How Tom Brady and the Patriots walked into Roger Goodell's trap is baffling

It's a term you'd never think to use when describing the New England Patriots – from owner Robert Kraft right down to star quarterback Tom Brady:

Naïve.

Yet there was Kraft on Wednesday morning at a stunning and unscheduled news conference all but admitting he was just that as he apologized to fans for backing off the fight against the NFL over deflate-gate.

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He was acknowledging the obvious: the Patriots lost this case – lost two draft picks, a million bucks, four games of Tom Brady's service and incalculable reputation for all involved. And they lost it as much out of poor strategy as evidence.

"I have come to the conclusion this was never about what was fair and just," Kraft said. "I was wrong to put my faith in the league."

Welcome to the party. Kraft finally concluded what many others did if not immediately, then months and months ago.

This is where the story leaves the easy narratives that each side wants the public to follow: the NFL pointing at obstruction, the Patriots pointing to science and weak evidence. Both have their strong points.

But unless you want to be a lemming, you have to step back from the black and white and see the spectacular chess match that unfolded here. This is real life in the gray area.

First off, to suggest there is no evidence against the Pats is wrong. There is some and some of it is extremely suspicious. It's also inaccurate to argue that the NFL didn't engage in extremely aggressive media tactics that resulted in prejudicial stories against New England that shaped everything.

This case isn't and never will be cut and dried. It's one reason why, thus far, the "winner" has been determined by who had their preferred storyline control the discussion.

On that point, it's been a complete knockout by commissioner Roger Goodell. The league has dominated this, just crushed New England in a public relations battle the team apparently wasn't even wise enough to realize it was in.

The Patriots have been mostly flat-footed – failing to go on the offensive other than Bill Belichick's passionate scientific rant the week before the Super Bowl. It was New England's best moment, and it's not surprising that Belichick may have been the only one in Foxborough who fully understood how this was going down.

[Slideshow: Kraft holds surprising press conference]

Kraft instead trusted the league office and his one-time buddy Goodell, trusting investigator Ted Wells' report and then accepting the penalties because he believed the NFL would quid pro quo a reduction in Brady's sanctions.

Meanwhile, Brady foolishly decided it would be a good idea to destroy his cell phone right as he was about to meet with the Wells' investigative team even though he never was going to have to hand over the actual phone. Whether there was anything incriminating or not on Brady's phone, destroying it gave Goodell the exact kind of juicy item that he could use as a reason to uphold the four-game suspension, crush the quarterback's reputation and win over the public at large.

It was incredibly dumb of Brady. Yes, the quarterback had the legal right and the right as a union member to do what he wished with his phone. That's all well and good if this was going to be an emotionless and even-handed investigation based on legal precedent and theories.

To not recognize that this was the exact opposite, to not see what the NFL was up to and what it cared about and how it would spin this ruling was beyond stupid. Brady gave Goodell the gun and ammo to use against him.

"I have never written, texted, emailed to anybody at anytime, anything related to football air pressure before this issue was raised at the AFC Championship game in January," Brady wrote Wednesday in a statement released on Facebook. "To suggest that I destroyed a phone to avoid giving the NFL information it requested is completely wrong."

Brady may be correct; the league had the phones of every other relevant member of the Patriots' organization and found no smoking gun (text or email) from Brady. And maybe he did destroy it "after," as he explained Wednesday, his attorneys made it clear the phone wouldn't be subject to the investigation. But his Facebook rebuttal was too little, too late after 24 hours of "Brady destroyed evidence" was out there. Context isn't a big deal in today's media environment.

On Wednesday, Kraft rightfully went directly after the league for all the media leaks. He said, unequivocally, that a source in the league office gave ESPN an early story that claimed 11 of the 12 Patriots footballs from the AFC title game were deflated more than 2 pounds per square inch. That was a bombshell that made New England look like it was engaged in purposeful and considerable levels of cheating, and it turned a brushfire into a five-alarm blaze.

The story was completely false. None of the footballs were deflated that much and the NFL knew it, yet allowed the public to believe it. Kraft was further aghast that at the same time, the league told New England the recorded psi levels were even worse, limiting the team's ability to defend itself. This was like an over-the-top police tactic from "Law & Order."

It was the clearest sign of what the league was about here. Had the initial story been that some of the Patriots' footballs were somewhat deflated, some weren't, the refs did a poor job of measuring, two separate and disparate pumps were used to record info, the league has no idea what naturally happens because it had never cared about this issue before and everything might be reasonably explained through Ideal Gas Law, then this isn't much of a scandal. Everyone falls asleep.

The NFL could have just fined the Patriots for having a game day employee take the footballs into a bathroom just before kickoff, a clear and major violation of protocol, and squashed the entire thing.

Instead Goodell's office put this on steroids, went for New England's throat, and Kraft and Brady either didn't see it or didn't understand it.

"I will never understand how an initial erroneous report was leaked from a source from the NFL [and] was never corrected by those with the correct information," Kraft said. "For four months that report cast aspersions and shaped public opinion."

Once Wells' report came out and New England knew that the psi-level story was incredibly made up, the Patriots never should have trusted the league again. Yet Kraft did, agreeing to the sanctions because he believed – as is his way – in a man-to-man, look-them-in-the-eye, get-the-lawyers-out-of-here deal. He counted on a commissioner who would protect a star, the way the old NFL or the current NBA would have done it.

Goodell played him as a fool.

Tuesday's announcement of Brady's penalties being upheld was predictably preceded by another leaked report about Brady destroying the cell phone hours before he was to meet with investigators, an incredibly suspicious and damning revelation to Brady.

It also would suck up the oxygen of all coverage and steer it away from Goodell still refusing to understand the science around inflation levels or any other weakness in his appeal denial.

"Yesterday's decision by Commissioner Goodell was released in a similar fashion [to the initial ESPN report]," Kraft said. "It minimized the acknowledgement that Tom provided the history of every number he texted during that time frame and we had already provided the league with every cell phone of every non-NFLPA employee that they requested, including head coach Bill Belichick."

Of course it did. This was only mentioned in a late-page footnote in Goodell's decision.

Again, this isn't to say Brady and the Patriots are innocent here. There is plenty of smoke to suggest they aren't and reasonable people can conclude that. Nor is it to say they are guilty. It is to say that when it came to each side getting its message out, one completely controlled the situation while the other stood around expecting fair play.

This wasn't a court of law – and any federal action won't be either; that will be waged over procedures and authority. This was the court of public opinion, and every action, every deal, every day of not owning the story was just as important as the actual facts around this confusing and mostly overblown controversy. This was politics, hardcore and ugly.

This is how the NFL operates under Roger Goodell. This is how the NFL has long operated under Roger Goodell. It's pro wrestling.

How the heck Kraft and Brady didn't see that, how they walked right into the trap and thus never really stood a chance to make their case is baffling.

"Unfathomable," Kraft said.

Try naïve. The Patriots were naïve here, incredibly naive.

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