#DFG: Canceling the Noise
- Thread starter nattysez
- Start date
Phrased that way, yes it is ridiculous. But there is a duty to cooperate in an investigation. And the NFL was aware of texts between Brady and the ball-people. At that point, I don't think that some sort of circumscribed request is ridiculous.
WayBackVazquez said:
What? Remove their framing of the question and consider this framing:
"We will provide you with a list of every person Brady texted during the time frame you request. That way, if there's anybody connected to the Patriots whose phone you have not already reviewed that you would like to contact to see the texts you'll be able to do that."
Eh, there was no way that the NFL was getting the phone without Brady's consent. Destroying it has zero upside. Putting it in a safe is a much better plan. And in no circumstance would a judge allow a wholesale fishing expedition into his personal data. At worst it would be a fight over search terms related to the facts at issue. This isn't rocket science. It happens all the time.dcmissle said:
cornwalls@6 said:
The opposite -- please continue to post & be involved in our little neck of the woods. It's just that the "sting" angle was a particularly hot sub-topic of this entire mess
amarshal2 said:
But they don't just want people connected to the patriots. They pretty much had access to all their phones. They want to know if Brady talked about game balls with his dad, Mark Wahlberg, his dry cleaner...
scotian1 said:
Same here. Love the man as I've ever loved any sports figure but I'm more disappointed in Kraft than I ever am of Brady.
It's simply for his past and current support for Goodell, nothing more.
WayBackVazquez said:
Which implies they were going to read through all his text messages; those to his wife, baby momma, kids, parents, etc. I know you know this, but just spelling out what an obscene ask that is.
Statement from Tom Brady's agent, Don Yee:
"The Commissioner’s decision is deeply disappointing, but not surprising because the appeal process was thoroughly lacking in procedural fairness.
Most importantly, neither Tom nor the Patriots did anything wrong. And the NFL has no evidence that anything inappropriate occurred.
The appeal process was a sham, resulting in the Commissioner rubber-stamping his own decision. For example, the Wells investigative team was given over 100 days to conduct its investigation. Just days prior to the appeal hearing, we were notified that we would only have four hours to present a defense; therefore, we didn’t have enough time to examine important witnesses. Likewise, it was represented to the public that the Wells team was ‘independent’; however, when we requested documents from Wells, our request was rejected on the basis of privilege. We therefore had no idea as to what Wells found from other witnesses, nor did we know what those other witnesses said.
These are just two examples of how the Commissioner failed to ensure a fair process.
Additionally, the science in the Wells Report was junk. It has been thoroughly discredited by independent third parties.
Finally, as to the issue of cooperation, we presented the Commissioner with an unprecedented amount of electronic data, all of which is incontrovertible. I do not think that any private citizen would have agreed to provide anyone with the amount of information that Tom was willing to reveal to the Commissioner. Tom was completely transparent. All of the electronic information was ignored; we don’t know why. The extent to which Tom opened up his private life to the Commissioner will become clear in the coming days.
The Commissioner’s decision and discipline has no precedent in all of NFL history. His decision alters the competitive balance of the upcoming season. The decision is wrong and has no basis, and it diminishes the integrity of the game.”
"The Commissioner’s decision is deeply disappointing, but not surprising because the appeal process was thoroughly lacking in procedural fairness.
Most importantly, neither Tom nor the Patriots did anything wrong. And the NFL has no evidence that anything inappropriate occurred.
The appeal process was a sham, resulting in the Commissioner rubber-stamping his own decision. For example, the Wells investigative team was given over 100 days to conduct its investigation. Just days prior to the appeal hearing, we were notified that we would only have four hours to present a defense; therefore, we didn’t have enough time to examine important witnesses. Likewise, it was represented to the public that the Wells team was ‘independent’; however, when we requested documents from Wells, our request was rejected on the basis of privilege. We therefore had no idea as to what Wells found from other witnesses, nor did we know what those other witnesses said.
These are just two examples of how the Commissioner failed to ensure a fair process.
Additionally, the science in the Wells Report was junk. It has been thoroughly discredited by independent third parties.
Finally, as to the issue of cooperation, we presented the Commissioner with an unprecedented amount of electronic data, all of which is incontrovertible. I do not think that any private citizen would have agreed to provide anyone with the amount of information that Tom was willing to reveal to the Commissioner. Tom was completely transparent. All of the electronic information was ignored; we don’t know why. The extent to which Tom opened up his private life to the Commissioner will become clear in the coming days.
