Making sense of NFL punishments is hard to do because you
can’t make any sense out of any of them.
The punishment handed down by the NFL against the Patriots for deflating
footballs is completely beyond what it should be. Back in November of 2015 the Panthers and
Vikings were caught red handed heating footballs during the game. This is a violation of NFL rules. You cannot artificially affect game balls. Their punishment? None.
They received a warning and were allowed to continue.. Meanwhile the Patriots were accused of
artificially affecting game balls.
Instead of heating them up, they were accused of deflating them. Were they caught red handed? No. A
massive investigation concluded it was more probable than not that they were
guilty. What punishment was given to the
Patriots? Was it just a warning? No.
Instead, their quarterback was suspended for four games. They lost a first and fourth round draft
pick, and they were fined $1 million.
It is true that after the Vikings and Panthers tampered
with the footballs, the league notified all teams so the Patriots along with
everyone else were on notice not to mess with footballs. But the NFL travelled a long way to go from “hey
you naughty boys cut it out” to the loss of a first and fourth round pick, a
major suspension, and $1 million in fines.
Meanwhile in Atlanta, the Falcons were found definitively
guilty of pumping in fake crowd noise during home games. This, of course, gives a distinct advantage
to the home team. Being the Falcons,
though, it didn’t really matter much.
But still, they cheated. They
admitted guilt. No “more probable than
not” here. We’re talking 100%
guilty. Their punishment? They were fined $350,000 and lost a 5th
round 2016 draft pick.; Their team
president was suspended from the competition committee for three months even
though the investigation concluded he had no knowledge of the crowd noise. Suspended from the competition committee. Wow, what a stunning blow to the team. But overall, I think that punishment was the
most fair punishment of the lot.
And of course, the Cleveland Browns were fined $250,000
because their GM texted play recommendations to the coaching staff during the
games. Being Cleveland, though, no
amount of cheating could actually help them win anything so the league let it
go with a simple fine.
Some argue the Patriots were punished harshly for two
reasons having nothing whatsoever to do with the actual deflation of the
footballs. These are:
·
The Patriots were not completely cooperative
with the investigation. Brady did not
turn over his phone to investigators and they did not allow equipment personnel
to have a second interview with the investigative team.
·
The Patriots are repeat offenders.
There is some merit to the notion if Brady had nothing to
hide, he should have readily turned his phone over to investigators. But let’s look at this more closely. If the Wells report were an actual legal
proceeding they could have subpoenaed the phone and emails. But Brady would have had the chance to fully
refute any adverse interpretations of those records. More importantly, he would have been able to
do his argument justice. In the case of
the Wells team, Brady would not have had this opportunity. And given that the NFL gave the Panthers and
Vikings a “knock it off” while launching a full blown mega investigation
against the Patriots along with lots of public statements to this effect, the
Patriots had every reason to think witch hunt.
And would any of us have turned over our phone to someone we thought was
conducting a witch hunt? Had the NFL
simply said “Look guys, you read what we said about the ball heating episode in
Minnesota yet you persisted in tampering with footballs. We’re going to fine you” the story would have
come and gone. That is exactly what the
NFL should have done. It should be noted
that NFL rules specifically address air pressure in footballs. Violations of the rules in this regard
results in a $25,000 fine. That’s
it. No suspensions and no loss of draft
picks is mandated for this offence. The
rules do allow the NFL to tack on a more severe punishment, but no one can
seriously claim the rule violation is meant to allow the punishment actually meted
out against the Patriots. But instead
of simply following their own written rules, the NFL launch a full-fledged
investigation costing thousands of dollars as if the Patriots had breached
national security. And when all was said
and done, Wells could not definitively conclude anything or, was not man enough
to make a bold stand for fear of a lawsuit.
Either way, the Patriots were punished based on probability.
Brady was not obligated to turn over his phone. He exercised his right not to do so. Why then is Brady being punished for
exercising his legal rights? To top this
all off, the Wells report specifically said the team and head coach had no idea
anything was going on. Why punish the
team then based on this report? The NFL
was intent on punishing the Patriots regardless. Their actions show this conclusively. In effect, the NFL said this. Hey Brady, the Wells report says you are more
probably guilty than not so we’re going to hit you hard. Hey Belichick and Patriots, the report says
you’re innocent but we’re going to hit you hard because. . .well. . .just
because.
