Fantasy Football Talk

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The real Deflategate verdict? The NFL's in trouble

MARKETWATCH 10:34 AM ET 9/3/2015

The football league has lost the ability to enforce its own rules and make its own personnel decisions

Even before Judge Richard Berman's decision to overturn Tom Brady's suspension (http://www.marketwatch.com/story/tom- bradys-deflategate-suspension-overturned-by-judge-ap-reports-2015-09-03), the NFL already had lost.

Also read: Tom Brady's 'Deflategate' suspension overturned by judge, AP reports (http://www.marketwatch.com/story/ tom-bradys-deflategate-suspension-overturned-by-judge-ap-reports-2015-09-03)

Once again, the National Football League finds its personnel decisions and rule enforcement under scrutiny by independent arbiters beyond its control. Long before the New England Patriots quarterback even spoke with team employees about proper football inflation, the NFL had lost the ability to enforce its own rules, make its own personnel decisions or even determine where franchises locate themselves from one year to the next.

The league's handling of Deflategate, through the team owners' marionette Commissioner Roger Goodell, has shifted its tone in recent years from strident and disciplinary to scattered and fickle. This was the league that shut down Adam " Pacman" Jones for a season for his role in a fight and shooting at a Las Vegas strip club in 2007; that banned Michael Vick from the league for more than two seasons for dogfighting; that banned Donte Stallworth for the league for a year for DUI manslaughter; and suspended Ben Roethlisberger for four games for a violation of the league's personal conduct policy related to sexual assault accusations. But it needed video evidence and public opinion to change the two-game suspension it handed Ray Rice for knocking out his fiancee in an elevator to a full-season suspension.

It's the league that fined the Patriots and coach Bill Belichick and docked the team a first-round draft pick for trying to steal the New York Jets' defensive signals in 2007. It dropped the hammer on the New Orleans Saints defensive coordinator Gregg Williams, head coach Sean Payton and several players for doling out bonuses to players who knocked opponents out of games. But it couldn't do enough basic math to keep a U.S. District Court judge from ripping the $765 million cap off its settlement with players who suffered debilitating head injuries during their time on the field.

Most importantly, it couldn't come up with evidence against Tom Brady or the Patriots (http://www.marketwatch.com/ story/deflategate-serves-as-good-cover-for-real-nfl-sins-2015-05-07) strong enough to keep this case out of federal court and to remove any reasonable doubt (http://www.marketwatch.com/story/tom-bradys-deflategate-punishment-will-send- fans-packing-2015-06-25) about Brady's guilt. A league that basically ran over its players during the 2011 lockout over their collective-bargaining agreement just opened itself up to a whole bunch of CBA and labor issues just by bringing the case against Brady this far.

Why does this matter? For the same reason the 2011 lockout mattered enough to the league for owners to put Goodell on the phone with season ticket holders to tell them everything would be OK: Because that gate revenue still matters. Because, if you're a Patriots season-ticket-holder and you're paying $990 to $1,950 for your season tickets, according to ticket brokerage site SeatGeek, you're going to want to know your league is competent enough to handle discipline against your team (http://www.marketwatch.com/story/deflategate-hate-unites-nfl-owners-players-and-fans-2015-05-14) fairly and in a fashion that holds up to legal scrutiny. Because, if you're a St. Louis Rams or Oakland Raiders season- ticket-holder paying between $250 and $1,750 a year -- not counting the $250 to $4,000 you paid for a personal seat license just for the right to buy tickets -- you're going to want to know that your years of investment won't just take the next available fleet of moving trucks to Los Angeles (http://www.marketwatch.com/story/the-nfl-is-moving-to-la-and- it-wont-be-cheap-2015-08-13) if that city bats an eyelash at your team's owner.

Because, if you're a Dallas Cowboys fan who paid the cost of a small home ($150,000 for the team's most expensive seat license back in 2009) and $3,400 for season tickets, you're going to want to know that your team is getting a fair shake (http://www.marketwatch.com/story/the-nfls-pre-super-bowl-hypocrisy-is-totally-deflating-2015-01-22) from the league and its officials on a week-to-week basis, especially in the post-season. Because, despite the fact that your team gets $226 million just for existing (http://www.marketwatch.com/story/nfl-teams-dont-need-your-tax-money-but-they-take-it-anyway- 2015-07-24), NFL owners still need your ticket revenue badly enough to push for new buildings in Atlanta, Minneapolis, San Diego, St. Louis, Oakland and anywhere else they can wring out an extra dollar.

Despite the fact that NFL attendance has rebounded since the recession to the point that the league has suspended its television-blackout rule this season, it shouldn't encourage season ticket holders to know that league owners can meddle with their investment on specious grounds. However, when season-ticket-holders are paying the same price for seats to preseason games as they are for regular-season games -- and saw how the 2011 referee lockout bled into the regular season -- the league's off-field incompetence isn't a great pitch for the upcoming season's on-field product.

Jason Notte is a freelance writer based in Portland, Ore. His writing has appeared in The New York Times, The Huffington Post and Esquire. Notte received a bachelor's degree in journalism from the S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications at Syracuse University in 1998. Follow him on Twitter @Notteham (https://twitter.com/Notteham).

-Jason Notte; 415-439-6400; [e-mail]

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09-03-151034ET
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