Deflategate: Will It Tarnish Tom Brady’s Legacy?


Deflategate has taught us that Tom Brady is a cheater and a liar, more than likely. This was spelled out in The Wells Report on the fiasco.

“Based on the evidence, it also is our view that it is more probable than not that Tom Brady (the quarterback for the Patriots) was at least generally aware of the inappropriate activities of (Patriots employee) McNally and (Patriots employee) Jastremski involving the release of air from Patriots game balls.”

What will this mean for the star quarterback’s legacy? Not much, say football experts.

Mike Weinreb, sports commentator and author, writes in Rolling Stone that even if Brady was involved in the Deflategate conspiracy, the whole thing was pointless anyway. The Patriots clobbered the Colts 28-0 after the plot to deflate the balls was discovered.

“Even if he did break the rules, as Ted Wells’ report seems to imply, he broke the rules in a way that allows for bawdy puns and grade-school guffaws.” Weinreb writes. “It was the moral equivalent of throwing a spitball..”

Weinreb also notes the way Brady pandered to the low-level employees who executed the Deflategate shenanigans could be more of an advantage than a disadvantage.

“[It] might finally pierce the gauzy viewpoint of Brady as the apex of human evolution, as the American dream personified, as a flawless human being with a flawless life.” Weinreb continues. “We already witnessed the fallibility of Tom Brady on a football field, when the Giants destroyed the Patriots undefeated season back in 2008; now, seven years later, we’ve witnessed the fallibility of Brady off the football field.”

Brady’s text messages with the two employees, McNally, aka Deflator, and Jastremski was the “smoking gun” of sorts in attorney Tom Wells’ investigation which revealed Brady’s involvement in Deflategate.

According to the report, investigators believe that Jastremski and McNally worked together to deflate the game balls before the 2015 AFC title game against the Colts. McNally physically deflated the balls, the report says, and used a needle that Jastremski supplied. After the story broke, both men exchanged texts and calls with the Patriots quarterback. During the investigation, Jastremski admitted that he talked to Brady about the core of the Deflategate scandal, i.e. the deflated balls.

But Deflategate will probably hurt McNally and Jastremsky more than it hurts Brady.

As Chris Chase writes in USA Today, “Five years down the road, here’s the reality: nobody is really going to care about Deflategate, even the people who are the most vehement Brady critics today. Brady won’t be a Pete Rose or Barry Bonds, unjustly kept out of the Hall of Fame because of his own transgressions, he’ll be a first-ballot Hall of Famer and it won’t be close or controversial. Football is a different animal. Perform and all is forgiven.”

Chase uses the example of another disgraced sports star to illustrate his point: Tiger Woods.

“Remember when it seemed like Tiger Woods would only be defined for that Escalade crash and hooking up with the best floozies Las Vegas had to offer? Now all anyone wants to talk about are his injuries and hooked tee shots.”

While his legacy probably won’t be tarnished in the long term, Business Insider reports that most football insiders believe he will be suspended for at minimum one game at the beginning of the 2015 season because of Deflategate. Jon Stewart slammed him on The Daily Show. Keith Olbermann of MSNBC and some armchair Twitter critics have been calling for a suspension.

Deflategate will probably be forgotten eventually, but it won’t be anytime soon.

[Photo Courtesy Business Insider]

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