Cousins (and to you Mr. King of the inquiring mind!),
What the naive Mr. King may not realize is that perhaps the league DID find out something in those tapes, which curiously seemed like BB was more than happy to cooperate with. Why did BB even keep those old tapes if it is the opinion of the league coaches that the signals are changed on a weekly basis anyway. What good are they? Maybe the tapes were destroyed because the Pats had some disturbing items on the tapes that would have led to more of a scandal about other teams and their practices than what Goodell even dreamed about.
I still believe that BB had something figured out and had an "insurance policy". That "insurance policy" was destroyed by Goodell.
Why would BB "blatantly" not conform to a league "memo" that was distributed in such a short order to the "crime". Why indeed to all you "cheater" accusers? Is BB stupid? Is he not one to attend to the smallest detail?
BB said he interpreted the rules a different way. We'll never know what he saw in the rules but I will guarantee there was a logical explanation for someone as intelligent as Mr. BB. You know he will not elaborate. His desire is just to go on. He did not drag other people down with him and we know he could have. Was this simply the theory of "It is easier to ask forgiveness than permission"?
Goodell came out along with the NFL and declared that there was nothing on those tapes to implicate the Pats in any other wrong doing, but nothing was said about the other 31 teams and the tapes were destroyed at "warp speed". Perhaps I am looking at this cynically, but if "no harm, no foul" was the case it arched my eyebrows. This was made out to be a bigger case than the Lindberg kidnapping and yet not one snippet was commented on about the details of these NFL "porn" movies? Hell, Goodells' wifes couldn't even get it out of him this time. Something big was up Mr. King and you are barking up the wrong tree. I say Goodell cut a deal with Kraft when the tapes were presented and viewed. Kraft first said he was furious then he backed off and accepted the penalty for the good of the league. I say BB had the goods on someone or many, and there was a tussle with Kraft interceding and telling BB to back off.
How many of the cousins out there believe that BB would not do this without reason or recourse? Mr King you should be the first yea voter! There is a much bigger cover up that was swept under the carpet and the BB made the perfect sacrifice being he is hated for his cold and no nonsense success by every non-Pats fan in the world, but every owner in the league (all 31) including the owners that employee Mr. Dungy would swap for BB right now. Goodells' thoughts were perhaps who else could have this roll off his back and who cares less about his own ego as any coach in the NFL? All he wants is to coach the perfect game.
Oh Yeh, Mr. Colinsworth, you as an attorney should do more due-diligence about how and why BB did this, what was on the tapes (supena Goodell for cryin out loud) and then judge if this was "Worse than Vick or Pacman". As far as I know, no living beings have ceased to exist with this over publicized common place (emphasize this) rules infraction.
As the Good Reverend Mr. Dungy stated about how this Pats thing really hurt the integrity of the game and yet his GM advocated persons on the Pats have their legs broken by some of the 53 Colts Apostles, and "Oh, by the way Tony I changed the game so we can win it this time" through my position on the NFL rules committee. Tony has to remove the "log" from his eye.
DW Toys