Trying to Avoid A Sack

("N.F.L. Upholds Brady Ban; Cellphone's Fate Helped Make the Call")

Like a mob boss, Tom Brady ordered his underling to destroy evidence of the crime. Or maybe like a former President of the United States.

Roger Clemens at one point tried to throw his wife under the bus.  Lance Armstrong seemingly threw everyone under the bus.  

It is not so much the wrongdoing, but what happens thereafter that fuels the fire. If Clemens, Armstrong or even Nixon had quickly admitted the error of their ways, mouthed a lukewarm mea culpa, and asked for understanding, forgiveness and the right of redemption, who knows how differently their tales would have been written.

And as for Tom Brady, there is a long tolerated and even condoned practice in sports sanctioning whatever competitive advantage you can obtain, up to a certain threshold. And perhaps Mr. Brady slipped over that line. But had he admitted to a vague awareness of the circumstances, professed a misunderstanding of its wrongdoing and not had an underling tasked with a throw away akin to a pass into the stands in the face of onrushing linemen, almost certainly he would not be faced with the level of punishment now imposed. It was a very bad audible called at the line by a quarterback who saw a blitz coming. In trying to avoid the sack, Mr. Brady only incurred a penalty for intentional grounding.

Alex Rodriguez tried to buy up the evidence of his drug usage. He sued everyone in the chain of command, alienating his team, the league and those who wanted, somewhere deep in their heart, to be able to forgive his trepasses.  In the final analysis this only made a bad situation that much worse.

Mr. Brady's mistake was not so much in throwing deflated footballs against an overmatched opponent, but in everything that he did thereafter. And his punishment, even in the stated opinion of the Commissioner, fits not so much the crime as its aftermath.