Last week, on June 23, NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell presided over Tom Brady’s appeal of his four-game suspension in the “Deflategate” case. However, there is currently no timetable for a decision on the appeal, as the collective bargaining agreement between the NFL and the NFL Players Association calls for a decision “as soon as practicable.”
The four-game suspension arose out of an investigation into the “Deflategate” scandal, where footballs were found to have been deflated to below the permissible limit under league rules. Attorney Ted Wells released the report, finding it “more probable than not” that Brady “was at least generally aware of the inappropriate activities” of two Patriots staffers who deflated the game balls.
Using this Wells Report, NFL Executive Vice President Troy Vincent issued Brady’s suspension. According to NFLPA general counsel Tom DePaso, the union is challenging the authority of Vincent to levy this punishment. Additionally, the union is arguing that the four-game suspension is inconsistent with prior discipline decisions and that the Wells Report contains insufficient evidence that Brady committed a violation of NFL rules.