Deflated Footballs: Deflecting our attention away from the NFL's real issues

May 11:
Back in December, the Vikings and Panthers were caught (video evidence on the sideline during the game, hardly circumstantial) heating footballs in a sub-zero game, or, you know, altering footballs.  Fittingly, Teddy Bridgewater and Cam Newton have each been suspended 4 games (luckily Cam has a fantastic backup), each team has been fined $1M, and 4 combined draft picks were lost.  Wait, no, now I remember, the league sent a memo out to remind teams they can't heat footballs.

Fittingly, when the NFL had suspicions about the Patriots under inflating footballs, they sent a memo out to its 32 teams about properly inflating footballs.  Wow, I'm off today, that didn't happen either.  Instead, the NFL forwarded the email from the Colts that raised the initial concern up the ladder without contacting the Patriots, despite the fact that the league office is supposed to work for all 32 teams equally.  In the end, due to all 11 of New England's tested footballs and three of four of Indianapolis' footballs (on one of the two testing officials gauges) being under-inflated, Tom Brady was suspended the first four games of the season.  Additionally, the Patriots organization lost a 1st and a 4th round draft pick, and was fined $1M, despite the fact that the Wells Report stated that Bill Belichick and Robert Kraft had no knowledge of the circumstantially "proved" deflation ring that Brady was running  (note: I have not read the entire report, just the executive summary).  Eight of the Colts footballs went untested, because I guess testing 23 footballs air pressure during an entire halftime would be too much to ask for right?  The Colts' under inflated footballs netted no punishment and, barring playing a pickup basketball game with Kelly Olynyk, Andrew Luck will start the season under center for Indy.

But you know what, Brady getting suspended and the Patriots losing draft picks and money isn't what angers me as a Patriots fan.  I am angry at this whole situation.

I am angry that people are condemning Brady on hearsay and because he never handed in his personal cell phone.  Funny because, much like Brady, NFL officials never handed over their personal cell phones when they were under investigation for how they handled the Rice situation.  Brett Favre never turned in his cell phone after he sent dick pics to all his buddies in the Wrangler's commercial.  People seem to forget that any text Brady may have sent the locker room guys would have also been on their phones.  

I am angry that when disproving the Patriots scientific claims that the balls started at the low end of the allowed spectrum and the weather changed the PSI, they failed to test wet footballs.  We do know that a wet football expands right?  We all remember from high school that a larger volume, all else equal, will reduce the pressure right?

I am angry that the NFL has a system in place for their footballs that would even allow for a team to consider under inflation.  When Walt Anderson, the referee for the game, was forwarded the email expressing Colts' concerned about the Patriots tampering with their footballs, how does he not record the exact PSI of every football he tested?  How does Anderson not remember which gauge he used for to test said footballs?  And how in the world was the AFC Championship Game the first time in 19 years as referee that Anderson lost track of the footballs prior to kickoff?  On the plus side, that must mean the Pats played with properly inflated footballs all the other times they drew Anderson as a ref since we know he must have properly checked all prior footballs and never let them out of his sight.  Right?

I am angry that despite basically a sting-operation being put on the Patriots, there was still only highly-questionable "evidence" against New England.  Shouldn't a sting at least produce tangible evidence?

But none of that anger comes close to the anger I feel towards the NFL, the media, and far far too many of the fans for caring about something that, per league rules, should be no more than a $25,000 fine.  I am angry that the NFL has shifted the focus away from the real issue it needs to address, its continued condoning of domestic violence, and I am angry that the media and the fans are allowing them to do so.

