MattM

Right--he basically said what I did above. Just like in civil litigation, the respondent conducts their own search pursuant to the rules of discovery and any agreement with the other side and turns over what they find, often certifying it. That's all he's saying here colloquially for a general audience (and you're just being intentionally dense to try to make some kind of point).

I think this part is being somewhat misconstrued--what I'm sure they said was Brady and his lawyers could do the search and turn over what they find rather than turn the phone over to the League for the League to search it. That doesn't mean they can send what they want--they are still obligated to search properly (perhaps using agreed upon search terns) and turn over their findings and the lawyers may even need the certify what they did (which long ago I suspected may have been the sticking points, a law firm not wanting to lie for Brady). This is SOP for discovery in normal civil litigation. No criminal right to not incriminate one's self in a non-legal case like this (remember, that was simply internal League discipline, much less a criminal case).

King is also known as a Pats* homer from way back, having grown up in CT. I wonder what that means that someone like him is now pretty sure that Goodell is in fact bringing the hammer down.

My apologies, No Saint--been a busy weekend--but to answer your question way above, if it's a legit third party (ie, a federal judge) hearing the case and decides for Brady then I guess I'd have to be ok with it, although I agree with you and Bandit above on the narrow scope of the appeal which to me means Tommy Boy has little chance to win there. Oddly, that also means that I agree with WEO above--he gets reduced to two (Goodell trying to split the baby to please all) and takes it, declaring victory (even though as a pure factual matter I think Brady told those two goofballs to do what they did and then lied about it; I also suspect that we'll find out lots more about other Brady/Belicheat* shenanigans over the years as time rolls on). Edit--did not see the headline in the King link above before typing that. Peter is pretty dialed in and so my guess is he talked to someone in the know, so perhaps it does stay at 4. We can only hope!

If that happens, the League better get ready for some major fan backlash. That would be utter BS and make a mockery of the League disciplinary process. The lesson? Just make enough of a stink and create a teeny tiny sliver of doubt and wedge yourself right through that sucker to daylight. It would also look an awful lot like a compromise between Kraft and Goodell--fine and draft picks in exchange for Brady. Until, of course, Bob tries to weasel those back, too, on the back of the suspension being vacated.

I summarized the main point of the article--funny how you left out the columnists' call to reason for Pats* fans to understand that what they're relying on has not been subject to anywhere near the same scrutiny as the Wells report and what scrutiny it has come under has shown the AEI report to be wanting and flawed. On the bought and "paid" for point, you're smart enough to understand that the LAST thing the NFL wanted was for Ted Wells and Exponent to have found evidence of cheating, unless you're a bigger condpiracy theorist than you claim me to be. The fact that the Wells report reached the conclusions it did and saw the light of day (unlike the last "destroy the evidence" foray) speaks volumes for the underlying facts here pointing to cheating.

For those putting any stock in the AEI report, I thought you'd find this of interest: https://www.bostonglobe.com/sports/2015/06/27/tom-brady-appeal-about-more-than-quarterback/ihhIAb6oJJdUrFS8V8w7uJ/story.html# Apparently a Pats* fan who happens to be a professional statistician looked at the AEI report and redid the experiments that AEI claimed to have used to debunk Exponent and the Welks report and instead found them to be exactly what Exponent and Wells claimed. He asked AEI what's up with that and got crickets chirping (probably because they didn't want to debunk their own bought and paid for report).

That's great to hear--thanks for sharing!

Not a former Bill, but what kind of a guy was Reggie Williams? I've read several glowing pieces on him, especially since he was one of the earliest and best Ivy League players to make it in the modern NFL. From your note there it sounds like he was a good dude, too, hopefully?

I totally agree on the bolded part, but the Chiefs!? You picked the Chiefs as your "good team"? Mine was the Raiders.....

I got his autograph at a mall in Rochester in 1976, which I wish I still had. A full on legend who played on some great (and fun to watch) Raider teams. RIP, Snake.....

Considering Goodell was just seen with Kraft* in Sun Valley, that does not bode well for Tommy Boy doing the full time. Perhaps they were putting the finishing touches on the deal made earlier over the draft picks. And here's PFT's article on this--unless you're in the tank, how the heck do you not mention the recent Kraft*--Goodell meeting when reporting this news? http://profootballtalk.nbcsports.com/2015/07/09/goodell-ruling-on-tom-bradys-deflategate-appeal-coming-soon/

Put the crack pipe down....

