round picks with the Patriots and the loss of the jets' 5th round pick sounds about right.

Then again, that would make sense in the real world. Probably not in the world where the league is run by a bunch of ex-jets employees

The JEST don't have a 5 this year.

Also, the penalty here should be more severe than the Bears case, since (A) there were multiple occasions, and (B) at least one of them involved an owner previously warned about tampering.

 

[Rob0729]

Perhaps, but how does that change the point about the nature of the two investigations, deflategate v tampergate? The action was much more pre-emptive in the latter.

Until we see the Wells Report we will not know. It could be a case that Kensil acted alone in Deflategate in the sting (it was a poorly executed sting) while Goodell and the rest of the league office was involved in the tampering stuff.

But I don't know if the Jets' investigation was preemptive at all. Odds are that the Jets were in contact with Revis and his agent since the Combines and it was reactive after all these other teams struck deals with the biggest named free agents illegally.

 

[AzorianPats]

As I said in my last post, I am guessing that there is a chance it could be a first rounder, but Goodell is too scared to take away the 6th overall pick.

Besides, I think the league wants the Jets to get Mariota because they want their NY teams to be relevant with a franchise level QB. Granted, I don't know if Mariota is that guy. In fact, I tend to doubt it.

Scared of the circumstances. Imaging awarding the 6th overall pick in the draft to the defending SB champs, and the most dominant team the last 15 years????

LOL the competition committee would go nuts!

 

[sieglo]

Mehta is just covering his ass because he was part of the Jets plan to get Revis back. As you said, he had the contract numbers while Revis was still a Patriot(I wonder how that might be...). Of course he wants to make this whole thing a non-issue, because he was a part of it.

It's possible he heard the numbers from Revis' camp.