As we approach a possible resolution in Deflategate, let's take a look back at some of the quotes and moments that have shaped this story:
#1
The tweet that started it all, sent out at 12:55 on Monday morning, January 19 by longtime Indianapolis media member Bob Kravitz.
That tweet hit the streets very shortly after Colts owner Jim Irsay was seen “red-faced and animated … talking fast to general manager Ryan Grigson and looking angry” in the Colts locker room after the AFC Championship Game.
#2
The first response from Tom Brady on WEEI’s Dennis & Callahan Show Monday morning less than six hours after Kravitz’ initial tweet.
New England Patriots
Find the latest New England Patriots news, highlights, analysis and more with NBC Sports Boston.
MORE
#3
ESPN’s report that 11 of 12 Patriots footballs were “inflated significantly below the NFL's requirement” on Wednesday evening.
The initial story alleged the footballs were deflated by as much as two PSI. This information turned out to be bogus as the NFL-sanctioned Wells Report declared the footballs should have been between 11.32 and 11.52 PSI given the climactic conditions that night. When the numbers were released, 11 of the 22 measurements taken (two different gauges, each ball) showed the balls were compliant. Chris Mortensen, who broke the story, fights on.
#4
On Thursday, the Patriots had their biggest media access day prior to leaving for the Super Bowl. With Mortensen’s story still fresh and a not-yet-revealed email from NFL Operations man David Gardi to owner Robert Kraft alleging there were footballs deflated as low as 10.1 psi being digested by the team, Bill Belichick addressed the now raging controversy. Belichick explained he didn’t care what conditions footballs were in and, in fact, made sure the team practiced with footballs in bad condition so it would be used to the elements.
#5
A rattled Brady met the press after Belichick. With damning “facts” out there about how severely underinflated the footballs were, Brady tried to keep his verbal boat afloat in a tsunami of accusatory questions. The worst moment for Brady came when he was asked if he was a cheater. Brady began his answer saying, “I don’t believe so…”
#6
With his team getting battered for two days after the Thursday press conferences, Bill Belichick called an impromptu Saturday afternoon press conference. Belichick detailed research and experiments he oversaw that, he said, explained the deflation. He was the first to even broach publicly the phenomenon of footballs losing pressure in the cold after being measured in a heated room. “I’m embarrassed to talk about the amount of time I’ve put into this, relative to the challenge in front of us,” Belichick said. He also said he was not the “Mona Lisa Vito” of football psi, the money quote from that press conference. Ultimately, his theory that the outcry was exaggerated because nobody considered the Ideal Gas Law and natural deflation was exactly right.
#7
Robert Kraft is the first to speak when the Patriots arrive in Arizona. At a Monday press conference, Kraft – whose silence was become deafening – stated: If the Wells investigation is not able to definitively determine that our organization tampered with the air pressure on the footballs, I would expect and hope that the league would apologize to our entire team and, in particular, coach [Bill] Belichick and Tom Brady for what they have had to endure this past week.”
#8
In the runup to the Super Bowl, Ravens head coach John Harbaugh stated, “nobody in our organization made any call” to the Colts prior to the AFC Championship Game tipping Indy off to suspicions about ball tampering.
It would later be revealed that the Ravens special teams coordinator did indeed call Colts head coach Chuck Pagano to discuss issues with footballs from the AFC Championship Game.
#9
On the afternoon of May 6 – three months after the Patriots won the Super Bowl – investigator Ted Wells’ report was released.
Wells wrote: "We have concluded that it is more probable than not that Jim McNally (the Officials Locker Room attendant for the Patriots) and John Jastremski (an equipment assistant for the Patriots) participated in a deliberate effort to release air from Patriots game balls after the balls were examined by the referee.
"Based on the evidence, it also is our view that it is more probable than not that Tom Brady (the quarterback for the Patriots) was at least generally aware of the inappropriate activities of McNally and Jastremski involving the release of air from Patriots game balls.”
This is the column I wrote the next day.
#10
Roger Goodell suspends Brady for four games, fines the Patriots $1M and strips them of their first and fourth-round picks in the 2016 NFL Draft.
Patriots owner Robert Kraft responded in a statement: "Despite our conviction that there was no tampering with footballs, it was our intention to accept any discipline levied by the league," Kraft said. "Today's punishment, however, far exceeded any reasonable expectation. It was based completely on circumstantial rather than hard or conclusive evidence."
#11
On May 12, Ted Wells got what he’d been demanding from the NFL: a chance to hold a conference call to put everyone in their place.
Wells – with admirable bluster – stated: “The conclusions of the report represent the independent opinion of me personally and my team. And those conclusions were not influenced in any way, shape or form by anyone at the league office. We made a fair and reasonable review of the evidence and we reached conclusions based on the preponderance of the evidence standard, which I was required to apply based on the league's rules.”
He didn’t sidestep any questions. He took them head-on and gave a contorted version of the truth that would not have come to light had the transcript of June’s appeal hearing not been released (we’ll get to that).
#12
After getting cozy at a birthday party for a CBS executive, Robert Kraft and Roger Goodell embraced upon seeing each other at the NFL Owners meetings in San Francisco.
Later that day – May 19 – Kraft stepped to a podium and said he wanted to “rhetoric” of the preceding four months to end and that the team would accept its punishment from the league.