The Commissioner’s decision and discipline has no precedent in all of NFL history. His decision alters the competitive balance of the upcoming season. The decision is wrong and has no basis, and it diminishes the integrity of the game.”
I literally take a hammer to old hard drives when I get a new computer, and there isn't a person on the planet that cares what is on that thing. It shouldn't be surprising that TB does something similar when he gets a new device.
wibi said:
Have you taken a poll of all of your co-workers to ask them what they do with their personal cell phone when they get a new one? How would you even know this? Plus I'm assuming since you work in such an environment that people are not conducting official business on their personal cell phones, so what's the point of bringing up what your co-workers may or may not do with their personal cell phones?
As many people have said in this thread, the timing of Brady destroying his phone certainly doesn't help him here. But the mere fact that he destroys a phone when he gets a new one doesn't seem so outlandish to me. I have no clue why you think an analogy to your own circumstance is relevant, or even what a majority of the population may or may not do.
I'm just reading through the Decision and found what is a minor, but foolish, error in Goodell's logic findings. In the last paragraph on Page 8 (carries over to page 9), Goodell is discounting Brady's testimony about what he discussed after the AFCCG with Jastremski about the footballs. In that paragraph, he writes "Mr. Brady testified that he was unable to recall any specifics of those discussions and he suggested that their principal subject was preparation of game balls for the Super Bowl."
Then, in the first full paragraph on Page 9, Goodell writes: "The sharp contrast between the almost complete absence of communications through the AFCCG and the extraordinary volume of communications during the three days following the AFCCG undermines any suggestion that the communications addressed only preparation of footballs for the Super Bowl rather than the tampering allegations and their anticipated responses to inquiries about tampering."
Brady testified that "the principal subject" was preparation of game balls, not the only subject. Yet RG's decision can't even follow the facts of a preceding paragraph.
Then, in the first full paragraph on Page 9, Goodell writes: "The sharp contrast between the almost complete absence of communications through the AFCCG and the extraordinary volume of communications during the three days following the AFCCG undermines any suggestion that the communications addressed only preparation of footballs for the Super Bowl rather than the tampering allegations and their anticipated responses to inquiries about tampering."
Brady testified that "the principal subject" was preparation of game balls, not the only subject. Yet RG's decision can't even follow the facts of a preceding paragraph.
Marciano490 said:
No, they spelled out the requests they made. They were typical discovery-style requests related to game balls.
They weren't in litigation, there was no subpoena, so Brady certainly was within his rights to refuse. But the requests were narrowly-drawn.
troparra said:
If the phone contained exculpatory evidence and Brady destroyed it anyway, that's just dumb. I'm assuming he isn't dumb, and that the phone therefore didn't contain anything he thought would help. Which isn't the same as somehow proving it contained incriminating evidence
RG and his lawyers have earned a PhD in Red Herring today.
The phone thing was used as evidence in the original ruling as a basis for the non-compliance part of the punishment. According to the NFL and precedent what is the prescribed punishment for saying "no, you can't see my phone?" Answer: $50k. What is the prescribed punishment for lighting your phone on fire a Park Ave. while screaming "now you'll never see my texts?" Answer: $50k. Why? Both are non-cooperation. You either cooperate or you don't. Since the court case will only be about procedural stuff the NFL's reasoning here does absolutely nothing for their case. Just like the Ideal Gas Law will not be on trial.
Here's the most important thing, everyone. If Brady burned his phone and made a public statement saying he deflated the balls himself with a needle what would that mean? IT WOULD MEAN THAT HE LOST HIS MIND AND LIED ABOUT BEING GUILTY BECAUSE THE SCIENCE AND MATH SAY THAT EXTRA DEFLATION COULD NOT HAVE HAPPENED. The circumstantial, no matter how damning, goes out the window when the cold hard science and math say nothing happened.
The phone thing was used as evidence in the original ruling as a basis for the non-compliance part of the punishment. According to the NFL and precedent what is the prescribed punishment for saying "no, you can't see my phone?" Answer: $50k. What is the prescribed punishment for lighting your phone on fire a Park Ave. while screaming "now you'll never see my texts?" Answer: $50k. Why? Both are non-cooperation. You either cooperate or you don't. Since the court case will only be about procedural stuff the NFL's reasoning here does absolutely nothing for their case. Just like the Ideal Gas Law will not be on trial.
Here's the most important thing, everyone. If Brady burned his phone and made a public statement saying he deflated the balls himself with a needle what would that mean? IT WOULD MEAN THAT HE LOST HIS MIND AND LIED ABOUT BEING GUILTY BECAUSE THE SCIENCE AND MATH SAY THAT EXTRA DEFLATION COULD NOT HAVE HAPPENED. The circumstantial, no matter how damning, goes out the window when the cold hard science and math say nothing happened.
