WPRO News
One day after NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell upheld his decision to suspend Patriots quarterback for four games at the beginning of the season, the Super Bowl champion posted a message on Facebook expressing his disappointment with the ruling.
“I am very disappointed by the NFL’s decision to uphold the 4 game suspension against me. I did nothing wrong, and no one in the Patriots organization did either.
Despite submitting to hours of testimony over the past 6 months, it is disappointing that the Commissioner upheld my suspension based upon a standard that it was ‘probable’ that I was ‘generally aware’ of misconduct. The fact is that neither I, nor any equipment person, did anything of which we have been accused. He dismissed my hours of testimony and it is disappointing that he found it unreliable.”
Brady and the lawyer with the National Football League Players Association say they will file an injunction in federal court to overturn the suspension decision.
Additionally, Brady also addressed comments that he tampered with evidence by destroying his cell phone before it was supposed to be turned over for evidence.
“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 continued:
“Most importantly, I have never written, texted, emailed to anybody at anytime, anything related to football air pressure before this issue was raised at the AFC Championship game in January. To suggest that I destroyed a phone to avoid giving the NFL information it requested is completely wrong.
To try and reconcile the record and fully cooperate with the investigation after I was disciplined in May, we turned over detailed pages of cell phone records and all of the emails that Mr. Wells requested. We even contacted the phone company to see if there was any possible way we could retrieve any/all of the actual text messages from my old phone. In short, we exhausted every possibility to give the NFL everything we could and offered to go thru the identity for every text and phone call during the relevant time. Regardless, the NFL knows that Mr. Wells already had ALL relevant communications with Patriots personnel that either Mr. Wells saw or that I was questioned about in my appeal hearing. There is no ‘smoking gun’ and this controversy is manufactured to distract from the fact they have zero evidence of wrongdoing.”
The four-time super bowl winning quarterback said he respects the commissioners authority, but that he also has rights as a private citizen.
Later the same morning, Patriots owner Robert Kraft called the decision unfathomable and that the league has no hard evidence of any wrongdoing.
The controversy stems from the infamous “Deflate Gate” scandal in which NFL investigators determined Brady, along with members of the team’s field staff, knowingly and illegally altered the air pressure of footballs during the AFC Championship game against the Colts earlier this year.
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