NFL News OT: Dolphins Owner Steven Ross Suspended, Picks Forfeited, For Tampering With Brady, Payton

[venecol]

I remain unconvinced BB wanted him. His energy and commitment to the team was less.

It's more likely BB, Bob provided lip service in terms of wanting Tom to stay.

I think Bill underestimated Brady. Bill really thought that Brady would stay and take the haircut he was offered. It was reported Bill was surprised when Brady told him he was leaving. Proof is the total lack of a QB succession plan by Bill. Unless we really believe Bill thought Stidham was it (not).

 

[lancerman]

You don’t talk to your enemy…period.

See this is why you are a homer and it’s merely team loyalty with you. The vast majority of people here can be fans of the Patriots and be critical of poor decisions. You on the other hand live in a childish fantasy world where rival teams are the enemy and it’s sacrilege to talk to them.

Brady was an employee of the Patriots. At the end of the day it’s his job and he performs a service in exchange for the value of his contract. It is business.

In no other scenario would people besmirch a long time employee if they went to their employer for contract negotiations and asked to be locked in for several years, had the employer refuse that and create a situation where they were released at the end of the year, and then in the employees final year he talked to a rival company in the industry about his future.

Nobody in the real world would say the employee owes the employers any favors in that situation. But you can’t divorce your fanboyism from it and look at in any realistic manner so you have to dress it up like it’s some grand betrayal and another team is this despicable enemy like he’s defecting from the US to Russia.

No he was doing a job, his employer didn’t want to commit to him, his contract was running out and he was preparing for his future, a future his employer didn’t want to guarantee they would be part.

It’s just suck low logic coming from the typical jilted lover.

 

[RobertWeathers]

How did you come up with your response from what I said? Brady asked for extensions and hes the one that didnt want to be here?

Not in the summer of 2019 and certainly not after the 1yr deal he signed.

Everything else is lip service and PR

 

[All3Phases]

Not in the summer of 2019 and certainly not after the 1yr deal he signed.

Everything else is lip service

Theres reporting that he asked for extensions after 2017 and 2018, in which they denied. Why would you deny that if you wanted him? You understand this right? Seems like you just jump to a random point in time. Even til the second that he left, they never put an offer in front of him matching what he got on the market

 

[Wozzy]

Brady is clearly being propped up by his weapons in Tampa, which NE didn’t have…if he stayed here it would be more of 2019

Brady wanted a longer more secure contract, but by that point the team had pushed enough cap down the road and had only employed older vet players for years... they aged out and reached the end of their resources.

As important as TB was the to the franchise, the ultimate goal was never to ensure that he retired a Patriot, especially if it ensured they had zero chance at winning a Super Bowl for the final years of his stay here.

The goal is to win Super Bowls, the fastest path back to relevance and a real shot at that was tearing it down and starting over.

There's little room for sentimentality in pro football.

 

[XLIX]

Don't like the dolphins. But frankly, this is BS. Everyone tampers. This should be a slap on the wrist. A 1st, 3rd and suspension is way over kill.

I agree - which is why I think the punishment is really about something else.

 

[Vindicate]

I feel like folks tend to forget that the NFL is a job within a business, just the same as anyone else's job.

 

[JarOfMayo51]

I think the lack of pushback on this and other posts saying similar things shows even the hard core Brady supporters have a hard time refuting this idea.

I agree with what you and others wrote, Tom is still the GOAT on the field, and owes New England exactly nothing.

At the same time it's hard to deny he did change over the years and a lot of that was due to his wife's influence.

I don't think that's a terrible thing because one is supposed to learn things from one's life partner, while some Bradyites seem to think making such admissions some how is an attack on Brady's masculinity.

Objectively speaking, she was right. It was a good time for Brady to decide he had enough here and he should look for greener pastures. Clearly NE was falling out of their window while Tampa was just entering theirs. He got more money than NE was putting on the table, moved to a nicer climate, led his team to another SB win which further enhanced his legacy, and secured the highest salary ever for a NFL TV commentator. For all we know he might be the next Terry Bradshaw or Al Michels, collecting big paychecks deep into their 70s.

As a Patriots fan this perhaps isn't the ideal way for things to end, but as above, he owes us nothing. Endings are messy, and IMO it could have been far worse. I predict in a few years both Brady and Gronk will show up for their red jackets. Time has a way of healing wounds. If they don't, oh well, we still got the trophies.

