This just in: Tom Brady likes his balls soft, although it would appear by the formal finding that he’s only “generally aware” of his illegal penchant.
This is the conclusion anyway of NFL appointed investigator Ted Wells who issued a novel-length report yesterday of a novel controversy that took him months to resolve: Underinflated footballs.
Wells also determined that the various excuses star player Brady has given for why illegally-soft balls were used in January’s AFC title game -- which saw an incredibly lopsided victory by the Patriots of 45-7 over the Indiana Colts -- was “implausible.”
Tom Brady defenders say the NFL is just looking for a scapegoat however. Mainly so it can get past the embarrassing incident and move on, something which will first require some stiff penalties and maybe even a suspension.
The substitution of deflated footballs, which are easier to grip of course, highlights the growing trend in bad sportsmanship that has plagued both professional and amateur sports for roughly two decades now, and produced far more troubling scandals, such as widespread doping.
The lingering DeflateGate controversy seems minor in comparison to, say, the gross misconduct of epic pro-cheater Lance Armstrong, but it’s still garnered a lot of attention and sucked the air out of more than just the Patriots’ locker room.
Indeed, it seems the one individual who should have known but was “generally” unaware of the team’s illicit scheme to steal the opposition's glory was the coach himself, Bill Belichick.
(Believe it or not.)
