#DeflateGate (Court of Appeals Reinstates Suspension)

[GratefulCs]

Months and months into this thing, I believe it is clear that the NFL has accomplished their main goal. No one is talking about NFL players that beat women or have long term brain damage from concussions anymore.

Yep.  Goodell was smart to make a big deal about going after the most polarizing team in the league.  Even when he inevitably acts like a buffoon, contradicts himself, abuses his position, makes the NFL look like a joke, and so on, there are still tons of fans willing to overlook all that because they hate the Patriots and are just so excited to see them branded as cheaters and get punished severely.

That's why it's gonna be extra awesome when the Pats win the Super Bowl again this season.

TP for the optimism


You just KNOW they're ready

[PhoSita]

Honestly, I don't care what the Pats do for the rest of Brady's tenure.  I'd like to see them continue to dominate the division and stay relevant in the playoffs, but this Super Bowl was the cherry on top for me.  The legacy is solidified.  Brady and Bill needed that final title to sow together the two ends of their run. 

Now they can just see how long they can keep their string of competitive seasons together going, but it's all gravy regardless.


That said, the suspension bugs me because we only get to see Brady playing for a few more seasons at most -- and who knows how much of that time will be spent in a Patriots uniform.  Four games is a large chunk of Brady's remaining career to miss out on.  Once Brady's gone, we're going to really miss having that superstar QB running the offense.  Who knows how long the Pats will spend finding a long term replacement.

[colincb]

http://www.washingtonpost.com/sports/the-nfls-basic-due-process-is-the-real-issue-in-the-deflategate-controversy/2015/07/30/ebda3b02-3666-11e5-9d0f-7865a67390ee_story.html

About that exploding cellphone. You know, the one NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell seems to think belonged to Machine Gun Kelly and was used in the kidnapping of the Lindbergh baby, as well as the Krupp diamond theft. The one that Ted Wells said he didn’t want or need to complete his investigation into DeflateGate. The one the NFL’s own investigator said wasn’t necessary to the case.

That one.

Wells never asked for Tom Brady’s cellphone and didn’t require it. “Keep the phone,” Wells told Brady and his agent. He insisted his investigation was thorough without it. “I don’t think it undermines in any way the conclusions of the report,” he said. Those were his exact words. So were these, after interrogating Brady for more than five hours: “Totally cooperative,” Wells said of Brady’s testimony.

Yet somehow Goodell found Brady guilty of lack of cooperation and willful destruction of evidence on appeal, all because he upgraded to an iPhone 6?

  They didn't ask Brady for the phone, they asked him for any texts and emails on his phone related to the inquiry. Brady didn't provide that information, and destroyed his phone so that information would be irretrievable.

Not true. They had the phones of all non nflpa patriots employees who would have been on the receiving end of those texts and emails.  Unfortunately for the nfl none existed

  They had some phones, which may or may not be all the phones Brady texted, and may or may not have deleted some of the texts.

  In any case, they asked Brady to provide them with some texts and emails from his phone. Not only did he not comply with the request, he destroyed his phone and the texts and emails on it.

And? Even IF all that's true... AND?

I don't know in what world you guys think it's OK for the NFL to have access to any private information a player has on their cell-phone/emails.

It's really ridiculous, and if for you that's sign of guilt so be it... but you've been taken by the NFL Irrelevant Propaganda and it's sad to see.

And to clarify something I read previously in this thread about social media passwords... it's illegal for employers to request that from their employee, just a little tangent on that (last I recalled).

If Brady didn't want to give up his cell-phone (which the investigator said wasn't needed), his texts (which we don't know what was provided or not), his emails, all the while found by the investigator to be cooperative... whether guilty or not of an event that hasn't been proved to have occurred in the first place, I don't know what the big deal is... other than optics.

  I don't know enough about the nfl's cba to know whether or not the league has any right to ask players for information or to punish them if they fail to comply with investigations. Apparently the league feels that it had those rights. We'll soon find out if the courts agree.

  I also don't think that it's universally true that it's illegal for employers to ask employees for social media passwords, more likely illegal in some states.

See the underlined sentences below. I don't think it's a settled matter in law and have read stuff on both sides, but in this case, it's tough for the NFL to justify saying Brady was obligated under the CBA to hand over his phone when you admit that you have no specific right to do force him to do so and there was no precedent. Given the long and sometimes contentious relationship between the union and the NFL, precedent and lack of a specific right seems to weigh in favor of Brady.

http://sports.yahoo.com/news/cellphone-privacy-workplace-nfl-superstar-tom-brady-105215323.html

In Goodell’s 20-page statement on the Brady matter, Goodell said that “neither the NFL or any NFL member club has subpoena power or other means to compel production of relevant materials or testimony.”

However, Goodell also said that under the collective bargaining agreement between the NFL and the player’s union, the NFL can consider the extent of cooperation of league or club employees during a workplace investigation in evaluating sanctions.

Goodell cited Article 46 of the collective bargaining agreement as granting the commissioner the power to discipline players for conduct “detrimental to the integrity of, or public confidence in the game of professional football.”

The commissioner’s conclusion was that the case evidence “fully” supported that Brady played part in a plan to alter the game balls and that Brady obstructed the investigation by having one of his cellphones destroyed.

The immediate response from Brady and the union was that the commissioner was mistaken.

On his Facebook page, Brady made the case that NFL version of the cellphone destruction was problematic.

“I replaced my broken Samsung phone with a new iPhone 6 AFTER my attorneys made it clear to the NFL that my actual phone device would not be subjected to investigation under ANY circumstances. As a member of a union, I was under no obligation to set a new precedent going forward, nor was I made aware at any time during Mr. Wells investigation, that failing to subject my cell phone to investigation would result in ANY discipline,” Brady wrote.

“I respect the Commissioners authority, but he also has to respect the CBA and my rights as a private citizen,” he said.

Lawyer Jeffrey Kessler for the player’s union made an equally strong statement on Wednesday. “It’s just grasping at straws to try to divert attention from their complete lack of evidence or legal process to justify what’s happened here,” he told USA Today.

[colincb]

I am sick of the way that ESPN has been the mouthpiece for the NFL on this. ESPN knew the initial piece was BS when the Wells Report itself discredited it. They did not have to wait for permission to retract the story. There’s been too much overlooking of the obvious here and too much of having clowns like Bill Polian, Mark Brunell et al, and too much one-sided reporting. They have their noses so far up the NFL’s behind in the hopes of getting more games, that any pretense of journalistic integrity has been exposed.

That you say this and then cite a Peter King article is golden. There is literally no bigger NFL brown noser in the industry than Peter King.

The article speaks for itself. Is it fawning?

No, and in this case I think the article is marginally valuable -- insofar as any peter King article has value, it's in the fact that you can always find out what the NFL thinks of the NFL by reading his column on Monday -- but the idea of King being painted in opposition to ESPN is hilarious to me, that's all.

I thought Tim Marchman did a really good job of explaining it here:
http://deadspin.com/peter-king-is-a-****n-embarrassment-1665259136

This didn't actually happen, though! In her own account of things, in an ESPN as-told-to over which she retained editorial control, Janay Rice is clear on exactly what did:

    I really didn't think they would ask me any questions, but I was asked one. I was surprised I was asked anything at all. One of the NFL executives asked me how I felt about everything. And I broke down in tears. I could hardly get a word out. I just told him that I was ready for this to be over.

There is no way to reconcile this with what King's source described over the summer. And as with a previous King correction involving an element of the Rice case, the journalistic error he's admitting to here is so basic as to be literally unbelievable.

The most generous version of what happened here would involve King getting caught up in a game of telephone, with some lower-level NFL minion's distorted version of what happened in the meeting between the Rices and league and team brass ending up in King's column. This would show King as being willing to run a key detail related by some random flunky without checking it in any way with the principals, who aren't exactly strangers to King. It would paint him as a complete incompetent, and a moron.

It's much more likely, of course, that someone who was in the room—one of the three NFL officials or two Baltimore Ravens officials King places there—lied to him. What he published, after all, wasn't an incorrect version of what actually happened, but something that never happened at all. And it had a very clear beneficiary, allowing Roger Goodell to be seen not as issuing a punishment that showed the NFL doesn't care about domestic violence, but as showing deference to the wishes of a victim.

King, in this version of events, was used as the instrument of a smear campaign, almost certainly by either the league's commissioner, its general counsel, or its senior vice president in charge of labor policy. That's a big story! A serious reporter, you'd think, would want to expose the powerful people who used his column against Janay Rice. Even allowing a more generous interpretation, you'd think anyone with any curiosity at all would want to know how exactly Janay Rice telling NFL higher-ups she just wanted it all to be over morphed into her pleading for mercy on her husband's behalf.

Ah language in the URL. Point being, this is funny to me because of who Peter King is and what his relationship to the NFL is.

What have you seen from ESPN calling into question the NFL's case?

[D.o.s.]

Nothing. What does that have to do with my own amusement at the scenario presented?

The point being that neither ESPN nor Peter King are going to be overly critical of the NFL because the NFL is a central part of the success of ESPN and Peter King. This is why it's funny.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xECUrlnXCqk

[colincb]

Nothing. What does that have to do with my own amusement at the scenario presented?

The point being that neither ESPN nor Peter King are going to be overly critical of the NFL because the NFL is a central part of the success of ESPN and Peter King. This is why it's funny.

I don't disagree with the idea that anyone in sports media is not going to be overly critical of their sources in the sport they mainly cover. That being said, there's plenty of people in media saying the NFL has screwed up, including King in this article. There's virtually nothing coming from ESPN in that regard.

[D.o.s.]

Very true, and certainly a valid thing to bring up -- I think it already has in a roundabout way as Olbermann and Simmons's respective dismissals have come up in the thread.

[colincb]

No kidding. Having trouble defending it too. In fairness it's his editorial supervisors at ESPN who should be pulling the piece.

http://blog.masslive.com/patriots/2015/08/chris_mortensen_deflategate_pa.html#incart_m-rpt-1

[colincb]

Coming attractions: Breakdown of the Brady/NFLPA brief to the 2nd circuit.

[Cman]

Honestly, I don't care what the Pats do for the rest of Brady's tenure.  I'd like to see them continue to dominate the division and stay relevant in the playoffs, but this Super Bowl was the cherry on top for me.  The legacy is solidified.  Brady and Bill needed that final title to sow together the two ends of their run. 

Now they can just see how long they can keep their string of competitive seasons together going, but it's all gravy regardless.

Totally agree. It's all gravy at this point. "This point" being that Brady and BB have firmly established themselves in the upper most echelons of the NFL.

[BballTim]

http://www.washingtonpost.com/sports/the-nfls-basic-due-process-is-the-real-issue-in-the-deflategate-controversy/2015/07/30/ebda3b02-3666-11e5-9d0f-7865a67390ee_story.html

About that exploding cellphone. You know, the one NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell seems to think belonged to Machine Gun Kelly and was used in the kidnapping of the Lindbergh baby, as well as the Krupp diamond theft. The one that Ted Wells said he didn’t want or need to complete his investigation into DeflateGate. The one the NFL’s own investigator said wasn’t necessary to the case.

That one.

Wells never asked for Tom Brady’s cellphone and didn’t require it. “Keep the phone,” Wells told Brady and his agent. He insisted his investigation was thorough without it. “I don’t think it undermines in any way the conclusions of the report,” he said. Those were his exact words. So were these, after interrogating Brady for more than five hours: “Totally cooperative,” Wells said of Brady’s testimony.

Yet somehow Goodell found Brady guilty of lack of cooperation and willful destruction of evidence on appeal, all because he upgraded to an iPhone 6?

  They didn't ask Brady for the phone, they asked him for any texts and emails on his phone related to the inquiry. Brady didn't provide that information, and destroyed his phone so that information would be irretrievable.

Not true. They had the phones of all non nflpa patriots employees who would have been on the receiving end of those texts and emails.  Unfortunately for the nfl none existed

  They had some phones, which may or may not be all the phones Brady texted, and may or may not have deleted some of the texts.

  In any case, they asked Brady to provide them with some texts and emails from his phone. Not only did he not comply with the request, he destroyed his phone and the texts and emails on it.

And? Even IF all that's true... AND?

I don't know in what world you guys think it's OK for the NFL to have access to any private information a player has on their cell-phone/emails.

It's really ridiculous, and if for you that's sign of guilt so be it... but you've been taken by the NFL Irrelevant Propaganda and it's sad to see.

And to clarify something I read previously in this thread about social media passwords... it's illegal for employers to request that from their employee, just a little tangent on that (last I recalled).

If Brady didn't want to give up his cell-phone (which the investigator said wasn't needed), his texts (which we don't know what was provided or not), his emails, all the while found by the investigator to be cooperative... whether guilty or not of an event that hasn't been proved to have occurred in the first place, I don't know what the big deal is... other than optics.

  I don't know enough about the nfl's cba to know whether or not the league has any right to ask players for information or to punish them if they fail to comply with investigations. Apparently the league feels that it had those rights. We'll soon find out if the courts agree.

  I also don't think that it's universally true that it's illegal for employers to ask employees for social media passwords, more likely illegal in some states.

See the underlined sentences below. I don't think it's a settled matter in law and have read stuff on both sides, but in this case, it's tough for the NFL to justify saying Brady was obligated under the CBA to hand over his phone when you admit that you have no specific right to do force him to do so and there was no precedent. Given the long and sometimes contentious relationship between the union and the NFL, precedent and lack of a specific right seems to weigh in favor of Brady.

http://sports.yahoo.com/news/cellphone-privacy-workplace-nfl-superstar-tom-brady-105215323.html

In Goodell’s 20-page statement on the Brady matter, Goodell said that “neither the NFL or any NFL member club has subpoena power or other means to compel production of relevant materials or testimony.”

However, Goodell also said that under the collective bargaining agreement between the NFL and the player’s union, the NFL can consider the extent of cooperation of league or club employees during a workplace investigation in evaluating sanctions.

  Right, so while the league obviously can't legally compel Brady to cooperate with them, they feel like they can punish him if he doesn't cooperate with them.

  By the way, I'd guess everyone else is aware of this, but while looking for that part of the document, I came across the Brady/Jastremski stuff. After apparently not communicating much (if at all) from October through the afc championship game, Brady spoke to Jastremski 8 times on the phone for a total of almost an hour in the three days following the afc title game, texted him 15 times and met with him in person. When asked about all the communications, Brady couldn't recall any specifics from the conversations and claimed they were mainly about ball preparation for the super bowl.

  It's hard to come to any conclusion other than Brady being uncooperative and less than forthright in his answers after reading that.

[colincb]

http://sports-law.blogspot.com/2015/08/synopsis-of-brady-and-nflpa-legal.html

Monday, August 03, 2015
 
Synopsis of Brady and NFLPA Legal Arguments
On Friday, Tom Brady and the NFLPA filed an Answer and Counterclaim in the New York federal court action initiated by the NFL to "confirm" the arbitration award rendered by Commissioner Goodell, which upheld Brady's four-game suspension arising out of Deflategate. This 54-page document lays out the NFLPA's legal arguments as to why Goodell's ruling should not be "confirmed" and, specifically, why it should be "vacated." It's a great piece of writing by Jeffrey Kessler and his team, and I believe it makes a compelling case to vacate Goodell's ruling, especially on the "no-notice" grounds, which have (in my view) constitutional dimensions similar to the Adrian Peterson and Ray Rice cases.

If you don't have access to PACER or just simply do not feel like slogging through a 54-page document, I have outlined the arguments raised by Brady and the NFLPA  in their Answer and Counterclaim (which is the "mirror image" of their petition to vacate filed in Minnesota). I've basically streamlined their document into a much shorter outline, with some of my own thoughts mixed in (particularly those which relate to what I see as "constitutional-level" violations, as well as a discussion of the standard of review).

Link to the 11 page outline
http://www.bplegal.com/webfiles/CLIFF%20NOTES%20VERSION_8_03_15_v5.pdf


====

My collapsing of the Sports Law Blog outline covering the main lines of attack:
 
A. LACK OF NOTICE A longstanding jurisprudence of NFL arbitrations provides that NFL players may not be subject to discipline without advance notice of what conduct might result in such discipline, and what the disciplinary consequences might be.

[IOW, you cannot create a policy and a violation after the fact.]

B. LACK OF “FAIR AND CONSISTENT” DISCIPLINE A long line of CBA precedents holds that discipline under Article 46 must be “fair and consistent.” Where the imposition of discipline is not fair or consistent, an abuse of discretion has occurred and the discipline must be overturned.

[In this section they argue that you cannot rely on the football testing because of all types of problems, which were admitted explicitly and implicitly by the NFL in its subsequent actions.]

C. FUNDAMENTALLY UNFAIR PROCESS Courts may vacate an arbitration award under Section 1 the Federal Arbitration Act (“FAA”) where, inter alia, “the Arbitrators were guilty of [any] misconduct . . . by which the rights of ant party have been prejudiced, thereby amount[ing] to a denial of [a party’s right to] fundamental fairness of the arbitration proceeding.”

