It’s time for NFL owners to rethink the powers of the commissioner, for the sake of their own business reputations, which are being sullied.
Roger Goodell uses his office as if he’s a black-jack-wielding tough from the 1920s with a crank-starting car. Every other league has seen fit to go to a mature, modern system of neutral arbitration in player discipline cases, for the simple reason that it works better for all. Meanwhile, the NFL lingers in a previous century for the sake of one man’s ego.
At this point the question is not whether Ezekiel Elliott committed domestic abuse, which he may well have, but why the commissioner serially abuses his broad disciplinary power and so undermines basic rules of fairness during “investigations” that it becomes impossible to know the facts. Why is it that, in every major adjudication, this commissioner is more interested in subjugating a player, clubbing him with his personal authority, than running a decently transparent process?
Owners must be careful here. Chronic misconduct by the league office threatens to have a competitive impact, to make audiences question the integrity of the game on the field. This is conduct truly detrimental.