So, let me ask a different question. The NFL has maintained that they gave Brady the option of only allowing access to DFG-related items, and that he could pre-screen everything, but we've never actually heard what the NFL considers "related to DFG". With this, Goodell stated that Brady destroyed his phone to keep over 10,000 text messages out of the NFL's hands. That's an awful lot of texting to keep out of the NFL's hands. It makes it look like the net they cast for "relevant to DFG" is pretty wide. Especially considering that they had a number of phones from the Patriots with records already, and they've stated that there wasn't a lot of contact between Brady and the two equipment guys before the Colts game. So what exactly were they asking for? Were they asking for all of his messaging with everyone on the team? What would happen if he had to turn over a conversation with Edelman asking him to come to a party, and an accompanying picture of Edelman holding a joint?
amarshal2 said:
IAAL, and they requested info from Brady related to game balls. Brady said, "well, I destroyed my phone from the relevant period, but you can talk to all the people I texted."
If this were litigation, Brady would be sanctioned for spoliation. As it is, it just doesn't look good, and the offer of a spreadsheet is pretty silly.
amarshal2 said:
Judges absolutely force people to turn over texts to their dry cleaner, best friend, whatever if those texts are relevant to a case. It happens all the time.
I agree.joe dokes said:
Whether or not Brady had a duty to produce the phone, I don't think drawing an inference of knowledge of guilt from its destruction, on or about the same exact time it was requested by Wells, is beyond Goodell's powers or even particularly unreasonable.
We'll wait to see what happens and if there's any explanation here, but this isn't good.
That will be ignored by 90% of the media and 99% of football fans.Drocca said:
However, it does reboots my confidence for Brady going to court
“@MikeSilver: On @nflnetwork just now, @judybattista reported that @NFL learned Brady had destroyed phone in June 18 letter from agent Don Yee…”
“@MikeSilver: Also, @judybattista said Brady team wanted record sealed as part of settlement talks. League said no bueno.”
“@MikeSilver: Also, @judybattista said Brady team wanted record sealed as part of settlement talks. League said no bueno.”
I didn't find Yee's statement particularly persuasive with regard to transparency. It's fine concerning precedent, because, well, it's correct there.
But it doesn't matter that you've turned over more information than anyone else ever has if the information that you withheld is the important stuff. He's spinning here, and in a way that's so unconvincing that it's worrisome.
But it doesn't matter that you've turned over more information than anyone else ever has if the information that you withheld is the important stuff. He's spinning here, and in a way that's so unconvincing that it's worrisome.
Hope the Brady camp follows trough on the "coming days" statement. Hopefully they've got the goods.
ifmanis5 said:
It appears Tomase didn't like it:
John Tomase @jtomase 4m4 minutes ago
If I'm Tom Brady, I'm telling Don Yee to practice writing statements to himself and then sticking them in his Trapper Keeper for eternity.
I don't know how dumb it is. The outcome of this process was pre-determined. Any information provided by Brady to the NFL would be acknowledged only if harmful to him and completely ignored/disregarded if it supported his innocence. There was no upside in providing them anything aside from fulfilling some basic standard of cooperation.NatetheGreat said:
Goodell has shown a willingness to openly dismiss fundamental laws of nature that go against his desired conclusion here. Even had Brady turned over the phone, the absence of any incriminating evidence would have been similarly dismissed, and the remaining texts pored over by the NFL in order to find anything that could be (mis)characterized as supporting their position that Brady was guilty.
DrewDawg said:
Coming from the same guy who wrote a fake story and should have been fired from the Herald for it.
joe dokes, on 28 Jul 2015 - 4:38 PM, said:
joe dokes said:
I am pretty sure that the CBA says the players have a duty to cooperate. Whether it extends to cell phones is obviously debateable. At one extreme: "Give it to us, we'll give it back when we feel like it" is probably out of bounds. But as far as I can tell, the NFL's request was fairly narrowly drawn. And as other lawyers have pointed out, it probably would have passed muster in actual civil litigation. Once again, litigants have the right to not comply with discovery rules. But there could be consequences. Adverse inferences is one. And destroying the evidence would almost assuredly result in a judge instructing the jury: "The evidence is that rather than turn over his texts Mr. Brady destroyed the phone. You are permitted -- but not required -- to draw the inference that there was information in those texts that would have been helpful to the NFL's case."
