We all know what’s about to happen. It’s pretty easy to piece together what happened in that football game on Sunday, but it’s also pretty hard to prove. And when you are the kind of guy who can spend five months ‘investigating’ an incident of domestic violence without bothering to ask anyone for the most obvious piece of evidence, it’s not hard to conjure up what the Roger Goodell playbook will be.
Yesterday, Bill Belichick and Tom Brady had their say about “Deflate-gate” (I hate that name by the way). I was shocked that I found Belicheck to be more believable than Brady. Maybe Bill Belicheck knew about the balls being deflated, maybe he didn’t, but there is no way this happened without Tom Brady’s input. Tom Brady is trying to sell us on the fact that either 11 of the 12 balls deflated by magic, or some entrepreneurial spirit on the Patriots sideline let some of the air out, to the perfect point without Brady knowing it. How could some ball boy or equipment manager alter the balls, to the exact point that Brady likes it, without Brady saying, ‘Hey, that’s exactly the way I like it’. That’s a big risk for a person on the sideline to take without the QB’s input. There is no way for whoever did it to know they were doing it right without Tom Brady saying it felt right. And what would be the point of taking the air out of the ball (aka cheating) if you were not sure it was being done correctly.
When I first heard of this concern, I, like most, really didn’t think it was a big deal. I mean the Pats won by 38 points. There is no way properly inflated balls would have erased this deficit. I don’t think that’s the point though. First of all, it’s not that one ball happened to have the wrong air pressure. It turns out almost all of them did. Second of all, in a week after Tom Brady stated with the utmost arrogance, that Baltimore should study the rule book a little better, why cheat?
I was chatting with a few friends before the game. A question I asked several people was, ‘can you see any scenario where the Colts win on Sunday?’ None of us were confident in the Colts chances. I know weirder things have happened, but it seemed like as close to a sure thing as I have seen in sports since San Francisco played San Diego in the Superbowl. So… why cheat? Why not give it a go straight up. The only logical reason I can find behind this (and I know, applying logic is my first mistake) is that they probably do this pretty often, so why not do it one more time. I think that they were sure they would not get caught, because they have done this before enough times without consequence that they felt immune. They were arrogant.
Speaking of arrogant, Roger Goodell and his crack team of investigators are on the case. Roger is in a tough spot here, as he has so little credibility, that he spent a week earlier this month pretending that Mueller Report was a big win for his office, when it really just proved that he ran an incompetent investigation into the Ray Rice domestic violence case, and then lied about it to the public. Roger needs to show the world that he is able to conduct an efficient and competent investigation and then that he can come down hard on the perpetrators.
Let’s ignore for the time being that this in itself makes him a little biased, and therefore he should not be anywhere near this investigation. Let’s look at the fact that he also needs Tom and Bill for the next week and a half. He will have billions of people tuning in to his flagship event on February 1st. This matchup between the Seahawks and Patriots is kinda a dream come true. Two great teams, lots of star power! Suspending a future Hall of Fame quarterback for the Superbowl will hurt the product.
So, as mentioned, Roger is in a tough position. If he comes down hard, he will be seen as being to concerned with his image, if he doesn’t he is running another incompetent investigation. If only there was a way to come down hard on the perpetrators, and not spoil the Superbowl.
Like I said, we can all connect the dots here, the play is obvious. Roger Goodell is going to grill everyone involved, get to the bottom of this and hand out a harsh penalty, but all this will happen after the Superbowl. He will stand up at the podium and lament the fact that there just wasn’t time to complete is investigation before the big game, but never fear, the NFL takes matters of integrity seriously. He will drop the hammer. And being a trend setter, he will do it in a way that is somehow too little too late, and overkill at the same time.
That’s the game plan for Roger, but I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again, the NFL has a problem, and it’s not going away. They have no credibility. As such, there is no way they can conduct and investigation and level any kind of punishment that will seem fair. They will push forward, explain their case. They will expect everyone to believe them. When nobody does, they won’t really care. Their decision to keep Roger Goodell in September was an arrogant one, and it will continue to haunt them in situations like this.
The fact that Roger and the NFL remain tone deaf to this if proof that they feel they are too big to fail. Now, however, being tone deaf to the consequences has managed to tarnish the Superbowl. The biggest event in the NFL calendar is under a cloud, all because the NFL cannot get their house in order.
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