There’s a suspension of decency in the NFL’s latest Deflategate move
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COMMENTARY
During a week that indirectly raised the NFL’s pathetic stance toward domestic violence to the forefront, the league leaned on an old crutch, as blatant as it is duplicitous.
There, on Sunday, of course, was Dallas Cowboys owner and general manager Jerry Jones, heaping praise upon defensive end Greg Hardy for his leadership, this after shoving a coach on the sideline during the Cowboys’ gag job against the New York Giants on Sunday. The same Greg Hardy who recently served a four-game suspension from the NFL for his part in a dispute involving ex-girlfriend Nicole Holder. Hardy’s initial 10-game suspension was whittled down to four following an appeal.
Jones considers this guy a “leader.’’ Neat.
“The leadership aspect comes in different ways,’’ Jones told a Dallas radio station on Tuesday. “First of all, to really be a leader on a football team, talking the talk without walking the walk doesn’t happen. Real leaders are really outstanding football players. So they get it done and through that they earn a great deal of respect by their teammates. My view is totally through the eyes of within the team, what the team thinks. What they think of each other, how hard are they willing to support each other when you do get in this competitive times. It is the role of an individual.’’
What a deplorable crock.
It’s not a good look for the NFL, one of its premier owners celebrating the character of a slug who allegedly threatened to kill Holder during a 2014 incident. Then again, such actions notably pale in comparison to the truly egregious acts talking place within the walls of One Patriot Place.
Oh, yes, Deflategate, in all of its mind-numbing banality, is back for more after taking a too-short, two-month respite, during which time Patriots quarterback Tom Brady has only made a firm case to win the Most Valuable Player Award come January, not to mention a fifth Super Bowl title in his hometown, nonetheless.
But on Monday, the NFL filed its opening brief in the foolish Deflategate appeal, comparing the suspicion of Brady tampering with footballs akin to the Black Sox scandal of 1919.
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Yup.
If the NFL weren’t so bloated of its own self-worth, perhaps commissioner Roger Goodell and company might understand how ridiculously abhorrent the league’s public image is these days. Their obsession with Deflategate is only the tip of the misguidance, extending to its fining players for honoring cancer victims while they make a profit on the disease, as well as the swirling cases of domestic violence and CTE that continue to plague the league while it hides behind its pursuit of a soap opera.
“Stripped of its celebrity,’’ the appeal’s introduction reads, “this case involves a straightforward exercise of authority expressly granted under a collective bargaining agreement (“CBA’’) and shielded from collateral attack by decades of precedent concerning labor arbitrations.’’
The next 60-some odd pages contain more of the same that you’re no doubt familiar with now. The Wells Report. Brady was less than cooperative with the investigation. Dorito Dinks.
“In short,’’ the 70-page document reads, “the Commissioner acted well within the bounds of discretion expressly granted by the CBA, while the district court vastly exceeded the narrow bounds of judicial review allowed under the Labor Management Relations Act and decades of precedent. The district court’s decision cannot stand.’’
To recap, Judge Richard Berman vacated Brady’s four-game suspension prior to the start of the 2015 season, which the quarterback has started with 16 touchdown passes and one, borderline criminal (thanks, Julian) interception. He brings a 113.2 QB rating into the next game, Thursday night against the Miami Dolphins at Gillette Stadium.
And yet, all the while, the NFL continues to dig its heels in on Deflategate, a drama that was tired and inconsequential by the time the thing wrapped up nearly two months ago. While Wells and the NFL deemed that Brady was “more probable than not’’ aware of the events that transpired around the PSI levels of footballs, Berman ruled that the commissioner did not have the authority to suspend Brady for a quarter of the season, a matter that Goodell and his minions continue to argue, and one that could set a dangerous precedent for league jurisdictions moving forward.
Had the suspension been held up, Brady would have only played the last two games, versus Indianapolis and the New York Jets. That’s the same amount of time Hardy ended up serving after his 10-game suspension was reduced.
“I certainly shouldn’t and wouldn’t comment about another team’s issues,’’ Jones said during a tongue bath for the commissioner this past summer. “First of all, let me really emphasize how much I endorse our commissioner. And how strongly I feel about the job he is doing. He has got obviously a very tough job. But he is doing an outstanding job. You have to deal with people you are counting on to help build and to help excel the National Football League and I’m talking about the owners. You have to know that you are going to make some decisions that are very unpopular with that particular group. This is the case.’’
The ramblings of a mad man.
After all, if Jones is the same guy who considerers Greg Hardy a “leader’’ then maybe it’s fair to question whether or not Goodell is doing as much of a bang-up job as Jones might have you believe.
In any case, welcome back, Deflategate. Nobody likes you.
And just how screwed are the Dolphins?
Contact Eric Wilbur at: [email protected]. Follow him on Twitter: @GlobeEricWilbur
Casting the “Deflategate’’ movie
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