The NFL hired an "independent investigator" to spend over 100 days looking for evidence to prove that the Patriots under inflated footballs.  Meanwhile, when the NFL had a video of Ray Rice dragging his then fiancee out of an elevator unconscious, despite it being "more probable than not" that Rice committed an act of violence against his fiancee in that elevator, the NFL failed to even ask the casino or the police who investigated the crime for the surveillance tape.  As you should remember, Rice was initially suspended all of two games (aka half of what Brady got), that is until TMZ posted the video of what actually happened that night.  The NFL swiftly suspended Rice for the season and the Ravens quickly cut him (the Ravens, who knew exactly what happened in that video, had not already cut Rice).  If TMZ is able to get information that the NFL is not, I start to question the NFL's ability to run an actual investigation.  I suppose this is why the NFL had to hire someone to "fully" investigate the matter, because "The Shield"s credibility is non-existent (see also: concussions, replacement referees).  But hey, if the NFL was only going to investigate one of these matters fully, at least they chose to investigate deflated footballs, because who really cares about domestic violence anyways?

Remember how I mentioned that back in December the Vikings and Panthers were caught heating up their footballs?  It's almost poetic that the teams that employed Adrian Peterson and Greg Hardy last season respectively were the other team to mess with their footballs this season.  If you don't know who Adrian Peterson (still a Viking) or Greg Hardy (who FYI got paid $13.1M last season basically to deal with his legal issues and not play) are or what they did last offseason, then the NFL and Roger Goodell have won.  Who am I kidding?  Either way, they already won.

The NFL won when we cared more about deflated footballs then we do about domestic violence.  How many more women and children must suffer at the hands of incredibly large, athletic, and strong men before something is done?  How many more frivolous "scandals" must the NFL create, have the media run with, and have the fans eat up to distract us from the glaring issues facing the NFL?

The sad thing is how well it is working.  I thought as a society we were smarter than this, but I guess we're not.  Who even paid any attention when the Seahawks drafted Earl Clark after he was kicked off his college team for knocking out his former girlfriend?  Or who noticed the string of players early off into their career retiring due to all the concussion issues?  Condoning domestic abuse and just not caring about concussions or player safety in the least, this is your legacy Roger Goodell.  At least you manufactured enough reports to make it seem that, at the time (let's see how these reports look in 50 years to sports historians), you handled them the right way.

I'm calling it now, if Brady appeals (which I feel he will and will take down Goodell with him, at least I hope he does), it will be heard the first week of August, and the result the 2nd week.  I have no basis in predicting this except it seems to be how the NFL operates these days.  This way, Goodell can use the media to make the fans forget that Junior Seau will be entering the Hall of Fame during the first full weekend of August.  If Goodell had cared about the players and their health and not just using them to make money, maybe Seau could have entered Canton in person.  If you don't understand what I mean by entering in person, again, the NFL has won again.

Sadly, the deflection has worked.  Gillette will be packed when the NFL season kicks off on a Thursday in September in prime time when the Patriots host the Steelers.  As of now, not only will Tom Brady miss the opener for deflating footballs, but both teams starting running backs LeVeon Bell and LeGarrette Blount will also be suspended for littering and... smoking the reefer.  But at least Ben Roethlisberger will play.  And if you don't remember what Roethlisberger did, then once again, the NFL has won. If you still can't remember, think of how Sean Connery would say "therapist" on Celebrity Jeopardy.  At least the integrity of the game has been protected.

The game is in New England.  While ideally the stadium would be empty to boycott the NFL, we all know that will not happen, because at the very least Steelers fans would buy most to all of the tickets.  Instead, I am hoping that New England fans use the nationally televised game as an opportunity to call out Goodell.  There are some months to go Patriots fans, plenty of time to think of chants, and a long game to get them all in.  I hope amongst many other chants, they show Goodell on the JumboTron (assuming he has the balls to show up or is even invited) and there is a chorus of "Fire Goodell!"

My hope is that May 11th serves as the day that sparked Goodell to be fired.  I hope Brady fights back and in the end drags the NFL through the mud on its handling of domestic abuse and player safety, and people finally force Goodell out.  This may be the spark.  The question is, will the media and fans get fired up and realize that Goodell allowing a culture condoning domestic violence to form and Goodell not caring about player safety is the problem, not a few deflated footballs.

Shame on Goodell and the NFL for deflecting the media's and fan's attention to the real issues at hand.  Shame on us for letting it work.  It is time for the masses to wake up.  It is time for Goodell to go.