Doyel: Tom Brady wins DeflateGate — but Patriots lost

Don’t do it. Don’t fall for the DeflateGate magic trick, the illusion that the rest of the country is falling for today.

Elsewhere, as has been the case for months, they’re paying so much attention to the left hand – the one waving Patriots pom-poms and wearing a miniature Tom Brady jersey – that they’ve somehow forgotten what the other hand has done.

When the right hand cheated – and admitted to it.

Don’t lose track of that, OK? Not here, not in Indianapolis, the one city in America that has the NFL team that was denied the right to a fair football game in the AFC championship against Tom Brady and the New England Patriots.

And there, I’ve done it too. See?

… against Tom Brady and the New England Patriots.

As if this is about Tom Brady. It is, of course, up to a point, but Tom Brady is really just a sideshow, rich and handsome and Hall of Fame-bound. He’s fascinating and famous and as the defendant in a case against the NFL, he has become the focus of this whole story. And for months, the plot has morphed into this:

If Tom Brady loses his appeal in federal court, the Patriots are guilty. But if Tom Brady wins his appeal? If he’s innocent?

Patriots win!

You see the illusion, right? The left hand is over there snapping and smirking and destroying a cell phone while the right hand is reaching – has already reached, and been caught doing it – into the Colts’ pocket and stealing their chance at a fair fight in the AFC title game.

Make no mistake, the Patriots didn’t need to cheat to beat the Colts on Jan. 18. They probably didn’t need to cheat to beat the Colts 45-7. Brady was actually more effective with legal footballs than with the illegal ones, after the cheating was discovered during the game. The Patriots were physically stronger that day, and the Colts were mentally weaker. A blowout was going to happen whether Brady’s footballs were inflated, deflated or replaced with a ham-and-swiss on rye.

But make no mistake, the victorious Tom Brady appeal, with all its minutiae and legal jargon – and, let’s be honest, its legitimate overall outcome – is merely a sideshow. The carnival is DeflateGate, and while Tom Brady was preening like the fat lady for eyeballs, the real rides were over and the cleanup had begun and the NFL had found the Patriots guilty of cheating the Colts.

And the Patriots agreed.

Patriots owner Bob Kraft consented to the findings in the Wells Report that two ball boys intentionally let out the air in the team’s footballs to make it easier for Tom Brady to throw them, easier for Rob Gronkowski and Julian Edelman to catch them, and harder for LeGarrette Blount and Jonas Gray to fumble them.

As for the judge’s ruling Thursday, look, it is defensible overall. Can you see that? I can. NFL commissioner Roger Goodell has overstepped his boundaries for so long, he’s now operating a good 12 miles over the line and expecting to get away with it. Because he always has. He crossed the line with his tough love long ago, and while I loved it – I’m a big believer in strong discipline if done with a pure heart, which I believe his generally is – Goodell did go too far here in the legal sense and, finally, a judge has rapped his knuckles.

Let’s not be stupid – let’s not be like some folks in the New England area, OK? – and deny that the other side has some merit, even as we hold firm to our overall point: The Colts got cheated. The Patriots got caught.

Tom Brady gets to play? Fine, whatever. You ask me, he’s guilty and should sit out four games. But if I’m a judge, and then you ask me the same question? I probably rule like U.S. District Judge Richard M. Berman. There is the guilt that you and I believe, and there’s the guilt that meets legal standards. And the Wells Report, which did the best it could despite the stonewalling and outright evidence destruction by Brady, did not prove beyond a shadow of a doubt that Brady was behind the deflation of the footballs.

Is there any planet where a person could reasonably believe that two ball-boy flunkies would take it upon themselves to tamper with the footballs in an AFC title game without the approval and even instruction of the Hall of Fame-bound quarterback who will throw them? Yeah, that planet exists. It’s called New England.

Let them have their victory today. Doesn’t really matter here, does it? Let Judge Berman channel his inner idiot by citing the irrelevant argument that, because steroid cheats and domestic abusers get suspensions of four games, Tom Brady shouldn’t get four games for something as relatively innocuous as (allegedly) deflating footballs. Let Brady use this victory to reaffirm his innocence.

Doesn’t change what happened Jan. 18. Doesn’t change that the Colts lost their biggest game of the season. Doesn’t change that the Patriots cheated.

And it doesn’t change that everybody knows it.

Find Star columnist Gregg Doyel on Twitter at@GreggDoyelStar or atwww.facebook.com/gregg.doyel