Tom Brady’s role in Deflategate "is over" after he announced on Friday he would not appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court, but NFLPA attorneys "fighting against the unfettered power of NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell may continue the fight without" the Patriots QB, according to Bob McGovern of the BOSTON HERALD. Sports law attorney Daniel Wallach said, "They may keep going due to the precedent that this has set. The current decision could impact player discipline for a generation, and it would be difficult for the union to craft legal arguments in the face of the commissioner’s superpowers that are limitless under the current decision.” The union "has until October" to file an appeal with the Supreme Court (BOSTON HERALD, 7/16). ESPN's Mike Greenberg said of the NFLPA possibly appealing, "They want to fight the principle. They want to fight the point. They need Brady in the middle of it, and if he has already served the four-game suspension, they would essentially be fighting for nothing" ("Mike & Mike," ESPN Radio, 7/18). Patriots Owner Robert Kraft on Friday in a statement said, "I am most frustrated that Tom was denied his right to a fair and impartial process. The League’s investigation into a football pressure matter was flawed and biased from the start. ... The penalty imposed by the NFL was unprecedented, unjust and unreasonable" (BOSTONGLOBE.com, 7/15).
TV TIMEOUT: Boston-based WEEI-AM's Ryan Hannable noted Brady during his suspension from Sept. 3 through Oct. 3 -- the day after the Patriots' Week 4 game -- "cannot have any contact with the team" and "cannot be at the Gillette Stadium facility." The Patriots "have two of their first four games of the season in primetime, as Week 1 is on NBC on Sunday night and then Week 3 is on Thursday night, part of the CBS/NFL Network package." When the NFL made the schedule, they "likely knew" Brady missing the first four games "was a possibility so it’s interesting they had two of them be in primetime" (WEEI.com, 7/17).
LIVE ANOTHER DAY: In Boston, Ron Borges wrote Brady "took what he was given, which in this case was a beating, and chose to live for another day, a day he knows will come soon enough" (BOSTON HERALD, 7/16). Also in Boston, Dan Shaughnessy wrote, "Let’s acknowledge once again that this was a minor infraction, never proved by the NFL." But the Patriots "dug their own grave by behaving like a guilty party from the jump," as they "did everything a guilty man does" (BOSTON GLOBE, 7/16). The HERALD's Steve Buckley wrote, "Had this been treated like a speeding ticket by the NFL, and if Brady had sent in a check to go along with the speeding ticket, this would have been over a long time ago." Instead, Deflategate "turned into a clown car of lawyers, accompanied by appeals and leaks and suits and reports and reports in context flying through the air, denting the heads of fans from coast to coast" (BOSTON HERALD, 7/16). Yahoo Sports' Dan Wetzel tweeted that Brady's decision "ends one of the most bizarre stories ever." The Ringer's Kevin Clark: "I can't believe Deflategate ended like this. All that's missing is Meadow Soprano parking and some onion rings" (THE DAILY). FS1's Jason Whitlock said Brady "made the right move by fighting it for as long as he did." Brady's image also "benefited from the fight, but now he's chosen the right time to move on" ("Speak For Yourself," FS1, 7/15).
POWER PERCEIVED: In N.Y., Mike Lupica wrote Deflategate is a "misdemeanor that Goodell, whatever his intentions and whether or not he was exercising powers that the players’ union stupidly handed over to him with both hands, turned into a federal case." Lupica: "This wasn’t ever about justice, this was about showing everybody who was boss. No matter what the cost." For Goodell, Deflategate "wasn’t about doing the right thing," but rather "showing all other owners besides his (former) friend Bob Kraft that he could finally teach the Patriots a lesson." Lupica: "Well, now he has. He officially gives Tom Brady twice what he originally gave Ray Rice" (N.Y. DAILY NEWS, 7/17). ESPN's Howard Bryant said Goodell "won the battle that is most important to win which is the labor battle" ("The Sports Reporters," ESPN, 7/17). In Indianapolis, Gregg Doyel wrote Goodell has the power he has "because his owners wanted him to have it." Kraft "did the most work to get that CBA done" in '11, but now thinks Goodell "has too much power." Goodell "has no business overseeing every level of league discipline," and going forward, when the next CBA is negotiated, NFL owners "have to know it can't continue" (INDYSTAR.com, 7/17). USA TODAY's Michael Middlehurst-Schwartz noted for Kraft, a "once-close ally of Goodell and the NFL, the saga has marked a sea change in his relations with the league" (USATODAY.com, 7/16). SI's Chris Burke tweeted, "Deflategate will wind up being a larger part of Roger Goodell's legacy than of Tom Brady's" (TWITTER.com, 7/15). Whitlock said Goodell's player conduct power is a "distraction" for the league and "it overshadows all the good things that he does" for the NFL. Goodell "should curtail his own power after this ... because this nearly drowned" him ("Speak For Yourself," FS1, 7/15).
MASTER OF NONE? In DC, Adam Kilgore noted Brady's decision "doesn’t mean the NFL won," as for more than 17 months, the NFL "maintained its power but utterly lost track of why that power mattered." Since '07, Goodell "wanted to strengthen his ability to suspend troublemakers," and players "believed a small cluster of misbehaving players had given them an unfair, inaccurate portrayal." One former player who worked closely with the NFLPA said of the current CBA, "We were all fed up. When we trusted Goodell, that’s when our first mistake was made. We wanted to clean the game up and wanted to send the message that those bad apples didn’t define us. We were all on board with trying to come down on guys like that." Kilgore noted that at the time, Goodell's far-reaching authority was the "public-relations victory the league wanted." But "at what cost?" The NFL has "preserved its power," but in doing so, it has "compromised the fan support it sought to win by acquiring that power in the first place." Kilgore: "Power for the sake [of] power is pointless. The NFL forgot that" (WASHINGTON POST, 7/16). The N.Y. Daily News' Lupica said this is "no great victory for this league and the real loser here is the NFL Player Association because they got exposed for leaving a guy like Brady vulnerable to a sanction like this" ("The Sports Reporters," ESPN, 7/17).
LESSONS LEARNED? ESPN N.Y.'s Ian O'Connor wrote there were "clearly no winners in this one, Goodell included." The commissioner "might've had his near-absolute authority notarized, but he can't possibly believe this 18-month debacle served what he's highly paid to protect -- the best interests of his league." Brady "will recover." This "surreal case hurt him, no question, but it didn't destroy him or severely diminish him" (ESPNNY.com, 7/16). YAHOO SPORTS' Wetzel noted Deflategate "wasn’t about anything," other than "making sure the Patriots were in big (expletive) trouble." No one "ever has or likely ever will prove the footballs were unnaturally deflated." It was "every scientist in the country vs. Roger Goodell and yet, in the end, Goodell won." Wetzel: "Whatever it is he does, he’s damn good at it" (SPORTS.YAHOO.com, 7/15).
