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Falcons to lose draft pick, but Browns won't for their crime

Eric Edholm

There had been a little debate going around league circles the past few months. Which was the worse crime: Cleveland Browns general manager Ray Farmer found guilty of texting down from the booth to the sideline or the Atlanta Falcons guilty of piping in crowd noise during games?

It turns out that the Falcons got the worst of it, losing a draft pick while the Browns didn't.

The Falcons will lose a fifth-round pick in 2016 for the crowd noise controversy, ESPN.com's Vaughn McClure said. Falcons president Rich McKay was suspended from the NFL's competition committee, effective April 1. He can't be reinstated until June 30 at the earliest, McClure reported. McKay has been on the competition committee the past 21 years. Roddy White, the former director of event marketing (no, not the Falcons receiver, there were actually two Roddy Whites in the organziation) was found to be solely responsible for pumping in the crowd noise and he'll get an eight-game suspension to be served if he lands another NFL job, McClure said. Even though White was responsible, McKay oversees the game-day operations. The Falcons were also fined $350,000.

Mary Kay Cabot of the Cleveland Plain Dealer confirmed the Browns' punishment: A $250,000 fine to the organization and a four-game suspension without pay for Farmer. The reason the Browns didn't lose a pick, apparently, was that ownership and other team executives didn't know of Farmer's actions. That's why most of the punishment came down on Farmer himself.

Is McKay's spot with the Falcons in jeopardy? That much is not clear. He's working closely with the team's newly formed AMB Sports & Entertainment Group, which will oversee the Falcons' new stadium development. But this latest incident will not go over well with owner Arthur Blank, and it's clearly a team in transition with a new head coach and a reformed front-office structure.

What about Farmer with the Browns? This incident alone might not be cause for termination, but if the Browns flounder and Farmer's recent draft haul and free-agent additions don't pan out, that might be enough for this rudderless ship of a team to make yet another tack in the flight plan.

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Eric Edholm is a writer for Shutdown Corner on Yahoo Sports. Have a tip? Email him at edholm@yahoo-inc.com or follow him on Twitter!