Finally, after more than three months, -- drum roll please -- the report is out on what had become known as Deflategate. You remember. In a playoff game where they crushed the Indianapolis Colts 45-7, much hype was generated over the New England Patriots having possibly deflated game balls.
Evidently, the on-field officials who handle the balls before and after every play didn't notice, so if it happened, it was subtle. And it certainly wouldn't have made a difference as to the outcome of such a lop-sided game. However, rules are rules, and the NFL has parameters on the air pressures allowed in their pigskins.
That hypocrisy in itself is laughable when one considers place kickers and punters get "special" balls to boot. Any 10 year old kid will tell you they can kick a rock hard football a lot farther than a soft one. One would think an NFL football should be an NFL football. They should all be the same.
Further, one could make an argument that any NFL game shouldn't require more than 6 footballs -- max. One to start the game, a new one for the second half, and a few spares just in case of whatever. It's not like they're flying into the stands all the time. They put nets up behind the end zones to catch the balls on extra points and field goals, right?
And hey, the same 10 year olds can play game after game with the same ball and it will continue to work just fine. While on that note, consider futbol (soccer). Those balls get kicked thousands of times but you don't see them being shuffled in and out of games for "replacements" every minute or so. If kicked in the stands, they throw it back and play goes on -- with the same ball.
So why is it that before any given game, both NFL teams are given about a dozen balls? Simply put, it's a recipe for hanky-panky waiting to happen.
Nevertheless, evidently a full-blown investigation was warranted to get to the bottom of Deflategate. America has become big on such things. Whenever there's a possible discrepancy, regardless of how trivial it might be -- hire an army of lawyers and spend a few million bucks to thoroughly examine it and eventually write a report James Michener would be proud of.
In this case, enter one Ted Wells as the lead investigator. Certainly Wells is a highly respected and well learned practitioner of the law. His legal record speaks for itself.
But that's where things get a little convoluted. Like judges, justices, and the IRS, lawyers can "interpret" the law in different ways. After all, they're human, pretty much. So whether they want to admit it or not, personal biases, political slants, and public opinion no doubt play factors in some of the "conclusions" they reach.
And so does who hired them and is paying their fees. Any litigator will try to achieve the best result possible for their client. Defense attorneys have "defendants". They'll do anything to beat the rap. Conversely, prosecutors claim to represent the "people", and they'll similarly do anything to obtain a conviction. The legal shenanigans cut both ways during the process while the truth sometimes ceases to matter. It's all about winning by any means possible.
In this case, Wells was hired by the NFL to delve into the matter. Given the rash of recent not-so-good incidents NFL players have been involved in, it would come as no great surprise that Roger Goodell and the NFL brass expected a report to eventually come back incriminating somebody for something. Good grief, they have that pesky media nipping at that heels again along with a few million arm-chair hang-em-high prosecutors that have already rendered their usual guilty verdict. It just wouldn't do if the report came back finding nobody at fault for anything. Surely Wells was well aware of that. Truth and justice are one thing, but satisfying the client paying him big bucks for a "favorable" result is something else. Wells knew he had to find SOMETHING.
And it appears he did. There are two people who are in big trouble. These would be a couple New England ball boys (equipment attendants). They have most certainly been outed as culpable. The text messages they shared about Deflategate have all but sealed their fate.
Idle thought: What kind of morons these days use texting to communicate about matters they don't wish to be known to the public? Don't they understand texts are Bushish and Clintonesque? As in, once there, they never completely go away and can come back months or years later to haunt you? I mean, c'mon. If couriers can't be afforded, try smoke signals, carrier pigeons, or snail mail. The telephone is a maybe depending on who might be listening -- but texts? Anybody that dumb is supposed to crash and burn. These guys are toast.
A bit of related history comes into play. After the Spygate video scandal that the Patriots were caught up in a few years ago, Roger Goodell instituted new rules in the interest of "protecting the integrity of the game". Henceforth, decreed the Commish, any such matters will be decided and ruled upon based on a "preponderance of the evidence". In other words, it's kind of like a civil trial, where the standards of obtaining a conviction are much lower than in a criminal proceeding. Remember, this is how they got OJ on the original murder thing. The criminal jury said he didn't kill Nicole, but the subsequent civil jury in a wrongful death case said close enough and took all his money away. Right or wrong, that's how it works in America.
So after all this time interviewing countless people and examining whatever "evidence" he could find, Wells finally released his final report. Some of the language should come as no surprise.
Wells determined that the air pressure in the footballs was "likely manipulated".
Further, "more probably than not" it was done intentionally.
Further yet, he concluded Tom Brady was also more probably than not "generally aware" of the situation.
So add it all up and what do you have?
Wells tailored the wordage of his report to exactly meet the standards of Goodell's recent fiat regarding how the league could rule on such matters. A "preponderance of the evidence" was noted on Page 1 of the tome he submitted to his client. How convenient.
Yet an objective person could look at it a different way. Consider what Wells has actually said:
He doesn't know for sure the Patriots' balls WERE deflated, much less intentionally. What has flown under the radar is a few of the Colts' balls were found to be under inflated as well. Nobody, including Ted, wants to talk about that.
And if they were, he has no hard evidence, let alone proof that Tom Brady was complicit in the matter. "Likely generally aware"? Please.
