Patriots Equipment Managers Suspended

The New England Patriots employees Jim McNally and John Jastremski were suspended on May 6th over deflate-gate.  These two were in charge of inflating Patriots’ footballs to regulation.

According to a report from ESPN’s Adam Schefter, it was actually the NFL’s decision to punish McNally and Jastremski, not the team’s.

From ESPN:

“For those asking why Patriots suspended two employees if those two did nothing wrong, as New England claims: NFL asked Pats to suspend them prior to discipline being handed down, per a league source in New York. New England obliged with the NFL’s request.”

This makes what the NFL said in a statement about the punishments unclear, writes Business Insider.

“Patriots owner Robert Kraft advised Commissioner Roger Goodell last week that Patriots employees John Jastremski and James McNally have been indefinitely suspended without pay by the club, effective on May 6th,” the statement read.

That seems to imply that the team suspended the two. But note the language — it only says that Kraft told Goodell that they had been suspended, not that he had ordered it, according to Business Insider.

If ESPN’s report is to be believed, it gives the Patriots’ denials a little more weight because the team never actually felt the need to punish McNally and Jastremski.

It’s also worth noting that ESPN’s information comes from a “league source in New York,” not from someone within the Patriots who wants to make them look innocent.

It also makes things messy. The NFL released the Wells report on May 6 but waited until May 11 to punish the team and Brady. Yet according to the league’s statement, McNally and Jastremski were punished on May 6.

Business Insider asks:  If that decision was the NFL’s, why did they hand down discipline for the two employees immediately but wait nearly a week to go after the team and Brady? And why did the Patriots comply?

(Updated article)

New York Post: New England Patriots Quarterback Tom Brady Will Be Suspended By NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell For Role In DeflateGate

New England Patriots Quarterback Tom Brady will be suspended by NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell over Deflategate, according to the New York Post.  He will be the highest-profile player ever suspended in the 96-year history of the NFL.

Mr. Goodell’s decision is expected to be announced next week, and it is no longer a matter of whether or not the NFL commissioner will suspend Brady, but for how long.

The New York Post states there is little doubt that Goodell considers Brady’s role in Deflategate a “serious violation.”

A suspension would mean the Patriots would be without Tom Brady for a long period of time for just the second time in his career.

Sources state that the NFL is convinced that connecting all the dots of the evidence supplied by attorney Ted Wells “leads to one conclusion:  Tom Brady cheated,” writes the New York Post.

The investigation led by attorney Ted Wells found that “it is more probable than not” that Brady was “at least generally aware of the inappropriate activities” of locker room attendant Jim McNally and equipment assistant John Jastremski, writes CNN.

There is a general sense that the Wells Report supplied the NFL Commissioner with “enough ammunition to suspend Brady both for breaking the rules by ordering the deflation of footballs and by not cooperating with the investigation when he refused to turn over his cell phone to Wells’ investigators,” according the New York Post.

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Is Deflate-Gate Important?

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According to Newsweek, on Wednesday, the NFL released its long-anticipated findings about Deflate Gate, the investigation into whether the New England Patriots deliberately deflated footballs to their advantage during last season’s AFC Championship Game.

Some players claim that it is easier to catch / throw / hold the football when it is deflated properly.  However, it is against the rules to do this.

The footballs must be inflated to 12.5 to 13.5 pounds per square inch.  During the AFC Championship game, many Patriots footballs were at around 11 pounds per square inch.

“Based on the evidence, the investigation has concluded that there was no deliberate attempt by the Patriots to introduce to the playing field a non-approved kicking ball during the AFC Championship Game,” the NFL report states. “We do not believe that there was any attempt by Patriots personnel, including Patriots kicker Stephen Gostkowski, to deliberately circumvent the rules by offering the kicking ball for play.”

So the Patriots as a whole were cleared of wrongdoing, including coach Bill Belichick.

However, player Tom Brady was not.

(Updated article)

http://www.newsweek.com/deflate-gate-nfl-finds-patriots-did-not-act-deliberately-tom-brady-knew-329037