This has it backwards, though. Kraft threw in the towel way before Brady did, and lack of support from his owner (along with other personal stuff going on) may have influenced Brady to give up the fight.
I doubt it. If I had to guess, Brady "gave in" when the federal appeals court ruled against him and his legal team doubted the Supreme Court would take the case. He carried that legal battle just about exactly as far as it was reasonable to suggest that he take it.
If Kraft had no support whatsoever amongst other owners to take on Goodell and his fraudulent conduct towards Tom Brady, I guess I understand a little better why he was such a wimp, but he WAS a wimp in my opinion, and that is never going to change (my opinion, that is). It doesn't mean I hate Kraft, but it also doesn't mean I think he handled things right. It's all water under the bridge at this point, obviously, and it's amusing to see Jerrah get a bitter taste of his own medicine. I still hate Goodell, though, and if Jones could get rid of him, great. If not, we're on to Miami!
I doubt Jones is in a position to do anything about Goodell. He's just making noise for noise's own sake, exactly so that he won't appear to just be lying down and taking it. Jones is playing to the media. I doubt any actual action will take place. It's all pandering to Cowboys fans who demand defiance. I'm not surprised Kraft didn't go there, When he's appeared in public he seemed softspoken and preferred to let his franchise do the talking for him.
I doubt Kraft has one single problem with the way this thing turned out, even with the lost picks, because at the end of the day, Robert Kraft won Deflategate. By responding with meekness he made a victim of himself and the Patriots, and made Goodell's overreaching become obvious to the world.
The initial gut check reaction against the Patriots would have been magnified if Kraft had raised the rebel flag, by responding softly, Kraft deflected that potential negative attention back on Goodell -- even most Patriot haters admit that Goodell really didn't have a leg to stand on in Deflategate and most of the football world knows that the whole scandal was a bad joke.
I know there's an inborn American cultural reaction that says that injustice must be defied from the rooftops but as the Good Book says, "a soft answer turneth away wrath." If Kraft was looking to get past Deflategate and play to the broader strategic vision of the New England Patriots, then as much as it feels unsatisfying for the fans (who are the smallest and least significant factor in Kraft's strategic view at that point), bowing meekly and letting Roger Goodell trip all over himself was the correct call.
In the battle of Agincourt, facing a French army that outnumbered them 5 to 1 and an infantry force that outnumbered their infantry by something like 20 to 1, the English infantry stood their ground while the French charged across the muddy field then, just as the exhausted French were preparing to join battle, English infantry took a step backwards, unbalancing their enemy and allowing the outnumbered English infantry to make quick work of the first line of Frenchmen. That's what Kraft did. He took a measured step backwards with the broader strategic picture in mind. Deflategate at the end of the day was a single event in the long history of the franchise, and it's perpetuating that history that is the major strategic aim of Robert Kraft and the New England Patriots. Not winning or losing any individual battle.
That's what "we're on to Cincinatti" means in the broader strategic picture of a franchise. Do not obsess about winning any particular battle or play. Focus on the main goal and marshal your strategic resources towards that ultimate end rather than squandering them on distractions and minor objectives. Understand what it takes to fully achieve that ultimate objective, and then, do the job you have to do to contribute your bit towards that goal. That's the Patriots Way, and in the meta-struggle in the owner's room, that means being willing to lose battles to win wars.
Which is ultimately the story of Deflategate -- a lost battle in a victorious war, no more significant to the broader history of the franchise than Operation Market Garden was to WWII. Does refighting that battle over and over again in our comfortable armchairs change the outcome of the war? No, and we certainly hope it doesn't. But that doesn't stop us from refighting the battles, does it?