Despite having been a prominent defense attorney in the past for several high-profile clients, it appears Wells has flipped and turned into a prosecutor. (Ah yes, the power of client fees). If they don't have a solid case, they'll create one with "circumstantial evidence", innuendos, and possible "theories" that they'll try to sell as truth. Basically, somebody committed a crime and they've decided on a patsy they're going to nail for it. Whether or not he actually did it doesn't matter. Once they secure a conviction, they can close the case and claim justice was done. A win. The scary part is -- the people that are dumb enough to believe it without asking for more conclusive evidence before they sign off on some poor devil, quite possibly innocent, having his life ruined. It happens all the time.
Look at what's occurring right now. Forget the armchair prosecutors because they're typically too stupid to know the difference anyway. An allegation was made -- dude must be guilty. Morons -- until and unless it happens to them or one of theirs. Then they see the light and change their tune.
Yet one would think others should know better. Specifically, the knee-jerk media. These people are college educated, presumably took an ethics class or two along the way about getting the story right before they run with it, and most of them have seen a lot of stuff in the sports world. And sure, like everybody else, they have teams they root for and others they don't like much. But they're supposed to be objective and open-minded in their coverage, much less jumping to wild conclusions they can't substantiate.
Many of them are already talking about how long Tom Brady's suspension should be next year. They've already done a kangaroo-court leap past possible guilt and moved on to the punishment phase. Should it be 2 games? 4? 6? The entire season?
The only thing they seem to agree on is because some high-falootin lawyer hired by the league to dig up dirt on the Patriots has made a few vague allegations in a lengthy report -- they must all be true. Wells' "more probably than not" ramblings have become written in stone as fact in their minds.
So far, yours truly has yet to see a single one of them stand up and say, "Hey, wait a minute. We don't know what -- if anything -- untoward happened so far. Even Wells has admitted he's guessing. How about we hold off on crucifying Brady until and unless we have some actual -- you know -- evidence that we was complicit in a crime that may or may not have been committed in the first place?"
But that's not how it works these days, is it? When the media gets a mere whiff of a possible scandal, they'll root in the dirt like rabid hogs on steroids. Forget the facts or lack thereof, and who their words may hurt -- anything for a story. If proven wrong later, no big deal. They've already moved on to trash somebody else when the chance presents itself. So much for that long lost ethics class they once sat in.
Idle thought II: Some of those texts between the ball boys exposed their hate towards Tom Brady. It was f*** Tom this and that. They even mentioned OVER inflating the pigskins to resemble a soccer ball or watermelon just to mess with the QB's head. That begs an obvious question. Given they were employed by the Patriots, a job a lot of young guys would kill for, why would they consider doing anything to sabotage their team's chances of winning? So they're accused of deflating, but considered INFLATING instead? A very strange twist to the story indeed.
Wells' report pretty much exonerated Patriots ownership (Robert Kraft) and management (Bill Belichick) of being complicit in any way for whatever happened or not. After all, just because a couple nitwit ball boys allegedly altered the air pressure in some footballs surely doesn't mean the franchise should be held accountable, much less punished, if they had no knowledge of it. If a couple janitors that worked in a GM plant went off the deep end and did something stupid, nobody would expect the CEO or the corporation as a whole to get hammered for it. That "should have known" and "happened on your watch so you're responsible" stuff has it's reasonable limits, or should have. They'd just fire the custodians. End of story. No big deal.
But there's the kicker. Wells has given Goodell the exact language he needs to render punishment under his own former edict. The Commish has a variety to choose from when it comes to sentencing. Even given the vagueness of Ted's not-so-excellent adventure, Goodell doing nothing is likely not an option. The hordes of armchairs and knee-jerks would scream bloody murder. More importantly, the media would be outraged. They'd likely go on a jihad to put the Commish on a spit and not-so-slowly roast him alive. How DARE he be objective in the face of all our stories? Harumph!!
Let's get real. While the New England Patriots have long been a standard of excellence in the NFL, outside of their own fan base in the northeast there are countless millions that root against them. Basically, it's called jealousy. So in the whole scheme of public opinion across the NFL nation, Goodell would be more popular if he hammered the Pats, one way or the other.
He could suspend Brady for X amount of games. The Players Union would certainly appeal and hard telling what a "neutral" arbitrator might decide on in the end.
Or he could fine the Patriots and/or take away a future draft choice or two. Robert Kraft himself has yo-yoed on his position of late. First he wanted the league to apologize for what he considered to be a witch hunt. Then he said he respected the process and will abide by whatever rulings the NFL hands down.
A couple million bucks and/or losing a lower round draft choice are one thing. But if Goodell hammers Kraft and his team too hard, the Cheesemeister might change his mind again. Remember, Wells exonerated Kraft and the team management from any wrongdoing in his report. So why should they be made to suffer for something they weren't responsible for in the first place? If it ever even happened?
This will heat up and get interesting in the next few months. A lot of issues will be on the table and debated fiercely in many quarters. How it will all turn out is anybody's guess. But you know who will be the sure winners when all is said and done?
The lawyers. The longer it drags out, the more billable hours. At the NFL level, we're talking serious cha-chings.
Ted Wells may or may not have compiled a worthy report on whatever happened, but trust me on one thing...
He knows all about billable hours......
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