So... Tom Brady has given up his legal battle against his four-game suspension. As a die-hard Patriot's fan, this just puts the icing on top of the layer cake that is disappointment and anger. To anyone who has actually been following the "Deflategate" story (and not just hopping on the "Tom Brady cheated" bandwagon) you would know that there has been no real evidence at all that proves Brady's guilt in tampering with the footballs in the 2015 AFC Championship game against the Indianapolis Colts.
(Side note: The Patriots actually played better in the second half of the game during which new regulation balls were introduced and the Colts scored exactly zero points.)
Just as a reminder, and to put things into perspective, The 2015 AFC Championship game was the "second most lopsided AFC championship victory ever." With a final score of 7-45 and a Patriots victory, it is not surprising that Colts fans were royally miffed. In fact, the entire "Deflategate" conversation started with a tweet (all conspiracies tend to start with a tweet these days) from Bob Kravitz, an Indianapolis sports TV reporter. This tweet read, "Breaking: A League source tells me the NFL is investigating the possibility the Patriots deflated footballs Sunday night. More to come." In an actual investigation, Tom Brady was found to probably have had some general knowledge of a scheme to deflate the footballs. Within a week that the report came out, the NFL announced that Tom Brady would be suspended without pay for four games of the next season for conduct detrimental to the integrity of the League.
To say that something probably happened, and then conjure up conclusions and punishments based on that idea is absolutely ridiculous. If I said that DC probably ripped off the idea of Batman from Marvel's Ironman, (despite the fact that Batman was created 24 years before Ironman) many people uneducated in the comic book world would jump right on that idea and pursue it until DC was suspended from making its next four movies.
This weekend, Robert Kraft, the owner of the New England Patriots and avid supporter of his starting quarterback, gave a statement regarding Brady's withdrawal from appeals. He says that "The penalty imposed by the NFL was unprecedented, unjust and unreasonable, especially given that no empirical or direct evidence of any kind showed Tom did anything to violate League rules prior to, during or after the 2015 AFC Championship Game," and Tom's ordeal has been "as far removed from due process as you could ever expect in this country."
In September of 2015, Brady and the NFL Players Association took the appeal of the four-game suspension to US District Court Judge Richard Berman. Judge Berman concluded that Tom's four-game suspension should be overturned, due to a few things. Roger Goodell came up with a four-game suspension punishment when he decided that this (still unproven) offense is an equivalent to using steroids to improve performance during a game. Judge Berman called Goodell out on this BS. He said that there was "no scientific, empirical, or historical evidence of any comparability between Brady's alleged offense and steroid use." He also stated that Goodell's refusal to produce the main "evidence" from which he based his conclusions was "fundamentally unfair" and "that Brady was prejudiced as a result." Due process allows a person to see the evidence against him, and Brady was denied that. Possibly the most important thing, is that Roger Goodell based his findings on factual conclusions that Brady knew about and consented to the deflating of the game balls, however those facts cannot be found anywhere in the investigation report. Judge Berman closed his statement with "Brady's four-game suspension is vacated, effective immediately."
And we all thought that was the end of it.
Somehow, Roger Goodell thinks that he knows better than a US District Court Judge and has managed to get the overturning of the punishment overturned, and now Tom Brady, one of the greatest NFL quarterbacks of all time, has accepted his four-game suspension.
And lets remember, the consequences and punishments of "Deflategate" are not only the suspension, but also a $1,000,000 fine to the Patriots, and to take away their first and fourth round draft picks for the 2016 and 2017 seasons.
To me, it seems that Roger Goodell and his NFL administration team, along with a whole lot of Patriots haters out there, just want to see a great team fail. Tom Brady was Patriot's pick number 199 in his rookie year 2000. Starting off the season as the fourth-string quarterback, he finished strong as number two on the depth chart, just behind the Patriots starting quarterback, Drew Bledsoe. He is tied with Mike Lodish for the most Superbowl appearances, and holds so many other NFL records, it is almost silly.
With Brady now definitely out of commission for the first four games of the 2016-2017 season, fans can count on a few things:
One; we will most likely finally get to see Jimmy Garoppolo be the starting QB for the Patriots, which is actually pretty exciting.
Two; come game number five of the season, we are sure to have a very angry QB 12 return to the field, and I am pretty much bursting with excitement to see how that game unfolds.
Three; Patriots fans are loyal to the very end. We will always show our support despite the response it usually elicits.
As disappointed and angry as I am with the NFL and Roger Goodell, I think Robert Kraft sums it up pretty well. "Unfortunately, this stopped being about air pressure a long time ago."