“I know that a lot of Patriots fans are going to be disappointed in that decision,” acknowledged Kraft. “But I hope they trust my judgment and know that I really feel at this point in time that taking this off the agenda, this is the best thing for the New England Patriots, our fans and the NFL. I hope you all can respect that.” Kraft was right about that.
#13
Later on May 19, Roger Goodell said he looked forward to hearing from Brady at his appeal and hoped “additional information” would be provided. Goodell cowered when asked why the league wasn’t introspective about its own role in the investigation and whether it properly advanced an unbiased study of the facts.
#14
On June 23rd, Brady and the NFLPA had its appeal heard by arbitrator Roger Goodell in the league’s Park Avenue headquarters. After 10 hours of testimony, the two sides emerged without comment.
The hearing transcript, released in early August, pulled back the rug and gave much-needed context to what the league was claiming Brady said, did and testified to. And how its own lawyers and executives comported themselves.
#15
On Tuesday, July 28 – two days before the Patriots were to open training camp – Roger Goodell released his finding as arbitrator, upholding the suspension handed down by NFL Commissioner … Roger Goodell. Earlier that day, the league leaked to ESPN’s Stephen A. Smith news that Tom Brady “destroyed” his cell phone prior to meeting with Ted Wells. That characterization allowed Goodell to base his decision around the notion Brady not only wasn’t cooperative but hindered the investigation.
That characterization won the day for the NFL. Also, for a nation long-since weary of digesting DeflateGate details, it sealed many minds.
#16
The following day, Brady’s agent Don Yee said the NFL “shifted from PSI to the new shiny object, the cell phone. Added Yee, “We expected this. Because this was the easy way to pivot off the junk science and get off the PSI issue. And we knew that from a newsworthiness standpoint, the general public might be easily fooled. But in the coming days — just like the Wells Report being picked apart after its issuance — the same thing happens with this.”
Yee was proven right as the realization that Ted Wells stated strongly he never wanted the phone itself, merely electronic documentation of outgoing calls, texts and emails – all of which Brady provided to Goodell at the appeal.
#17
Robert Kraft unloads in a press conference on Wednesday, July 29. Accusing, he says, “for reasons that I cannot comprehend, there are those in the league office who are more determined to prove that they were right rather than admit any culpability of their own or take any responsibility for the initiation of a process and ensuing investigation that was flawed.
I have come to the conclusion that this was never about doing what was fair and just. Back in May, I had to make a difficult decision that I now regret. I tried to do what I thought was right. I chose not to take legal action. I wanted to return the focus to football. I have been negotiating agreements on a global basis my entire life. I know that there are times when you have to give up important points of principle to achieve a greater good.
#18
On July 30, the NFL, which hustled to the Southern District of New York to get Goodell’s decision validated, draws Judge Richard Berman as the man who will decide whether Goodell acted appropriately as arbitrator in hearing Brady’s appeal.
The case was punted East by the Minnesota court that the NFLPA initially requested hear Brady’s appeal of his appeal ruling.
#19
On Tuesday, August 4, Berman gives a taste of the transparency he’d bring to the case by ordering the release of transcript and evidence from the June 23 appeal hearing. The transcripts were rife with fodder for anyone looking to expose NFL inefficiency.
In the transcript, you see the duplicity of the NFL in calling Wells independent but allowing NFL executive Jeff Pash to edit the report then hiding Wells from testifying. You find the central role of Wells colleague, Lorin Reisner, in the appeal on behalf of the league after being a cohort in compiling and defending the Wells Report. You find testimony from NFL VP of Operations Troy Vincent pleading ignorance to any prior concern about deflated footballs on the part of the NFL (which aligns with them saying there was no “sting”) and then contorting testimony in the appeal so it doesn’t match up with the Wells Report.
Most importantly, you see the volume of documented electronic communication handed over by Brady.
#20
On Wednesday, August 12 Brady and Goodell are in Berman’s courtroom at 500 Pearl Street in lower Manhattan. After saying he'd love to see a settlement, Berman got down to the business of hammering NFL attorney Daniel Nash over a seeming lack of direct evidence from January 18 and the lack of independence from the Wells Report.
The NFLPA attorney Jeffrey Kessler gets milder treatment. The worst part for them is having to explain why Brady didn’t share his phone which required rolling the Patriots attorneys and Brady’s agent, Don Yee, under the bus, and saying that decision was a mistake.
#21
On Wednesday August 19, there is a second hearing in front of Berman. This time, Brady and Goodell are absent. Brady spent Tuesday in New York trying to hammer out a settlement but the NFL kept insisting he agree to the findings of the Wells Report. In court, Berman again hammers Nash. This time for comparing ball deflation to steroid use and keeping Jeffrey Pash from being questioned by the NFLPA during the June 23 appeal.
The entitlement that fans and media perceived on the part of the NFL was validated in open court by Berman who seemed to express the same opinion.
#22
On August 31 – given a 12-day respite to work on a settlement – the two sides met again in Berman’s courtroom. The best the NFL could muster was an informal offer to reduce the suspension to three game with a full admission by Brady that the Wells Report was a solid piece of investigative work. No go. Berman requested that the two sides bring members of their decision-making boards to the hearing. John Mara represented the NFL Management Council; Jay Feely the NFLPA Executive Board. Neither made a whit of difference. Berman’s decision is due to drop at any time.