29, 2019 (Getty Images) Tom Brady on Aug.
Because the league’s findings, the legal fight and the personal accounts have never produced a universally accepted verdict among fans, yet the punishment still divides opinion, partly. Brady served the suspension, returned to win games and later won another Super Bowl with New England. Ten years on, Deflategate remains a revealing test of how the NFL handles discipline, evidence and public trust.
Tom Brady returned to the New England Patriots on October 9, 2016, after serving a four-game suspension over Deflategate, helping his team beat the Cleveland Browns 33-13. The league accused Brady of being aware of the use of under-inflated footballs during the 2015 AFC Championship Game, an allegation he denied throughout the dispute. The controversy began after the Patriots beat the Indianapolis Colts in the AFC Championship Game in January 2015. A federal judge overturned the punishment in September 2015, offering him a temporary victory. The NFL successfully reinstated it in April 2016, however, and the 2nd U.S.
The league concluded it was “‘more probable than not’ that Patriots personnel deliberately deflated footballs during the AFC Championship Game, and that Brady was probably ‘at least generally aware’ of the rules violation, according to ESPN’s report on the investigation. You can tell he was distraught,” Revis said on Apple TV+’s documentary The Dynasty. He acknowledged that Brady’s own response had contributed to the controversy, saying the league “perhaps overreacted and Brady himself didn’t say what he could’ve said.”
A decade later, the punishment remains a source of disagreement among NFL fans, former players and sports commentators. The case triggered a lengthy legal fight and cost the NFL millions of dollars, leaving a question that has never quite gone away: did Brady deserve to miss those four games? An NFL investigation led by general counsel Jeff Pash and attorney Ted Wells examined whether New England personnel had deliberately deflated footballs. Brady received a four-game suspension without pay. Circuit Court of Appeals rejected Brady’s appeal that May. “When the Deflategate happened, and Tom was the headliner of the whole situation, he addressed us as a team. Costas compared the situation to other forms of competitive gamesmanship, including watering down a playing field to slow an opponent or using pine tar on a bat.