That's just on this topic alone. They may also know other embarrassing/inopportune facts the Pats* would not want public. This may get a whole lot more interesting if it heads in that direction, but I suspect if that were the case these two "gentlemen" would be paid appropriately for their silence, if that hasn't happened already.

I had not heard that there was no toilet of any kind in the washroom--do you have a link on that? If that's the case, this one's even more open and shut than I'd previously thought, considering that McNally told investigators he needed to use that room to pee.

Your first sentence is just plain wrong--if he texted or called someone (his agent or atty or coach, for ex) other than Tweedledum and Dumber, then Wells would most likely NOT have it. Based on the way Brady acted on his messages, it's pretty clear that that's factually the case. His fighting handing anything over rows strongly in that direction. I also think you and others here may be a bit confused about the legal remedies available here. Any appeal of a decision by Goodell would be on a very narrow basis, with a very high standard for Brady to meet to win. Brady can blame the union's negotiating away more disciplinary power for that.

I used to love Lucius Sanford (old number 57 out of Ga. Tech) as a kid--my favorite Bills player of that era for his name alone!

If you want to talk about disingenuous, recall that the Pats* first press salvo defending themselves from the non-compliance charge was to say that they'd made McNally available to the investigation 4 or 5 times already., when in reality all but one of those times was initially just talking to NFL folks before Wells got involved. Go back and look--they worded it in a deliberately murky way to imply that Wells talked to Needledumb multiple times. Total scumbags. You don't seem to understand how this game is played, Herr Doktor. A regulator (which to my mind is really what Wells was most like here) or investigator can talk to people as many times as he wants to. People can decide not to comply, but there are then sanctions for non-compliance.

Wow--that article was a blast from the past--a time when Florio wasn't totally in the Pats*' pocket, like he's been the last month or so. He's been positively schizophrenic on this topic over its life. On the original topic of why he didn't hand over phone evidence, I wonder if the request was so broad that it included evidence of any form of violating league rules. If so, that could obviously be a problem (see, for ex., Belicheat's offseason e-mails to Hernandez). Similarly, his turning things over may have also involved a certification by his lawyers as to the search, making lying tough. I'd wager one or both of these may be behind the failure to turn anything over or to claim there was nothing relevant to turn over (which he's never said).

I totally agree with all of the above. Would be nice to get into company, though

To quote an anonymous member of the NFL's Competition Committee in a NYT article post-Spygate "it was just one team, really, brought before us over and over again on suspicion of cheating". He was backed up by another unnamed member of said committee on that as per the same article.

I'm a lawyer, but admittedly not a labor lawyer. From what I've read elsewhere it sounds like the scope of review on appeal in a court action would be very narrow (ie, on something like the NFL having proper authority under its own rules to give this suspension), all of which would make it very difficult for Brady to win in court.

I'm a graduate of Columbia, so, yeah, I get that difference. (BTW, my Econ prof there was Sunil Gulati, now head of US Soccer--great guy and great teacher). Thanks for the link. Without knowing too much about it's methodology, have to question any ranking that has both Reinhart and Rogoff still among their most top trusted/influential after a UMass grad student found major errors in their seminal work, but that may just be me.....

Grandstanding? I gave several good reasons why Hassett is really not any authority here (or, to thinking people anywhere, on anything). In terms of your original statement on him having gone through peer review "dozens of times", I highly doubt AEI material is peer reviewed, but could be wrong. In terms of academia, he was only a professor (at Columbia B-School) for about 5 years--perhaps he published dozens of article while there, but if so, that would make him much more prolific than the average B-school prof. The AEI report sought to focus on the weak link in the public opinion war--since most people don't understand the science, it made it the easiest to attack, so they hired their version of a hit man to do so. Plain and simple. Folks understand the texts, so after their initial foray into trying to explain those away (to wit, "he was trying to lose weight"), they realized there was no way they could spin those, so they tried this tack. Judging by some of the responses on this thread, it seems to be working.

Hassett? You mean the guy who grew up probably a Pats* fan in MA and who brought us "Dow 36,000" right before the tech bubble crashed? The guy who after that brilliant move could only find work at AEI telling rich donors what they wanted to hear (those right wing think tanks will never go broke at least!)? The guy who's an economist and not even a physical scientist? Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha......