Oh I get that. But Brady was cited for not cooperating and for not being fully candid. Exact same language used with respect to Favre.Ferm Sheller said:The NFL would argue that Favre's transgression was a non-violent off field one and that Brady's touched on the integrity of the game.
CoffeeNerdness said:Kind of annoying that they only spoke on a condition of anonymity. Also it doesn't mention anything illegal, but the tweet frames it with "what Brady did". What he did and what the anonymous source did was ask for balls on the low range. Also, the AFC championship was played in hurricane like conditions? OK, then.
This could qualify as a dumb question but is it a certainty that the courts would find an alleged onfield transgression more harmful than an alleged workplace sexual harassment complaint?Ferm Sheller said:The NFL would argue that Favre's transgression was a non-violent off field one and that Brady's touched on the integrity of the game.
There is simply no good reason for Brady to talk and the only people suggesting that he do so are naive attention seekers.Mugsy's Walk-Off Bunt said:Florio on the wisdom of Brady shutting up:
http://profootballtalk.nbcsports.com/2015/05/31/tom-brady-is-smart-to-keep-quiet-on-deflategate/
Similarly, the NFL has a bit of a women-related PR issue they are still working to resolve (to put it mildly). I wouldn't put it past the tone-deaf NFL, but I think most organizations would want to avoid saying not cooperating with a sexual investigation is a lesser offense than not cooperating with a deflated ball investigation - particularly in a court of law. And further, that not turning one's phone over for the former was less severe than not turning ones phone over for the latter.dabombdig said:This could qualify as a dumb question but is it a certainty that the courts would find an alleged onfield transgression more harmful than an alleged workplace sexual harassment complaint?
Let us begin the integrity hearing to defend the People's Honor.Gorton Fisherman said:Seems to me that any heightened penalty associated with the "integrity of the game" aspect should be attached to the "tampering" charge, not the "non-cooperation" charge. This is assuming "integrity of the game" refers to actions that could impact the fairness of actual "inside the lines" gameplay on the field. If this is the case, then.the Favre and Brady non-cooperation cases are directly comparable. And yes, Brady's penalty for the same alleged misdeed is insanely disproportionate.
Not sure I agree. There are plenty of valid reasons for wanting Brady to talk – from wanting to hear his side of the story to thinking he owes it to the fans if anything happened. It's his lawyer's job to give him the best path to a successful appeal.TheoShmeo said:There is simply no good reason for Brady to talk and the only people suggesting that he do so are naive attention seekers.
Then, regardless of any valid reasons for Brady to break his silence, would it still not be best for him to hold it until after the appeal?Van Everyman said:Not sure I agree. There are plenty of valid reasons for wanting Brady to talk – from wanting to hear his side of the story to thinking he owes it to the fans if anything happened. It's his lawyer's job to give him the best path to a successful appeal.
tedseye said:After weeks of accepting the legitimacy of the Wells/Exponent report, Ben Volin in the Sunday Globe at last joins other critical minds:
"And, of course, Goodell's office levied historically harsh penalties -- a four-game suspension to Tom Brady, a loss of a first-round pick for the Patriots and $1 million fine --based on incomplete evidence and shaky science."
(Edited to correct omitted dashes and apostrophe.)
Of course. I'm just saying that you don't have to be a card carrying member of the media industrial complex to want to hear him speak. I mean, I'd like to hear him speak – not to "explain himself" but to go off on what an absolute bag job this whole thing was. Will never happen but doesn't mean I don't want to hear him say it as a fan.ipol said:Then, regardless of any valid reasons for Brady to break his silence, would it still not be best for him to hold it until after the appeal?
You're not naive to think that Goodell might reduce/vacate the suspension under those circumstances. You are very naive to think that professor would ever reconsider his opinion.Bleedred said:The guy who wrote that article linked above, eviscerating Wells and exponent, said he sent the link to the Princeton professor who stood behind the science in the report. Am I naive to think that if the Princeton professor reads the article, and based on it, reconsiders and disavows the science in the Wells report, that it would be a total game changer and allow Goodell to reduce Brady's suspension to 0 games?
