It will never happen. Everybody important in the organization would abandon Tom if they were forced to talk about it under oath. oh, and fuck tom.
Common sense says that there was no reason for an attendant or an Asst. Equipment Mgr. to orchestra any of this on their own. Even if Brady didn't directly tell them to do it there's a million ways to indirectly communicate the information. But the lawyers and the technocrats will try to find little nooks and crannies in the Wells Report to tear it apart. But Wells is a lawyer, too and I'm glad he'll be present at the hearing.
I read one article that said that if Brady takes this to court the suspension could be put on hold maybe even until 2016 and he can play in 2015. This could be his end game. To keep it in the courts for as long as they can.
I don't think it's a slam dunk. Goodell is interested in Brady starting in game 1, and don't discount his relationship with Kraft. I imagine he'd like to make up a little to his sugar daddy. I can see suspension is postponed due to "new undisclosed evidence" until after game 1. And then Goodell might play it by the ear, gauging his actions based on public interest.
I agree with this post but public opinion of a "future considerations" punishment would be nuclear. I feel like somehow this is going to end up in court to keep Tom* in the game week one and take the burden of overturning this off of GODell. I still think you leave the 4 games as is. It's 4 games for refusing a drug test why not 4 games for not cooperating with an investigation into cheating in the AFCC game.
Goodell could have easily have given this to a third party to hear. He generally does and it was specifically requested by the NFLPA that he let a third party hear this one. I don't think the reason for that was that he wants to let them off easy.
Do you actually think he's innocent of this? I don't believe any ball-boy in their right mind would ever do this w/o consent from Brady.
Since you are asking... I don't believe anything was done to the balls after the refs checked them for the colts game. So the ball boys wouldn't have to DO anything that they weren't told. There are scientists coming out of the woodwork saying the Pats footballs at halftime fall into pretty much where they should, and depending on the gage the ref used at the beginning of the game possibly higher. I'm answering because you asked my opinion. I know I won't change anyone's mind on here, and I've never even tried, and I know most of you guys will flame me or whatever, but you asked my opinion. If your QB was in this same position, and not one piece of actual evidence had come out that he did anything wrong, wouldn't you want to give him the benefit of the doubt? So that's how I feel right now.
So the deflator - the guy whose job it is to transport the balls to the field, whose job has nothing to do with preparing footballs, just transporting them - that guy got his nickname because he was losing weight? And he had conversations about rugby balls, and tom being mad about the balls and cash and shoes because??? Oh and telling different stories about why he was filmed going into the bathroom with the balls instead of right to the field - that was probably just because. I'm sure the Pats refused a second interview with Wells because he was just too good of a guy to bother again. or something.
