The question this morning is does the punishment of Tom Brady and the Patriots actually fit the crime?
The answer is a resounding “no!”
The National Football League, which has been dragged kicking and screaming to the scandal of concussions among players and their tragic consequences as it has to the on-going off-field horror of domestic abuse, has decided to throw the book at Brady and at his team over the “probable” infraction of a slightly under-inflated football — an infraction it admits had absolutely no effect on the AFC Championship Game in question.
But that matters not to the Lords of the NFL, who seem intent on punishing the Pats for everything up to and including its 2007 videotaping of opponents — yes, the team’s entire history of infractions, all the while exonerating owners and executives of any knowledge of this particular incident of wrongdoing.
And they readily admitted punishing Brady with a four-game suspension in part for exercising his legal right to refuse to hand over his cellphone and evidence of texts and emails.
The conclusions reached by NFL Executive Vice President Troy Vincent in his incredibly officious letters to the team and to Brady would be laughed out of court based on the evidence in hand. But Vincent clearly didn’t need evidence of wrongdoing; it was enough simply to call Brady a liar as he pretty much did.
“The integrity of the game is of paramount importance to everyone in our league,” Vincent insisted.
What about the integrity of a league that makes up rules and punishments as it goes along?