Great post, I hope that time heals all these wounds and we see them in red jackets

I get nervous that it will turn into a Peyton Manning/Colts situation... I don't think Peyton has been back to Lucas Oil Stadium ever since he left to Denver, he never talks about them, etc... its like he just erased them from his mind

Even superstar players have strong emotions like us normal plebs

 

[RobertWeathers]

I think Bill underestimated Brady. Bill really thought that Brady would stay and take the haircut he was offered. It was reported Bill was surprised when Brady told him he was leaving. Proof is the total lack of a QB succession plan by Bill. Unless we really believe Bill thought Stidham was it (not).

He had a succession plan and Brady outlived it.

Bill saw the need to rebuild after the 2019 season.

I don't buy for a second Bill was surprised Tom walked.

 

[Bill Lee]

The first half of your post basically says, BB wanted Brady, strictly on his terms. Thats not how negotiations work. Brady wanted a multi year deal (which was still a bargain) and was denied multiple times. They had every chance to pay him and they didnt

IMO, given Tom was turning 43 as he became a free agent, IMO it'd be risky to pay him top of market rates especially on a team with other highly paid aging vets. Fans wanted Tom to get that top of market contract just out of fandom, not out of objective analysis. Putting 43 year old Tom on the team we had the last two years would have been bad for Tom and bad for the team. There was no fairy tale ending to be had here. We were on the way down, Tampa was on the way up. Given that Mac fell into our laps, it was better for Tom, better for the league as a whole, and better for the Patriots long term that Tom moved on when he did.

 

[RobertWeathers]

Theres reporting that he asked for extensions after 2017 and 2018, in which they denied. Why would you deny that if you wanted him? You understand this right? Seems like you just jump to a random point in time. Even til the second that he left, they never put an offer in front of him matching what he got on the market

No. Let me be clear.

I'm sure he wanted to stay in 2017. The financials didn't work for NE and they wanted to go year to year with him. Tom didn't like that and that's fine.

In Aug of 2019 he wanted to leave and Bill knew it

 

[SHOWTIME15]

See this is why you are a homer and it’s merely team loyalty with you. The vast majority of people here can be fans of the Patriots and be critical of poor decisions. You on the other hand live in a childish fantasy world where rival teams are the enemy and it’s sacrilege to talk to them.

Brady was an employee of the Patriots. At the end of the day it’s his job and he performs a service in exchange for the value of his contract. It is business.

In no other scenario would people besmirch a long time employee if they went to their employer for contract negotiations and asked to be locked in for several years, had the employer refuse that and create a situation where they were released at the end of the year, and then in the employees final year he talked to a rival company in the industry about his future.

Nobody in the real world would say the employee owes the employers any favors in that situation. But you can’t divorce your fanboyism from it and look at in any realistic manner so you have to dress it up like it’s some grand betrayal and another team is this despicable enemy like he’s defecting from the US to Russia.

No he was doing a job, his employer didn’t want to commit to him, his contract was running out and he was preparing for his future, a future his employer didn’t want to guarantee they would be part.

It’s just suck low logic coming from the typical jilted lover.

I hate to tell you, buddy, we are fans here, and this fanbase gave Brady 20 years of loyalty. There are certain things you don't do to your fanbase. One is to seek employment with a rival team while you are still employed by said team. That is, unless you don't care about your fanbase...

 

[venecol]

Don't like the dolphins. But frankly, this is BS. Everyone tampers. This should be a slap on the wrist. A 1st, 3rd and suspension is way over kill. Of course out stuff should have been small potatoes too. The NFL is just stupid about these things.

The only thing i think should cost a team draft picks is when you go beyond the cap or you coach steps out the feild to get in a players way and effect a play. Stuff like that.

Except if they only hand out a slap on the wrist, then the focus goes to the tanking and how they just buried it. Instead we have the reactions you see here: BRADY.

This thread should be about the pos Ross that offered Flores $ to throw games. Ross should be forced to sell. Instead it's a smorgasboard of Brady haters making up conspiracy theories to continue their hate. If I didn't know better, you'd think this was a Colts, Jete, Steelers forum.

 

[JarOfMayo51]

Don't like the dolphins. But frankly, this is BS. Everyone tampers. This should be a slap on the wrist. A 1st, 3rd and suspension is way over kill. Of course out stuff should have been small potatoes too. The NFL is just stupid about these things.

