NFLPA has a master plan for Tom Brady
On Tuesday, a union source told an ESPN/ABC legal analyst the union would take Brady’s case to court if his four-game suspension wasn’t overturned entirely.
The source laid out five points for Adam Kilgore of the Washington Post:
• The NFL policy for handling equipment in the NFL is in the club manual and pertains to club personnel, not players. The NFLPA would argue that the NFL suspended Brady four games under a policy that doesn’t apply to him.
• The Wells Report, the investigation on which the NFL based its suspension, alleged Brady was “at least generally aware” that footballs had been tampered. The NFLPA would argue that the “general awareness” standard has no legal merit – either Wells found direct evidence, or he didn’t.
• The NFLPA would argue Brady – given the rules in the club manual did apply to him – received a punishment without precedence. Under the collective bargaining agreement, players have a right to know specific punishment for specific violations.
• The NFLPA plans to cite a specific example in oral arguments in an effort to prove Brady’s suspension was arbitrary. Last year, the league caught the Minnesota Vikings tampering with footballs by placing them in a dryer, a violation of the club manual. The team, the NFLPA source said, received a letter from the league and no further reprimand.
• The NFLPA would mount an argument against the procedure the Wells Report used to measure the inflation and deflation of footballs, saying there was no previous standard.
The plan of attack for the NFLPA should be to go home and fight another day. You can't win. The best QB of all-time is now a punchline on Jeopardy.
The answer: “Who is Tom Brady?”
President Gerald Ford pardoned Richard Nixon on September 8, 1974 so that the country could move forward. This was 30 days after Nixon's removal from the Oval Office. History has proven that this was the right call.
President Ford appointed Charles E. Goodell, chairman of the Presidential Clemency Board, which reviewed in 1976 clemency applications by 21,729 Vietnam War resisters, including many who had fled to Canada and other countries to avoid conscription. Charles is the father of NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell
We are now into the seventh month of DeFlateGate. Each day brings more shame on the best QB, the best franchise and the best professional league. All these idle threats by the NFLPA against Roger Goodell haven't helped. If the NFLPA would just get out the way, Roger will do what his father did, and end the war.
History will get it right. It always does.
Paul Murphy is a freelance writer from New Hampshire. .
Follow me on Twitter at @_prmurphy
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