For the first time in a long time, we can say something about the Patriots that hasn't been said since the Super Bowl.
They’re winning.
More accurately, they’ve won.
A ruling or settlement on Tom Brady’s federal appeal won’t come down for a while, but make no mistake, the fight is O-V-A-H.
Regardless of the ruling, we now know who the bad guy is. (Hint: It’s not the All-American, four-time Super Bowl-winning QB with the dimpled chin and fashionable boots.)
Anyone who possesses the capacity for rational thought has to concede -- whether or not they’re convinced Brady and the Pats are 100 percent innocent of any and all Deflategate charges -- that there's no proof, possibly even no crime. And the investigation was, and is, a total farce from the beginning.
All it took was for Judge Berman to open up the books this past Tuesday for all to see, without any shred of doubt, that they’re cooked.
New England Patriots
And so is the NFL. And everyone knows it.
Well, not everyone. There are those whose hatred for all things Patriots still fuels them to fight.
In particular, one New York newspaper columnist and another in Indianapolis. Let’s call them Statler and Waldorf.
But allow me -- a former card carrying member of the “They did it!” lynch mob -- to say: Stop. You’re embarrassing yourselves.
Channel your inner Fonzie and admit you were wr-wr-wr-wr-wrong. Go ahead. Many others have come around.
And why is that? Because things change. Lies are replaced by facts. And for most of us, opinions evolve.
Your average person gets angry when they are misled. But you seem to be mad the lies weren’t true in the first place.
You want to believe, so you gorged yourselves on all the BS the NFL put on your plate.
Maybe a list of all the mistruths and misinformation will get your anger focused in the right direction:
The Wells report was independent.
No. It wasn’t. It was edited by NFL Counsel Jeff Pash. Also, Ted Wells' associate, Lorin Reisner, was both part of the investigation and in on the cross-examination of Tom Brady at the appeal hearing.
Brady was suspended in part because of his failure to hand over his phone.
Except Wells told him he didn’t have to, and also said he wouldn't be punished if he didn't.
Troy Vincent didn’t know footballs could lose air in cold weather.
That's something known by everyone who has ever owned anything with air in it. How often have you left a basketball in your garage and discovered, when you fetched it days or weeks later, it needed to be pumped up? How often was your reaction: "My God! Someone must have deflated it! There’s no other possible explanation!"
It wasn’t a sting.
Actually, it was.
Eleven out of 12 balls were underinflated by two pounds per square inch
Well, even you know by now that's not true; the Wells Report -- which many of you admit you have not read because, hey. why should we? We all know Brady and the Patriots are guilty as sin -- shot it down, and even the reporter (Chris Mortensen) admitted he got it wrong.
And that's part of a giant issue in all of this: The NFL not only probably leaked bad info, but refused to retract it once it was proven faulty.
Integrity!!!! Brady violated the NFL’s integrity-of-the-game policy, which is largely why he was suspended for four games.
Except that rule doesn’t apply to players. They don’t see it or sign it. It’s for owners, presidents, GMs and coaches.
(Also -- and this one is kind of important -- the balls weren’t actually deflated. Shhhhh. Don’t tell anyone.)
So . . . what else have you got?
'Deflator' nickname. Trip to the bathroom.
Yup, suspicious; no doubt. But hard evidence? Nope.
Destroyed cell phone!
Yeah, but that didn’t matter. (See "failure to hand over his phone" above.) It was misdirection. An NFL parlor trick.
No players, current or former, came to Brady’s defense.
Not true. Also, many of the players who did express an opinion were reacting to the false narrative concocted by the NFL. (See "Eleven out of 12 balls were underinflated by two pounds per square inch" above.) Without that, none of this exists. No Investigation, no tears from Mark Brunell. Nothing.
Or if you prefer, take it from a former player:
@BartHubbuch Yes, I've heard their remarks. They're generally in response to leaks, mischaracterizations, headlines, and falsehoods.
@BartHubbuch I'd also argue they're pretty uninformed about every nuance of this case, the CBA, the process, etc.
Anything else?
Brady hasn’t come out and strongly denied anything.
Except he did.
Well . . . he just didn’t sound convincing.
That’s it! Thank you, Mona Lisa Vito! There it is! The Case Cracker!
Again, guys, it’s time to stop. Not stop hating the Patriots; you can keep doing that. And you can keep thinking something nefarious took place. Maybe it did. We may never know.
But that's the key: We don't know. We may never know. Stop pretending/insisting you do.
Heck, give it time, be vigilant, and some day -- maybe soon -- you may even catch ‘em doing something.
But don’t be so blinded by your hatred that you can’t see the light. You're being used. Puppets on a string.
Roger Goodell can’t believe you ate this all up. He is literally laughing at you.
Consider this an official cease-and-desist letter. I’m begging you. Stop your trolling ways.
The NFL has lost what little credibility it had left.
You guys still have a chance to keep what remains of yours intact.