Servicing the fans is great for show runners of an AMC series. It's far less so as a strategy for Tom Brady. This whole mishegoss is the baggiest of bag jobs and, should the wheel of justice spin to "proper", will eventually be shown as such.Van Everyman said:Of course. I'm just saying that you don't have to be a card carrying member of the media industrial complex to want to hear him speak. I mean, I'd like to hear him speak – not to "explain himself" but to go off on what an absolute bag job this whole thing was. Will never happen but doesn't mean I don't want to hear him say it as a fan.
What I want as fan:Van Everyman said:Of course. I'm just saying that you don't have to be a card carrying member of the media industrial complex to want to hear him speak. I mean, I'd like to hear him speak – not to "explain himself" but to go off on what an absolute bag job this whole thing was. Will never happen but doesn't mean I don't want to hear him say it as a fan.
How pissed off do some of these people have to be right now given the bright light the NFL has accidentally thrown on corporate corruption? I'm sure the Princeton physicist cashed a nice large check to sign off on Exponent's work never thinking the whole project was going to come under this sort of scrutiny. But he's staked his reputation on a hack engineering report and will now be forced to defend it.Average Reds said:You're not naive to think that Goodell might reduce/vacate the suspension under those circumstances. You are very naive to think that professor would ever reconsider his opinion.
Paul Weiss is a top tier firm in many areas. I don't see the Wells Report having much of an impact on it. M&A and bankruptcy clients aren't going to think twice, for example. And I doubt this does much to Wells or anyone else in his area of practice. One, he did get a lot of publicity from this and all PR is good PR. And two, while we have a more studied view (and admittedly, one that carries a bias) of the report -- which I agree, was a flaming pile of crap -- I don't think much else of the world has read it with nearly the critical eye that NE Patriots fans have. Hell, people who get paid to talk about it on the radio (Chris Russo) admit that they never even read it. Yes, there are the Sally Jenkins of the world, but she is very unique.Gorton Fisherman said:I also think Ted Wells and Paul Weiss have damaged their professional reputations by producing and attaching their names to this flaming turd of a report. How big and how long-lasting the damage is I don't know. I'd be curious to hear the takes of the various members of the legal profession who frequent this forum on this point.
I think they're more harmed by the way they dealt with it publicly than the report per se. But all of this is survivable if the NFL lets the initial ruling stand and doesn't pursue the case. Unfortunately for everyone involved on the NFL's side it's almost certain they do, and when they do they're going to make a story of this that will catch the eye of media people outsdide the sports room, which won't paint a pretty picture.TheoShmeo said:Paul Weiss is a top tier firm in many areas. I don't see the Wells Report having much of an impact on it. M&A and bankruptcy clients aren't going to think twice, for example. And I doubt this does much to Wells or anyone else in his area of practice. One, he did get a lot of publicity from this and all PR is good PR. And two, while we have a more studied view (and admittedly, one that carries a bias) of the report -- which I agree, was a flaming pile of crap -- I don't think much else of the world has read it with nearly the critical eye that NE Patriots fans have. Hell, people who get paid to talk about it on the radio (Chris Russo) admit that they never even read it. Yes, there are the Sally Jenkins of the world, but she is very unique.
Gorton Fisherman said:I also think Ted Wells and Paul Weiss have damaged their professional reputations by producing and attaching their names to this flaming turd of a report. How big and how long-lasting the damage is I don't know. I'd be curious to hear the takes of the various members of the legal profession who frequent this forum on this point.
Gorton Fisherman said:
So I guess I would agree that absent any game-changing development, the reputation of Weiss and Wells will be fine among the general public (for those who even care). The only thing I could see changing this would be if Kessler and the NFLPA deliver some damaging critiques of the Wells report as part of Brady's appeal, which will receive lots of media attention.
The Effect of Human Factors on Gauge Accuracy
In order to evaluate whether there was a human factors effect (i.e., “operator variability”) on the reading taken by a particular gauge (that is, whether a reading generated by a gauge was impacted by the individual taking the reading), Exponent constructed a set of trials during which five individuals were asked to use the Non-Logo Gauge to measure 11 footballs inflated to the same pressure, as measured by the Master Gauge. Each individual was allowed to familiarize himself with the operation of the gauge using a practice ball, and was then asked to measure the 11 test footballs and announce the reading, which was logged by the test operator. The pressure inside each football was reset with the Master Gauge prior to each trial and temperature conditions were monitored within the test environment to control for any pressure change resulting from changes in the room temperature.
All of the readings generated by all five individuals and all 11 footballs were within 0.05 psig of each other, which is equivalent to the reading resolution of the Non-Logo Gauge (as well as the Logo Gauge).
