Don’t be surprised to see, nine months from now, a baby boom in Indianapolis, New York, Miami and Buffalo because Tom Brady’s DeflateGate suspension is back on.
Just a few moments ago the 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals handed down the 2-1 decision that puts the New England Patriots quarterback back on his couch for the first four games of the 2016-17 NFL season.
#BREAKING: U.S. appeals court reinstates Tom Brady’s suspension https://t.co/NA2h45XR2w
— CNN Newsroom (@CNNnewsroom) April 25, 2016
“Our role is not to determine for ourselves whether Brady participated in a scheme to deflate footballs or whether the suspension imposed by the Commissioner should have been for three games or five games or none at all,” Judge Barrington D. Parker wrote in the majority decision. “Nor is it our role to second-guess the arbitrator’s procedural rulings. Our obligation is limited to determining whether the arbitration proceedings and award met the minimum legal standards established by the Labor Management Relations Act.”
The appeals court decision fixes the horrible ruling from Judge Richard Berman back in September 2015 that negated the four-game suspension and allowed Brady to play in every game for the Patriots in the 2015-16 season.
Brady and the National Football League Players Association can ask for the same court to re-hear the case or even petition the United State Supreme Court but both of those options seem completely ridiculous. That doesn’t mean Brady and the NFLPA won’t try it, but the notion that the Supreme Court would hear a case about deflating footballs is laugh out loud funny.
Tom Brady and the union haven't made a decision on how to move forward yet. Here's the NFLPA's statement. pic.twitter.com/vr1vt44B0V
— Albert Breer (@AlbertBreer) April 25, 2016
There was one dissenting voice on the court, Chief Judge Robert Katzmann.
“I am troubled by the Commissioner’s decision to uphold the unprecedented four-game suspension,” Katzmann said. “The Commissioner failed to even consider a highly relevant alternative penalty.”
Katzmann is right in that NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell should have suspended Tom Brady for a year.
The games the Patriots will lose Brady for are all big ones. They open the season against the Arizona Cardinals that was seen just this morning as a potential Super Bowl match up. After that they play the rejuvenated Miami Dolphins, the Brock Osweiler-led Houston Texans and the Pat-hating Buffalo Bills. It is not ridiculous to think the Patriots could lose all four of those games.
"Tom Brady's next step is to make an en banc appeal…those are very rarely granted."
– Gabe Feldman pic.twitter.com/RYQql42WPd
— NFL Network (@nflnetwork) April 25, 2016
Goodell and the league were pleased with the return to sanity in the league’s disciplinary powers as Berman’s ruling a year ago could have easily led to a lawless wasteland.
“We are pleased the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit ruled today that the Commissioner properly exercised his authority under the collective bargaining agreement to act in cases involving the integrity of the game,” the NFL said in a statement. “That authority has been recognized by many courts and has been expressly incorporated into every collective bargaining agreement between the NFL and NFLPA for the past 40 years.”
Judge Parker, proving he’s not a moron, said that Brady’s destruction of his cell phone seemed to be all the evidence the NFL needed to suspend him. It changed the argument “from air in a football to compromising the integrity of a proceeding that the commissioner had convened… So why couldn’t the commissioner suspend Mr. Brady for that conduct alone? With all due respect, Mr. Brady’s explanation of that made no sense whatsoever.”
And, of course, it didn’t.
New England @ Arizona (week 1) goes from Even to Arizona -4.5 without Tom Brady
— Danny Sheridan (@DannySheridan1) April 25, 2016
And so the Jimmy Garoppolo era is set to begin in New England for at least a quarter of the seasons. Garoppolo was drafted in the second round by the Patriots in 2014 and has throught a total of 32 passes in his NFL career and most of those were in his rookie season. Last year he was 1-of-4 for six yards.
As for Brady, the hit to his legacy is now secure. The suspension for cheating, now upheld but a federal court, is part of his history along with his draft position, his three SpyGate Super Bowl wins and his one lone non-cheating (as far as we know) Super Bowl victory.
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