Who can possibly make sense of this? They issue a warning to two teams for ball
tampering and completely slam another for ball tampering even though the teams
receiving the warnings were caught red handed while the one getting slammed has
not actually been found definitively guilty.
With respect to Brady not giving up his phone I have been
confronted with the same situation except before the days of cell phones. Back in 1992 I was involved in a court
proceeding involving the Branch Davidian cult.
This was before the siege and therefore before the cult burst into
public prominence. The court proceeding
was in family court and involved trying to get a little girl out of the
cult. I accused the cult of some really
bad things and they exercised their right to defend themselves in court. When I left the cult they had stolen a computer
of mine on which I had written down some private philosophical musings in the
form of notes. I never distributed them
because they were notes made to jog my memory should I ever get back to musing
on those subjects. This meant the notes
were very disjointed to anyone else reading them, but made perfect sense to
me. This is why they were private.
When I was on the witness stand the lawyer for the Branch
Davidian member brought these notes to light.
He read some passages and because they were disjointed to him and
everyone else, accused me of taking drugs and being mentally unstable, and
along with everything else evil about me according to the lawyer, this meant my
testimony was worthless. The lawyer did
exactly what he should do in a court case.
He was a very good lawyer doing his job.
Never mind the documents were from a stolen computer and never mind the
documents were private and meant only for myself. In fact, the document represented thoughts
which I did not necessarily actually agree with. I was brainstorming as it were. And somehow that was turned into me being on
drugs and a crazy mentally unstable person.
But because this happened in a court room, the lawyer
representing the plaintiff, for whom I was a witness, along with myself, was
able to counter the arguments. I was
able to explain the context. The judge
accepted my interpretation and, in fact, called both lawyers to the bench and
told the Branch Davidian lawyer his use of such tactics was irrelevant to the
case. That is when I knew we were going
to win and the little girl in question would escape the cult.
This happened in the days before social media and also
before anyone knew of the cult. IF this
trial had happened a year later, the public might well have seen what the
lawyer tried to use against me. And the
public would have jumped to all manner of conclusions.
My point is, even if you think Brady is guilty, he was
under no obligation to release private material to anyone. He had every legal right not to do so and
given his public prominence and what must have been his feeling of a witch
hunt, I perfectly understand why he chose this course. I understand that too many in the public
Brady looks guilty for withholding this information. In a legal proceeding, Brady would have had
no choice. But had he released his phone
records to Wells, he would have been at their mercy and at the mercy of public
opinion. Brady would not have had his
day in court so to speak.
Of course it is entirely possible Brady was guilty and he
withheld the records precisely because they would prove his guilt. But we don’t know this for certain. It is equally possible Brady chose not to
subject himself to false interpretations.
If a non binding investigative team had asked me to release all my computer
files there is no way in hell I would have done so because I knew people
reading some of the stuff on my computer would jump to the wrong conclusion.
We have a big problem in our society. That problem is we think too highly of social
media. We pay too much attention to
tweets and text messages without knowing the full context. We pass judgments based on insufficient
information despite the fact we live in an information age. You can have lots of information and
misinterpret it. As someone once said “Logic
is a systematic method of coming to the wrong conclusion with confidence.” ( I wish I knew the author of this
quotation). It’s not that social media
is wrong. The problem is social media
gives us the false illusion we know and understand a subject well. In some cases, we might, but in many cases,
we do not. The above quote could as
easily be reworded as “Social media is a communications phenomenon which
facilitates coming to the wrong conclusion with confidence.”
It is clear to me the NFL paid attention to all those
tweets and all those talking heads and meted out a punishment based on those
things, and not on the merits of the case.
Brady is punished for exercising his legal rights. The Patriots are punished harshly even though
the report says they were innocent. And
the Patriots are being punished far more harshly than other teams who were
definitively found guilty of cheating.
In what possible way is this fair?
The NFL needs to get its own house in order when it comes to meeting out
discipline and not care about what’s out there on social media.
One might argue that a corporation has the right to
protect its brand. Yes they do, but we
are talking about peoples’ reputation and livelihood here. Brady can afford to go without four weeks of
pay but can the equipment staff? The NFL’s
Mickey Mouse methodology for meeting out punishments is damaging to individuals
and does not pay any attention to their legal rights. And that is something they do not have the
right to do.
