I Hate Reasonable People

You know who you are. You see both sides of every question. You love to play Devil's advocate. You're the worst kind of politically correct. I'm looking at you, Kevin Flanagan.

 

Flanagan isn't the first of the local pigskin pundits and bobbleheads to wonder out loud if Brady cheated. John Tomase and Michael Felger come to mind (I'm sure you're not surprised). Apparently, I'm being silly. I'm silly because I've dismissed the text messages from October because the context was the overinflated footballs from the game with the Jets; footballs which had apparently been inflated to 16.0 PSI. I'm silly because I can't ignore the only evidence tying Tom Brady to football inflation is his memo to the game officials reminding them that 12.5 PSI is legal and please don't add air to the game balls, thank you. I'm silly because I find the selective use of data in the Wells Report to be unconvincing and I'm curious as to why there hasn't been more discussion of the so-called "Logo Gauge" readings; data that shows that it's more likely than not the Patriots game balls were inflated to 12.5 PSI. I'm silly for believing a man went into a bathroom to take a piss.

Kevin Flanagan, I can only assume, is not silly.

He says Tom Brady is guilty. What is his evidence? It's a syllogism that goes something like this…

All NFL quarterbacks cheat.

Tom Brady is an NFL quarterback.

Tom Brady cheated.

"1. Gamesmanship: a. The practice of winning a game or contest by doing things that seem unfair but that are not actually against the rules. b. The clever use of skills or tricks to succeed or do something.

"2. Guilty: a. Responsible for committing a crime or doing something bad or wrong. b. Showing that you know you have done something bad or wrong. c. Feeling bad because you have done something bad or wrong or because you believe you have done something bad or wrong.

"Now, let's tie the two together in a way that even the most over-the-top Patriots sycophant can understand. Tom Brady – the guy most Patriots' fans place above god and country – is guilty of gamesmanship, just like every other of the 31 starting quarterbacks in the NFL. Let there be no doubt that he instructed the two middle-aged ball-boys to prepare the game day footballs the way he likes them – soft – and if they were not up to his under-inflated standards, there would be hell to pay."

Let there be no doubt.

Apparently, I'm worse than the most over-the-top Patriots sycophant. Despite Mr. Flanagan's unassailable logic and undeniable conclusion, I still have my doubts. Yes, okay, Aaron Rodgers has copped to manipulating football air pressure, but Russell Wilson, God's chosen quarterback? A cheater?

But okay, let's roll with Mr. Flanagan's argument for a moment: Tom Brady didn't do anything that every other NFL quarterback does when it comes to preparing game day footballs.

So, why did Ward come down so hard on the Beaver?

Tom Brady and the Patriots weren't sufficiently contrite, it seems. Admittedly, we must dismiss any possibility that Tom Brady wanted his game day footballs inflated to 12.5 PSI, the legal lower limit for NFL footballs. That would put Tom's laughing it off as "Now I've heard everything" in a much different context. Apparently, though, the subtext for Brady's denials were "Fuck you, NFL! I'm Tom Fucking Brady! Can you hear me? I said, I'M TOM FUCKING BRADY!"

"The reason that this became the story it has become – other than Goodell seizing an opportunity to put himself back in the good graces of the other 31 owners and their fans after soiling himself with his handling of the Ray Rice affair – is due to the sanctimonious way the team saw fit to respond to what was a minor infraction.

"If the team – and more specifically Tom Brady – came out the day after the AFC Championship game and responded to questions about footballs being under-inflated and copped to the crime, this story would have been over even before it began.

"All it would have taken would have been a mild mea culpa, something to the effect of the cleft-chinned QB saying, 'I told the guys, I like the balls a certain way, perhaps they got a little carried away with getting them the way I like them,' and the whole thing would have blown over (pun intended, again) long before the farcical Wells’ report was ever put into play.

"Instead, they chose to do what they always do down in Foxboro, and they hopped on their high-horse and told the rest of the world to go screw themselves."

Sanctimonious? I hope Mr. Flanagan doesn't live in a glass house.

Mr. Flanagan conveniently forgets the context. The NFL had leaked the erroneous information that the Patriots game balls were 2.0 PSI underinflated. Even the most over-the-top Patriots sycophant was taken aback by those numbers. Those were numbers that sounded way outside the margin of error, even for those of who had yet to spend time on Wikipedia reading about the Ideal Gas Law. 0.2 PSI? Big deal, so what. But 2.0 PSI? That sounded pretty bad.

So, if Brady had admitted to that, it would've just "blown over?"

Of course, we know now that was a lie.

lie, n, a false statement made with deliberate intent to deceive; an intentional untruth; a falsehood.   

Really, though, Tom Brady has been a total dick about this whole thing, hasn't he? I mean, there was that time he said, um, okay, Tom Brady hasn't really said anything since that surreal press conference after the AFC Championship game, has he? But Belichick was a complete jackhole in his "Mona Lisa Vito" presser, right? So what if everything he said has since been proven to be true. And Robert Kraft? Dude! You're a billionaire. Stop riding that horse all over Foxborough. You're making a fool of yourself!

Flanagan did nail that one. If I was a billionaire, I'd have one of those self-driving Google cars; solar-powered, 4G LTE, and a bed instead of seats because I've still got one very special item left on my bucket list.

Let me give Kevin Flanagan the next to last word…

"Argue all you would like about the unfairness of the penalty, but please don’t tell me one of the most detail orientated, preparation first, anal individuals doesn’t know precisely how the object he makes his living with is being prepared. To believe otherwise is asinine."

Exactly: The Logo Gauge + The Ideal Gas Law = 12.5 PSI.