Six Key Takeaways From Roger Goodell's Press Conference
BOSTON (CBS) -- Roger Goodell spoke to the media on Wednesday. I'm sure that on at least one or two occasions, he spoke the truth, but I'm not entirely sure which moments those were.
The commissioner stepped to the podium and addressed all of the issues for which that the country has been waiting with baited breath for him to provide updates -- the new PAT rule, Super Bowl cities, global growth, player safety, values, and stadium security.
Conveniently, in his opening statement, Goodell left out any mention of Robert Kraft's press conference from Tuesday, the one that leads the NFL news cycle. But once he opened up the floor to questions, he did address the ongoing saga known as DeflateGate. (Here's the full news story on that.)
At this point, everyone's wasted too much time on this topic, and adding Goodell's spin is certainly not the best decision one could make in life. So I'll get through this as quickly as possible.
1. Goodell Denied Any "Handshake Agreement/Back-Channel Deal" With Kraft
Well, duh.
If you negotiate a secret deal behind the backs of 31 owners, you don't announce it to the world just because you're asked about it.
"This was his initiative and something he wanted to do, and I certainly admire the step he took," Goodell said of Kraft.
And when asked if Kraft's acceptance of punishment would affect Tom Brady's appeal process in any way, Goodell said, "No."
2. Goodell Still Plans To Hear Brady's Appeal
The NFLPA on Tuesday formally requested that Goodell recuse himself as the arbitrator for Brady's appeal hearing, but Goodell said that he has been too focused on the meetings to have had the time to fully process the letter from the players' association.
The letter is a whopper, coming in at 119 words, so it's understandable that Goodell hasn't yet carved out the necessary time to "give it full due consideration and make sure that we do the right thing."
But based on everything Goodell said, it sure seems like he plans on staying put as the arbitrator in Brady's appeal hearing.
"I look forward to hearing from Tom," Goodell said. "If there's new information that can be helpful to us in getting this right, I want to hear directly from Tom on that."
I think we can all agree that having Roger Goodell hear the appeal on the suspension issued by Roger Goodell is the most fair way to go about this process.
(Spare me the Troy Vincent thing, if you don't mind. Thank you.)
Later, when referencing the Mueller investigation into the league's mishandling of the Ray Rice punishment, Goodell admitted, "There's no way that I can do an investigation on myself."
So, he should be a pretty fair judge whenever he hears the appeal.
3. Goodell Said That Adam Schefter Is Wrong
This week, Adam Schefter -- aka the most plugged-in NFL reporter who might not have a reporting blemish on his impressive resume -- reported that the NFL had asked the Patriots to suspend John Jastremski and Jim McNally while the league considered the remaining punishment.
Goodell calls this report false.
Question: Did the league ask the Patriots to suspend those staffers?
Goodell: No.
So, it's up to you whether you want to believe the reporter with the impeccable resume or the commissioner, who is a convicted and habitual liar.
4. Goodell Didn't Care For Questions About Failures From His Office And Employees
Any human being on earth who tries to say that the Patriots are 100 percent innocent of any wrongdoing in this whole situation are crazy. But anyone who believes that the NFL did nothing wrong is 10 times crazier.
Roger Goodell believes the NFL did nothing wrong.
CSNNE's Tom E. Curran posed a question to Goodell concerning the Wells report -- namely, its glaring omissions in any criticisms of any NFL employees. Do you feel the NFL has an obligation to be more transparent in how it was conducted?
"Well, Tom," Goodell bristled, "I think Ted Wells did address that in his report. I think he addressed it. I asked him specifically when I engaged him to evaluate the league's conduct to evaluate what we could have done differently. … So I would disagree on that point."
(Ted Wells did not address this in his report. The only criticism of any league employee came when he refused to accept referee Walt Anderson's best recollection, because that best recollection would have made this whole four-month frenzy about nothing more than about a 0.3 PSI discrepancy. Other than that ... nothing.)
Though Goodell was eager to move on, Curran pressed further, asking Goodell how false info was leaked from his office and why that major part of the story was omitted from the Wells report.
All Goodell could muster for an "answer" was this: "As I say, we've given all of that to Ted. Ted's had the opportunity to evaluate that."
Weak. But what else would you expect?
5. Goodell Respects Brady, But Uniform Punishment Must Be Enforced
"I have great admiration and respect for Tom Brady," Goodell said, "but the rules have to be enforced on a uniform basis."
Uniform basis, by NFL standards, means a memo being sent to one team for football manipulation, and an issuance of a fine/force of lost draft picks/suspension of quarterback being handed down to another.
Or, in the case of refusing to hand over a personal cell phone, it means a $50,000 fine to one quarterback, and a four-game suspension to another.
Uniform, right across the board.
6. Integrity
Integrity.
That's it.
It wouldn't be a Goodell press conference without the word "integrity" falling out of his lips.
Integrity. Integrity? Integrity!
"It's our job to determine if there's violations of our rules, of our polices, of our procedures, and to enforce those," Goodell said. "It's my job here to make sure that we're doing everything we can to protect the integrity of the game."
Goodell failed to add that this effort does not apply to policing NFL employees. Just like with that long 119-word letter, he must not have had enough time to get to that part.
Read more from Michael Hurley by clicking here. You can email him or find him on Twitter @michaelFhurley.
