Tom Brady’s agent accuses NFL of ‘sting operation’ in Deflategate

Tom Brady’s agent says the Deflategate report “omitted nearly all of Tom’s testimony’’ and accused the NFL and Indianapolis Colts of running a “sting operation’’ against the Patriots. AP Photo/Charles Krupa

By Jeff Pini

May 7, 2015

3 minutes to read

Tom Brady’s agent says the Deflategate report “omitted nearly all of Tom’s testimony’’ and accused the NFL and Indianapolis Colts of running a “sting operation’’ against the Patriots.

Don Yee, Brady’s agent, released a statement a day after the Wells Report found it was “more probable than not’’ that Patriots staffers deliberately underinflated footballs and Brady “was at least generally aware’’ of the activity.

“The Wells report, with all due respect, is a significant and terrible disappointment,’’ Yee said in the statement. “It’s omission of key facts and lines of inquiry suggest the investigators reached a conclusion first, and then determined so-called facts later. One fact alone taints this entire report.’’

Yee also suggested that the Colts, the Patriots’ AFC Championship game opponents, colluded with the NFL to trap the Patriots before the game began.

“What does it say about the league office’s protocols and ethics when it allows one team to tip it off to an issue prior to a championship game, and no league officials or game officials notified the Patriots of the same issue prior to the game? This suggests it may be more probable than not that the league cooperated with the Colts in perpetrating a sting operation. The Wells report buries this issue in a footnote on page 46 without any further elaboration.’’

Timeline of Deflategate

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Yee also said that the firm that the league hired to conduct the investigation could not perform its duties objectively because of its prior business relationship.

“The league is a significant client of the investigators’ law firm; it appears to be a rich source of billings and media exposure based on content in the law firm’s website,’’ he said. “This was not an independent investigation and the contents of the report bear that out – all one has to do is read closely and critically, as opposed to simply reading headlines. The investigators’ assumptions and inferences are easily debunked or subject to multiple interpretations. Much of the report’s vulnerabilities are buried in the footnotes, which is a common legal writing tactic. It is a sad day for the league as it has abdicated the resolution of football-specific issues to people who don’t understand the context or culture of the sport.

The report says that Brady “declined to make available any documents or electronic information…that [investigators] requested.’’

But Yee says that he was present while the league investigators interviewed Brady.

“I have verbatim notes of the interview,’’ Yee said. “Tom made himself available for nearly an entire day and patiently answered every question. It was clear to me the investigators had limited understanding of professional football. For reasons unknown, the Wells report omitted nearly all of Tom’s testimony, most of which was critical because it would have provided this report with the context that it lacks.’’

Yee also said that lead investigator Ted Wells should have shared more of what he learned from Brady.

“Mr. Wells promised back in January to share the results of this investigation publicly, so why not follow through and make public all of the information gathered and let the public draw its own conclusions?’’ Yee said. “This report contains significant and tragic flaws, and it is common knowledge in the legal industry that reports like this generally are written for the benefit of the purchaser.’’