I saw your questions several times I am still consideringSo the equipment manager knew, all of Boston knew, Gronk knew, so I would imagine management knew, what is the punishment? Come on, let's hear what you think is fair and who should be punished?
Brady lied, many in the New England organization stonewalled and lied to the NFL. This will hang them more than anything and the Patriots need to be punished.
Now in history we have Cleveland texting, Atlanta sound game and so on. We also have George Brett and the pine tar game. Jerry Rice admitted to using stick-um his entire career. Both are cheating, does this change your view of Rice or Brett? Do you think Montana knew Rice used stick-um? My guess is yes.
Now to Brady and New England, Brady 4-8 game suspension and a fine. New England a fine and loss of a draft pick. New England will fire their equipment staff, and if the QB that starts in Brady's place, if he is good, Brady will be cut.
The punishment is where we're going to seriously disagree.
1. The NFL has no real reason to punish the team, as the report that was produced completely cleared Belichick and Kraft.
2. There's not a chance in hell that the NFLPA will allow Brady to be suspended for multiple games on the basis of "it's more probable than not that he was generally aware".
3. Cleveland and Atlanta admitted to their actions. In this scenario the NFL has no actual proof that Brady was involved in intentional deflating of footballs.
4. I'm not sure how truthful it is to say that many in NE stonewalled the investigation. I mean, honestly, even Brady refusing to give them access to his phone, yeah it sounds bad, but is it really that crazy? He's a guy married to an incredibly famous woman, with many celebrity friends, and the NFL front office leaked like a sieve in the weeks leading up to the Super Bowl. Would you trust those guys if you were him?