{"id":4630,"date":"2016-04-26T08:01:17","date_gmt":"2016-04-26T15:01:17","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/spijue.wpengine.com\/news\/appeals-court-brady-must-serve-suspension\/"},"modified":"2016-04-26T08:01:17","modified_gmt":"2016-04-26T15:01:17","slug":"appeals-court-brady-must-serve-suspension","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/sports\/appeals-court-brady-must-serve-suspension\/","title":{"rendered":"Appeals court: Brady must serve suspension"},"content":{"rendered":"

NEW YORK<\/strong> \u2014 New England Patriots quarterback Tom Brady must serve a four-game \u201cDeflategate\u201d suspension imposed by the NFL, a federal appeals court ruled Monday, overturning a lower judge and siding with the league in a battle with the players union.<\/p>\n

A three-judge panel of the 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Manhattan ruled 2-to-1 that Commissioner Roger Goodell did not deprive Brady of \u201cfundamental fairness\u201d with his procedural rulings. The split decision may end the legal debate over the scandal that led to months of football fans arguing over air pressure and the reputation of one of the league\u2019s top teams.<\/p>\n

It also fuels a fresh round of debate over what role, if any, the quarterback and top NFL star played in using underinflated footballs at the AFC championship game in January 2015. The Patriots won the contest over the Indianapolis Colts, 45-7, and then won the Super Bowl.<\/p>\n

Soon after the ruling, Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump opened a campaign rally in Rhode Island by sticking up for Brady, a longtime friend and golfing buddy.<\/p>\n

\u201cFirst of all let\u2019s start by saying leave Tom Brady alone. Leave him alone. Leave him alone he\u2019s a great guy,\u201d Trump said. \u201cIt\u2019s enough. It\u2019s enough.\u201d<\/p>\n

The ruling can be appealed to the full 2nd Circuit or to the U.S. Supreme Court, but it would likely be a steep and time-consuming climb even if the courts took the unusual step to consider it.<\/p>\n

In a majority opinion written by Judge Barrington D. Parker, the 2nd Circuit said its review of labor arbitration awards \u201cis narrowly circumscribed and highly deferential \u2014 indeed, among the most deferential in the law.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cOur role is not to determine for ourselves whether Brady participated in a scheme to deflate footballs or whether the suspension imposed by the Commissioner should have been for three games or five games or none at all. Nor is it our role to second-guess the arbitrator\u2019s procedural rulings,\u201d the opinion said. \u201cOur obligation is limited to determining whether the arbitration proceedings and award met the minimum legal standards established by the Labor Management Relations Act.\u201d<\/p>\n

The 2nd Circuit said the contract between players and the NFL gave the commissioner authority that was \u201cespecially broad.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cEven if an arbitrator makes mistakes of fact or law, we may not disturb an award so long as he acted within the bounds of his bargained-for authority,\u201d the court said.<\/p>\n

In a dissent, Chief Judge Robert Katzmann said Goodell failed to even consider a \u201chighly relevant\u201d alternative penalty.<\/p>\n

\u201cI am troubled by the Commissioner\u2019s decision to uphold the unprecedented four-game suspension,\u201d Katzmann said. \u201cIt is ironic that a process designed to ensure fairness to all players has been used unfairly against one player.\u201d<\/p>\n

The NFL Players Association said in a statement it was disappointed.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe fought Roger Goodell\u2019s suspension of Tom Brady because we know he did not serve as a fair arbitrator and that players\u2019 rights were violated under our collective bargaining agreement,\u201d the statement said. \u201cOur union will carefully review the decision, consider all of our options and continue to fight for players\u2019 rights and for the integrity of the game.\u201d<\/p>\n

NFL spokesman Brian McCarthy said the court ruled Goodell acted properly in cases involving the integrity of the game.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat authority has been recognized by many courts and has been expressly incorporated into every collective bargaining agreement between the NFL and NFLPA for the past 40 years,\u201d McCarthy said.<\/p>\n

The appeals ruling follows a September decision by Manhattan Judge Richard Berman that went against the league, letting Brady skip the suspension last season. Goodell insisted the suspension was deserved.<\/p>\n

The appeals court settled the issue three days before the start of the NFL draft and well before the start of the 2016 season, avoiding the tension built last year when Brady didn\u2019t learn until a week before the season that he would be allowed to start in the Patriots\u2019 opener.<\/p>\n

At oral arguments in March, appeals judges seemed skeptical of arguments on Brady\u2019s behalf by the NFL Players Association.<\/p>\n

Circuit Judge Denny Chin said evidence of ball tampering was \u201ccompelling, if not overwhelming\u201d and there was evidence that Brady \u201cknew about it, consented to it, encouraged it.\u201d<\/p>\n

The league argued that it was fair for Goodell to severely penalize Brady after he concluded the prize quarterback tarnished the game by impeding the NFL\u2019s investigation by destroying a cellphone containing nearly 10,000 messages.<\/p>\n

Parker said the cellphone destruction raised the stakes \u201cfrom air in a football to compromising the integrity of a proceeding that the commissioner had convened.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cSo why couldn\u2019t the commissioner suspend Mr. Brady for that conduct alone?\u201d he asked. Parker added: \u201cWith all due respect, Mr. Brady\u2019s explanation of that made no sense whatsoever.\u201d<\/p>\n

Parker also was critical of the NFL at the arguments, saying Brady\u2019s lengthy suspension seemed at \u201cfirst blush a draconian penalty.\u201d<\/p>\n

___<\/p>\n

AP Pro Football Writer Barry Wilner and AP sports writer Kyle Hightower contributed to this report.<\/p>\n

AP NFL website: http:\/\/pro32.ap.org and http:\/\/twitter.com\/AP_NFL<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

NEW YORK \u2014 New England Patriots quarterback Tom Brady must serve a four-game \u201cDeflategate\u201d suspension imposed by the NFL, a federal appeals court ruled Monday, overturning a lower judge and siding with the league in a battle with the players union. A three-judge panel of the 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Manhattan ruled […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":107,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_stopmodifiedupdate":false,"_modified_date":"","wds_primary_category":6,"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"yst_prominent_words":[],"class_list":["post-4630","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4630","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/107"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4630"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4630\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4630"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4630"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4630"},{"taxonomy":"yst_prominent_words","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/yst_prominent_words?post=4630"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}