[Except: “For example, prior to the hearing, Goodell had ruled that Brady and the Union could not question essential witnesses, denied them access to the investigative files underlying the Wells Report (which were nonetheless available to the NFL’s counsel at the arbitration), and  summarily rejected Brady’s unlawful delegation argument without considering any evidence (other than “facts” decreed by Goodell himself in his decision)”.]

D.    GOODELL WAS AN “EVIDENTLY PARTIAL” ARBITRATOR Federal courts also have authority to vacate an arbitration award if the arbitrator exhibited “evident partiality.”
To vacate an arbitration award on this basis in the Second Circuit, the challenging party has the burden of showing that “a reasonable person would have to conclude that an arbitrator was partial to one party to the arbitration."

[Excerpt: "Prior to serving as hearing officer, Goodell publicly lauded the Wells Report—the issue at the very heart of the appeal. By doing so, he made it impossible to serve as arbitrator in any proceeding challenging the conclusions of the Wells Report. And, unsurprisingly, his eventual Award declared the Wells Report unassailable in every respect."]


====

IMO, Kessler could have done a better with item D, but I’m making that assessment without access to the actual filing. I do not see how Kessler does not mention that Goodell’s subordinates were actively involved with the ”investigative process”. The other sections seem strong, but while I have a decent background in constitutional, contract, franchise, and labor law by education and business experience, I’m not a lawyer, never mind one who deals with these issues in the 2nd Circuit.

[kozlodoev]

After apparently not communicating much (if at all) from October through the afc championship game, Brady spoke to Jastremski 8 times on the phone for a total of almost an hour in the three days following the afc title game, texted him 15 times and met with him in person. When asked about all the communications, Brady couldn't recall any specifics from the conversations and claimed they were mainly about ball preparation for the super bowl.

  It's hard to come to any conclusion other than Brady being uncooperative and less than forthright in his answers after reading that.

Well, Walt Anderson thought he used the logo gauge, but it was hard to come to any conclusion other than he "may have misremembered". Welcome to the land of "independent" NFL investigations.

[D.o.s.]

http://blog.masslive.com/patriots/2015/08/chris_mortensen_deflategate_pa.html

I'm getting ready to go to Arizona for the Pro Bowl and Super Bowl, which we happen to have on ESPN, and all I can tell you is my inquiry was focused just like this with somebody on the night I was looking forward to leaving the next morning to get out of the winter and into the sun. (The inquiry) was, 'How many footballs are we talking about here? Three or four?' And what came back to me was 11. And that was a significant number. That was my focus. Because quite frankly, I didn't even know what the PSI regulations were at that time, but when I heard 11 footballs were under inflated, then I got on the phone and talked to three different people and one of them said...11 footballs was consistently verified, as it was in the Wells Report, by the way. The PSI level, one of my sources said 'two pounds under.' And another said 'significantly under inflated.' I used both those terms. Two pounds under and significantly under inflated. Who those sources are will forever remain in my confidence."

    You cannot touch it. The reason why you create trust with sources is you don’t even go there. And it could be very unfair to the person identified by somebody as a source. And by the way, we have sources. It’s not a single source at the time. What you do is you have to keep your distance. That’s how you keep your credibility with your sources anyway just to maintain that level of trust. You’re never going to bend in terms of identifying them.

"I already had changed the descriptive tone. And I did with our news desk, pretty early, to 'significantly underinflated.' And I will never retract that. The two pounds PSI, that was obviously an error and clarified and corrected. If you want to call it a retraction...what I didn't do was retract it on Twitter. And that was probably technically a mistake."

Listen, one of the sources I did not feel betrayed by I think I've got a pretty good understanding of what happened. I feel like I probably could have done a better job of vetting, but I didn't have access to that person for that long a period, but I did on a couple of others. For me, it's a matter of, 'When you say two pounds under, what are you talking about? Are you generalizing a range of two pounds under?' And oh by the way, in the NFL letter of notification to the Patriots, when they notify them 'Hey we're looking into this,' Dave Gardi, who is part of the football operations for the NFL, said one ball was as low as 10.1 PSI. Turns out there was no ball 10.1 PSI. And so therefore, I think there was some inaccurate data at the time that was passed on to me, but I also talked to other sources who verified the number that I was focused on. The number of footballs. Eleven was a significant number, and 'significantly underinflated' was a significant description. And so therefore do I feel betrayed? No. And by the way, this whole concept of being deliberately lied to, that means somebody called me up. When anybody calls me up and volunteers significant information, I always get suspicious of motive. That's a red flag right there. As I said you go through that process and you review your own work. And I've done that. An

