Brady, Patriots get what they deserved.
Brady, Patriots pay price for breaking rules
Tom Brady’s biggest sin wasn’t tioning everything from the methodology of the testing to why there was no smoking air gauge. Brady’s agent, Don Yee, did so again Monday, outlining what surely will be the crux of an appeal by calling the Wells Report “an incredibly frail exercise in fact-finding and logic.”
But that ignores common sense. Brady is one of the best quarterbacks to ever play the game, a four-time Super Bowl winner and two-time NFL MVP. Do you really think two low-level Patriots employees are going to mess with his footballs without his knowledge or direction?
You’re going to buy that those two employees just happened to joke about letting the air out of the footballs, with one even calling himself “The Deflator”? And that the flurry of phone calls and texts between Brady and equipment assistant John Jastremski after the deflated footballs were discovered was pure coincidence? Please. Letting air out of footballs sounds like a high school prank, not something so serious it merits benching Brady for a quarter of the regular season. Odds are he won’t sit that long, with his sentence likely to be reduced by a game or two upon appeal.
It’s not as if the deflated footballs made a difference, either. Brady threw for two touchdowns and the Patriots outscored the Indianapolis Colts 28-0 in the second half of the AFC Championship Game, after the shenanigans were discovered.
None of that is the point, however. Brady played fast and loose with the rules, and now he has to pay the price. Some might say it’s too high, with the Patriots docked two draft picks and fined $1 million on top of Brady’s suspension. But this isn’t about deflated footballs, it’s about integrity and honesty. Those don’t come cheap.