U.S. District Judge Richard M. Berman certainly let the air out of the NFL’s attempt to suspend Patriots’ quarterback Tom Brady for four games. Berman used 40 pages worth of legal terms and interesting logic to claim NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell was too tough on Brady.
Whether or not one is a Patriots’ fan, most people know some shenanigans went on with Deflategate. Until Brady and the NFL Players Association went to federal court, we thought the Commissioner could mete out intra-league justice, just so it is not over the top.
Consider this: Major League Baseball has the authority to suspend a player, manager or executive for life for gambling, which can affect the outcome of games. Reasonable people can then conclude that a football player giving a nod and a wink to conduct designed to give one team an advantage over another deserves punishment. Four games pale in comparison to life.
Judge Berman did not exonerate Brady, but his ruling, if not successfully appealed, may have side effects we may like even less. This case has a bit of the Goodell, the bad and the ugly.
The Goodell. The judge accepted as fact the findings of NFL-commissioned investigator Ted Wells. Brady had “general awareness” that footballs were being doctored on his behalf during January’s AFC Championship Game. That makes Brady an “accessory.”
As the NFL investigated, Brady stonewalled. In fact, he destroyed his cell phone and the tons of text messages it contained.
Goodell suspended Brady because of his role as an accessory and for impeding the investigation. Patriots’ owner Robert Kraft accepted the sanctions on the team, but vocally supported Brady in his appeal.
The collective bargaining agreement between the players and owners provides the Commissioner with disciplinary authority. This authority played out in the false starts involving the string of domestic violence matters involving NFL players such as Ray Rice, Ray McDonald and Greg Hardy.
Another example was Bountygate, where the Commissioner suspended New Orleans Saints players and coaches for earning extra money for knocking out opposing players. In this case, player sanctions were ultimately overturned in court, while challenges in the domestic violence cases saw reversals or reductions in punishment.
The bad. Berman ruled Goodell exceeded the Commissioner’s collectively-bargained authority by imposing a suspension similar to those guilty of steroid use. The judge wanted to know what part of the suspension was for “general awareness” of deflating footballs and what part was for impeding the investigation. There was, of course, no answer to that.
Berman also found Brady was wronged when investigator Ted Wells did not tell Brady he was subject to discipline for stonewalling. All of this gave Berman his grounds for ruling the NFL’s actions constituted “insufficient notice” to Brady about his four-game suspension.
The judge also whacked Goodell for trying to suspend Brady for “conduct detrimental” to the NFL. The Commissioner’s use of the collective bargaining agreement’s “conduct detrimental policy… to impose discipline upon Brady is legally misplaced.”
Sorry, your honor. Knowingly sitting by while attempts are made to gain an unfair advantage is dishonest and is conduct detrimental to the game. This is an in-house matter and should have stayed that way.
The Ugly. If Berman’s ruling is allowed to stand, it can adversely affect other areas of NFL discipline. USA Today’s Christine Brennan brings up the domestic violence case of Dallas Cowboys’ Defense End Greg Hardy.
Previously, Hardy had his NFL-imposed suspension reduced from 10 to 4 games, despite the horrid set of facts involved, according to the victim. According to ESPN, Hardy “is considering appealing his four-game suspension after seeing Tom Brady win big against the NFL in U.S. District Court on Thursday.”
Hardy, according to his former girlfriend, inflicted far worse damage than Ray Rice did to his fiancée, now wife, Janay. Brennan brings up the ugly specter of Hardy using the Berman ruling as a precedent to get what Brady got: no punishment at all.
“How Hardy even has a job in the NFL after what he did is a question we all should be asking, but after Thursday’s ruling, there’s no point in doing that anymore,” wrote Brennan.
Hopefully, Goodell and the NFL will prevail in their appeal.