The only thing i think should cost a team draft picks is when you go beyond the cap or you coach steps out the feild to get in a players way and effect a play. Stuff like that.

the harsh penalty was for the blatant tanking that Ross was pushing, which is an insanely egregious violation. The NFL doesn't want to deal with the tsunami of **** that would come with that, so they penalized the Dolphins heavily for the tampering to apply punishment indirectly for the tanking

Along the same lines as to why Deflategate punishment was so severe, to satisfy a couple powerful owners that felt they didn't get their pound of flesh from Spygate

 

[All3Phases]

No. Let me be clear.

I'm sure he wanted to stay in 2017. The financials didn't work for NE and they wanted to go year to year with him. Tom didn't like that and that's fine.

In Aug of 2019 he wanted to leave and Bill knew it

No, lets be clear about this, he wanted to stay, asked for it. The financials didnt work? Can you explain that to me? How they couldnt afford their best player for a handful of years?

 

[venecol]

I think there's an argument to be made we were better off restarting but, I don't think it's a no brainer. I mean if Tom hung around til we got cap space in 2021, we'd have been great.

The cap space excuse is just that an excuse. We've seen teams manipulate the cap succesfully that resulted in SB wins. Bill chose not to do that. That's on him.

 

[lancerman]

I hate to tell you, buddy, we are fans here, and this fanbase gave Brady 20 years of loyalty. There are certain things you don't do to your fanbase. One is to seek employment with a rival team while you are still employed by said team. That is, unless you don't care about your fanbase...

Cool story. Guess what? Brady have this franchise 20 years of busting his ass, prepping his body, meticulous study, time away from his family. We sat in a couch or a stadium for a few hours on Sunday and might have looked up some stats online in our house. Let’s not compare what Brady have the Patriots vs what the fans gave him. He doesn’t owe ****. No player in the NFL owes any fan a goddamn thing. It’s a job and they bust their ass and break their bodies in ways that will effect them the rest of their lives. When Brady did that here it resulted in the best run this team will ever have and the best run any team in this league had.

Brady was going to be a free agent. His employer did not want to commit to him. In no other scenario but blind uncritical sports fandom would someone scream that a guy that was about to be out of his job went and looked for future employment.

 

[venecol]

See this is why you are a homer and it’s merely team loyalty with you. The vast majority of people here can be fans of the Patriots and be critical of poor decisions. You on the other hand live in a childish fantasy world where rival teams are the enemy and it’s sacrilege to talk to them.

Brady was an employee of the Patriots. At the end of the day it’s his job and he performs a service in exchange for the value of his contract. It is business.

In no other scenario would people besmirch a long time employee if they went to their employer for contract negotiations and asked to be locked in for several years, had the employer refuse that and create a situation where they were released at the end of the year, and then in the employees final year he talked to a rival company in the industry about his future.

Nobody in the real world would say the employee owes the employers any favors in that situation. But you can’t divorce your fanboyism from it and look at in any realistic manner so you have to dress it up like it’s some grand betrayal and another team is this despicable enemy like he’s defecting from the US to Russia.

No he was doing a job, his employer didn’t want to commit to him, his contract was running out and he was preparing for his future, a future his employer didn’t want to guarantee they would be part.

It’s just suck low logic coming from the typical jilted lover.

He's just a pathetic troll. He just wants to get a reaction from certain posters so he can go running to the mods and try to get them tossed from the thread. He then jerks off content he scored since he can't find a real woman (not inflatable dolls).

 

[All3Phases]

I hate to tell you, buddy, we are fans here, and this fanbase gave Brady 20 years of loyalty. There are certain things you don't do to your fanbase. One is to seek employment with a rival team while you are still employed by said team. That is, unless you don't care about your fanbase...

 

[archstanton543]

Cool story. Guess what? Brady have this franchise 20 years of busting his ass, prepping his body, meticulous study, time away from his family. We sat in a couch or a stadium for a few hours on Sunday and might have looked up some stats online in our house. Let’s not compare what Brady have the Patriots vs what the fans gave him. He doesn’t owe ****. No player in the NFL owes any fan a goddamn thing. It’s a job and they bust their ass and break their bodies in ways that will effect them the rest of their lives. When Brady did that here it resulted in the best run this team will ever have and the best run any team in this league had.

Brady was going to be a free agent. His employer did not want to commit to him. In no other scenario but blind uncritical sports fandom would someone scream that a guy that was about to be out of his job went and looked for future employment.

Without fans, there would be no league. I would say that the players owe the fans everything. Without people watching and cheering there would be no professional sports.