So Bill Belichick and the Patriots cheated and everyone waited for the commissioner to come down hard. He had to because he dropped the hammer all throughout the off-season. Just this month an assistant coach was suspended for five games for buying performance enhancing drugs [curious as the coach doesn't actually play the game]. In addition to all the other suspensions levied [Chris Henry gets eight games for a traffic violation?] Belichick's staff videotaping opposing coaches was previously caught, they were warned not to do it again, and yet they did it anyway. And there's still been no discussion about whether or not they were messing with the radio frequencies in the visiting quarterback's headsets.
The hammer had to fall. And yesterday it did.
But it was more like a toy hammer.
So there's a monetary fine and the lost of a first round draft pick. No suspension for the coach. About the cash, the Patriots are the 3rd most valuable NFL franchise worth about $1.2 BILLION. They made over $250 MILLION in revenue last year. It makes the combined fines of $750,000 look pretty weak. And as for the draft, the Pats traded with San Francisco last year and got their first round pick, meaning they'll likely get an even better position than what they normally had.
The new commissioner is looking pretty inconsistent right now. If you want to be the hard-dog, you gotta play the role even when it seems silly. I'm sure we're going to hear about this decision throughout the rest of the season. With this tumultuous first year, you gotta think that the Goodell era will be a relatively short one.
And who would've thunk this would be the year of the cheater?