Brady Not Appealing to Supreme Court, Ends Painstaking 18 Month Saga

By Ryan Whitfield

Twitter: @RyanWhitfieldNE

Have your day. All of you. Pop some champagne, cheer, celebrate and rejoice that Tom Brady will miss the first four games of the upcoming season. I don’t think I can recall ever seeing two sides so split over an issue and both sides being so wrong and misguided over a sports topic. I will address both in a moment, but first let me take my turn at clapping. Thank you Tom, thank you for finally ending this insufferable story. 500+ days, 18 months, and a storyline that started out as an issue of deflated footballs, that twisted and turned into a national news headline as part of a labor debate that pitted Employer vs. Union, with questions of due process and general fairness.

Now let me say my final piece to both sides. I’ll start with you. I assume the majority of the readers stand with the masses outside of New England choosing to rejoice and celebrate Tom Brady’s defeat. I won’t waste my words arguing over the effect of deflated footballs or the equally borderline practices of the 31 other franchises. You’ve all made up your mind one way or the other. And even if you are too blind to see that this rationally is an insanely harsh punishment, you can’t really be this dumb…can you?

Allow me to lay out what just happened. A commissioner, who in recent years was being overturned in arbitration at an alarming rate, has decided to evoke his bargained power to act as judge, judy and executioner. And worse, he got the judicial system to verify his power and set court precedent. Furthermore, he yielded this power against one of the faces of the league. One of, if not the best, quarterback in the history of the game. I’m no conspiracy theorist, but I’d caution any player in the NFL to stay clear of Goodell’s bad side, before he cites article 46 and uses it to hand down whatever punishment he wants. Goodell is the almighty, it’s backed by the court system, and the NFLPA does not have the gaul to strike during the next CBA negotiations to take this power away. Scary days.

Now to the Patriots fans. I have a few gripes with you too. Sure, there was really no “smoking gun” evidence, and the league seemed to be making up for the lack of punishment for Spygate. But, they did it. Now I’m not sure that Tom Brady specifically told anyone to get the balls below a legal limit. However, Bill and the Krafts made this Brady’s issue from the get go, and the there was definitely a process to circumvent the rules here. So look internally first, before you keep complaining. Next, stop with the fire Goodell nonsense. You sound like 5 year olds at the checkout counter after being denied a candy bar. First of all, Goodell is not an idiot. He’s the exact opposite, he acts with arrogance and at times borderline recklessness, because he is smart enough to know he can. His job is to grow the league. Check. And do the owners bidding. Check. That’s it! And as long as he does those two things he’s untouchable. If the owners wanted deflategate to go away it would’ve. Lastly, if you’re mad at Brady for giving up on the fight, then you are a loser. The most likely scenario for Brady was that his stay of suspension was granted and then the Supreme Court would rule to not hear this case. Anything short of a guarantee that that wouldn’t happen until after the season would’ve been selfish of Brady. If you have to miss him for four games, you do it in September not December.

There are two silver linings here. One, the Patriots are now able to truly evaluate what they have in Jimmy Garoppollo. Is he the future? Is he a bust? Can you flip him for a first round pick? We should know by October. Secondly, it’s over. It’s over, over, over. I never have to write about it again, and as soon as October rolls around it’ll truly be history.

P.S. This is the most loaded offense for the Patriots since 2007, and they have a better/ younger defense. Patriots start 3-1, and I can’t wait to drink your virtual tears on Twitter all September long.