Because the variability of measurement readings seen in the human factors testing was within the reading resolution of the Game Day Gauges, the measurements on Game Day were unlikely to have been affected by issues relating to the human factors of how the gauges were read or handled to make the measurements.
Gorton Fisherman said:Hmm, interesting. I would agree that most "casual" fans and other members of the general public likely haven't actually read the report,
love to see the video of their "reenactment" of what supposedly transpired in the bathroom.troparra said:
Would fake data in the Wells report be a game-changer?
See this section (p. 186 of Wells report):
The results (bolded - emphasis mine) are fake. There is no way 5 people each measuring the pressure of 11 balls using the non-Logo gauge can get all 55 readings within 0.05 psi of each other. Not when the non-logo gauge had a standard deviation of 0.11-0.12 as determined within this same report (see Figure 8).
My guess is they didn't even do this experiment. The only other possibility is that they did the experiment, saw bigger variation than they expected, and changed the results. Either way, these results are totally falsified.
Yeah, Paul Weiss' other clients are of the "We want this kept low key" variety, so their handling of the publicity has probably spooked their other clients that don't like that sort of spotlight. My point as regards the report, which I think others have missed, is that Wells put this thing together thinking that no one would ever ask any questions, because that's what happened the last time they did one of these hatchet jobs. So Paul Weiss were caught off guard by the reaction and Wells handled the reaction very badly. But part of the reason for the scrutiny was Goodell's decision to try and make a Himalayan range out of nothing. They can't be happy with the NFL for putting them in that spot unnecessarily.Average Reds said:Not a lawyer but I have worked with law firms on matters of corporate litigation for years.
The report was not only acceptable, it was precisely what the client asked for. So no, the report should not damage PW or Ted Wells among the client base in any way.
The press conference held by Ted Wells and PW is another matter. It was unprofessional and may (depending on circumstances) create some short term awkwardness among clients who work with Wells. But even this worse case scenario will pass quickly.
Yeah, but this whole thing has pretty well tarred the name of Exponent and the Princeton professor that sold his name for this. And there's a danger of nuclear winter for them. Most of Exponent's advocacy work is esoteric enough to make it tough for attorneys to use in cross examination, but this is one of those cases where the science is laughably bad and the issues simple enough that opposing lawyers can use this to wreck their credibility from now until doomsday, if Goodell decides to go to war over this. Having to testify in court and getting demolished on the stand (I mean the denial of the existence of human error alone is going to bring waves of laughter) permanently damages the credibility of everyone at Exponent. The Princeton professor probably never gets another one of these gigs if he's forced to defend his signature in court. They have to be really pissed at how the league office has hung them out to dry on this.Average Reds said:The problems that you see as being related to the report are a function of the scope of work set by the NFL and the shaping of the final report (by the NFL) to reach a desired conclusion. That's on the NFL, not PW. It's also worth mentioning that people outside of New England don't really see any issues with the report.
No shot.nighthob said:Yeah, but this whole thing has pretty well tarred the name of Exponent
I said in the original post that people were jumping off of that they're probably facing a rebranding if the NFL pursues this to break from an easy to abuse talking point. They'll still want the engineers, they don't want the association.Joshv02 said:No shot.
Exponent is basically a group of unaffiliated trial/consultant experts. Maybe someone won't use these specific guys -- I have no idea, I'm not in that field -- but no one will stop using anyone else because of it. We use a bunch of their other experts for other issues, and aren't going to stop using some of the top testifying expert in what we hire because of an unrelated report about footballs.
No shot. I'll make it more plain:nighthob said:I said in the original post that people were jumping off of that they're probably facing a rebranding if the NFL pursues this to break from an easy to abuse talking point. They'll still want the engineers, they don't want the association.
Opposing attorneys certainly will.Joshv02 said:No shot. I'll make it more plain:
No one gives a fuck.
I'll stop boring this thread more, but always keep in mind: all experts in litigation are bought and sold. That was an issue before soft balls, it will be an issue afterwards - this doesn't do anything to move the needle. But, in no way, shape, or form would this really make any impact on any case that didn't involve these guys (for various rules and practical based reasons), and even in cases that did involve them, this is still not an issue that is worth bringing up. It just does not matter.nighthob said:Opposing attorneys certainly will.