A brownout at the NFL

Some day, historians may look back on 2016 as the start of the irreversible decline of the National Football League, and certainly as the beginning of the end of Roger Goodell’s stint building an unstoppable powerhouse. Exhibit A: the epic botch of league discipline against New York Giants kicker and confessed domestic abuser Josh Brown.

The NFL, also struggling with declining ratings, and mushrooming evidence that hits to the head cause long-term brain damage, and early retirement by marquee stars, and a flatfooted response to a spate of national anthem protests, had a perfectly thrown ball on its fingertips — and dropped it.

Two years ago, the league got caught going easy on Baltimore Ravens running back Ray Rice after he clobbered his fiancée in an elevator. At the end of the embarrassing saga, Goodell, playing tough guy, laid down a tough new policy mandating a six-game suspension for any offender.

This year, the fact pattern repeated, almost eerily, with Brown. No smoking-gun video — but again, overwhelming evidence of battery, in this case against the woman who was his wife, followed by a meek one-game suspension for unspecified misconduct, complicated by what amounted to evidence of a coverup.

Tuesday, the Giants released Brown, surely hoping to put it all behind them. No can do. The damage is done. Americans are forced to ask: What is Roger Goodell thinking? Or to put a finer point on it, is Roger Goodell thinking at all?