Nobody from the NFL ever identified Brady as being the target of an investigation in that first week we're talking about, within three days of the game. Brady's never mentioned. The Patriots are never mentioned. And the Wells investigation was not launched because of my reporting. There's no evidence of that. I've checked on that. So therefore it's hard to feel I was used. And Ted Wells himself in a conference call said, 'It's ludicrous to think that the league would want to smear its face of the league in Tom Brady with this type of campaign.' To me, it's an insult a little bit to the intelligence. But I do know the Patriots believe that, by the way. That is their belief, and therefore obviously their fanbase believes that, too...

Sometimes, as time passes on, the narrative—that's the popular word—that everything changes where people think, like I say, I never even identified Brady. I never had NFL sources say Brady was the target."

fwiw.

[nickagneta]

http://blog.masslive.com/patriots/2015/08/chris_mortensen_deflategate_pa.html

I'm getting ready to go to Arizona for the Pro Bowl and Super Bowl, which we happen to have on ESPN, and all I can tell you is my inquiry was focused just like this with somebody on the night I was looking forward to leaving the next morning to get out of the winter and into the sun. (The inquiry) was, 'How many footballs are we talking about here? Three or four?' And what came back to me was 11. And that was a significant number. That was my focus. Because quite frankly, I didn't even know what the PSI regulations were at that time, but when I heard 11 footballs were under inflated, then I got on the phone and talked to three different people and one of them said...11 footballs was consistently verified, as it was in the Wells Report, by the way. The PSI level, one of my sources said 'two pounds under.' And another said 'significantly under inflated.' I used both those terms. Two pounds under and significantly under inflated. Who those sources are will forever remain in my confidence."

    You cannot touch it. The reason why you create trust with sources is you don’t even go there. And it could be very unfair to the person identified by somebody as a source. And by the way, we have sources. It’s not a single source at the time. What you do is you have to keep your distance. That’s how you keep your credibility with your sources anyway just to maintain that level of trust. You’re never going to bend in terms of identifying them.

"I already had changed the descriptive tone. And I did with our news desk, pretty early, to 'significantly underinflated.' And I will never retract that. The two pounds PSI, that was obviously an error and clarified and corrected. If you want to call it a retraction...what I didn't do was retract it on Twitter. And that was probably technically a mistake."

Listen, one of the sources I did not feel betrayed by I think I've got a pretty good understanding of what happened. I feel like I probably could have done a better job of vetting, but I didn't have access to that person for that long a period, but I did on a couple of others. For me, it's a matter of, 'When you say two pounds under, what are you talking about? Are you generalizing a range of two pounds under?' And oh by the way, in the NFL letter of notification to the Patriots, when they notify them 'Hey we're looking into this,' Dave Gardi, who is part of the football operations for the NFL, said one ball was as low as 10.1 PSI. Turns out there was no ball 10.1 PSI. And so therefore, I think there was some inaccurate data at the time that was passed on to me, but I also talked to other sources who verified the number that I was focused on. The number of footballs. Eleven was a significant number, and 'significantly underinflated' was a significant description. And so therefore do I feel betrayed? No. And by the way, this whole concept of being deliberately lied to, that means somebody called me up. When anybody calls me up and volunteers significant information, I always get suspicious of motive. That's a red flag right there. As I said you go through that process and you review your own work. And I've done that. An

Nobody from the NFL ever identified Brady as being the target of an investigation in that first week we're talking about, within three days of the game. Brady's never mentioned. The Patriots are never mentioned. And the Wells investigation was not launched because of my reporting. There's no evidence of that. I've checked on that. So therefore it's hard to feel I was used. And Ted Wells himself in a conference call said, 'It's ludicrous to think that the league would want to smear its face of the league in Tom Brady with this type of campaign.' To me, it's an insult a little bit to the intelligence. But I do know the Patriots believe that, by the way. That is their belief, and therefore obviously their fanbase believes that, too...

Sometimes, as time passes on, the narrative—that's the popular word—that everything changes where people think, like I say, I never even identified Brady. I never had NFL sources say Brady was the target."

fwiw.

I think that there is significant evidence that it is more likely than not that Mortenson was at least partially aware that his sources were wrong and feeding him bad, inflammatory information.