News: PFT: NFL: Goodell was aware of Kia Roberts’ opinions

[hornitosmonster]

Isn't Stephen Jones on the competition committee?

Yes, so is Mara

 

[erod]

The media wouldn't be making proclamations that end up not being the case....that never happens, right!

The source is Kia Roberts. Watch.

 

[waldoputty]

Yeah, I am trying to figure out how this seems to help the NFL here. Basically, it just puts Goodell back in front of the target. He at least had plausible deniability if they could argue he didn't know what Roberts was saying and in her report. Now he's admitting he had the information from the person the league hired to head the investigation, the only person to actually interview the alleged victim, and he ignored her findings and went with what Friel wanted to do.

It puts Goodell back in front of the target, however he had little choice.
If Goodell tries to hide behind the offered fig leave, the others would point the finger at him.
He is ultimately better off in front protecting the others than trying to hide and having whatever support he has collapsing under him.

That is not to say the union did not anticipate this.
They filed saying Goodell did not know because they had no proof that Goodell knew.
Now that the NFL acknowledged that Goodell knew, it is now game on.

 

[BrAinPaiNt]

Goodell is either lying or he just does not care and wants to shoot his rifle at a target even after everyone has told him it is full of dummy rounds.

Either way, does not look good for the Commish right now.

 

[zack]

I have made no conclusions about Zeke, all I have to go by is that four independent individuals that reviewed all of the evidence concluded by that evidence in a 4-0 decision that Zeke was by a preponderance of the evidence(51% belief) that he hit the woman..that's their conclusion, not mine!! . One investigator believed she wasn't credible and shouldn't be suspended and therefore the NFL is out to get Zeke and it's all a conspiracy???....BURDEN OF PROOF STANDARD in a company policy is minimal. I haven't seen all the evidence but apparently most of this forum has apparently, they've made the conclusion Zeke didn't do it, and that she's a liar, she's a money grabber, she's a stripper, she's this, she's that... that all may be true............
but THIS CASE ISN'T BEFORE A COURT, conflating criminal charges or "guilt" to a company policy is annoying, As many say, Zeke wasn't charged, there's no conviction in a court.....complete different standards in a company policy, or Zeke should sue the league for Slander or libel...or he should sue Thompson, which would only open up a new can of worms, If the appeal is not successful, Zeke will go to court but just remember, the argument in court won't be about Zeke's guilt or innocence of the allegation conclusion by the league, it would be about an injunction so he can play on the basis of a procedure process.. Maybe Zeke wins the appeal and Henderson voids the suspension....Nobody cares about Thompson, she'll be forgotten about in three months, Zeke is a major star in the NFL, playing for the marquee team in the NFL and this notion that there's some conspiracy by the NFL to suspend him because he's a Cowboy and the league is OUT TO GET the Cowboys is laughable, for what would be the reason for that, they only won two play off games in 22 years..

I agree the league has lied for decades in the past, they used to sweep these incidents under the rug but those days are over after the AP, Rice and Brown incidents, no longer can the league ignore these allegations against their players or sweep them under the rug.......

Exactly, that is the point....to keep it at 2 playoff victories in 23 years. The fact that they have an in house Giants fan doesn't bother you one bit? It doesn't bother you one bit that they gave a 1 game suspension to a former Giants Kicker? They did that because they knew that not one NFL team was going to hire a kicker with that history and thus his career was over once he admitted to beating his wife.

Zeke can't win on the findings of fact (51%, etc, that is correct), but maybe they can win on procedural errors......

 

[Sydla]

I have made no conclusions about Zeke, all I have to go by is that four independent individuals that reviewed all of the evidence concluded by that evidence in a 4-0 decision that Zeke was by a preponderance of the evidence(51% belief) that he hit the woman..that's their conclusion, not mine!! . One investigator believed she wasn't credible and shouldn't be suspended and therefore the NFL is out to get Zeke and it's all a conspiracy???....BURDEN OF PROOF STANDARD in a company policy is minimal. I haven't seen all the evidence but apparently most of this forum has apparently, they've made the conclusion Zeke didn't do it, and that she's a liar, she's a money grabber, she's a stripper, she's this, she's that... that all may be true............
but THIS CASE ISN'T BEFORE A COURT, conflating criminal charges or "guilt" to a company policy is annoying, As many say, Zeke wasn't charged, there's no conviction in a court.....complete different standards in a company policy, or Zeke should sue the league for Slander or libel...or he should sue Thompson, which would only open up a new can of worms, If the appeal is not successful, Zeke will go to court but just remember, the argument in court won't be about Zeke's guilt or innocence of the allegation conclusion by the league, it would be about an injunction so he can play on the basis of a procedure process.. Maybe Zeke wins the appeal and Henderson voids the suspension....Nobody cares about Thompson, she'll be forgotten about in three months, Zeke is a major star in the NFL, playing for the marquee team in the NFL and this notion that there's some conspiracy by the NFL to suspend him because he's a Cowboy and the league is OUT TO GET the Cowboys is laughable, for what would be the reason for that, they only won two play off games in 22 years..

I agree the league has lied for decades in the past, they used to sweep these incidents under the rug but those days are over after the AP, Rice and Brown incidents, no longer can the league ignore these allegations against their players or sweep them under the rug.......

You are doing it again. First, they aren't "independent" individuals. Further, at least on of the individuals has been known to botch previous investigations for the NFL.

Of course company policies have a lower standard of proof than the legal system but they still have to have some standard of proof and they have to at least follow procedures and policies and give the person in question some level of fairness.

The only evidence they have based on everything released is photos and time stamps of photos and metadata that puts Elliott with the girl on the days in question. That's it. That's all they have. They will claim they have her statements but at this point, you have two municipalities claiming she wasn't credible and the LEAGUE's OWN LEAD INVESTIGATOR is saying she has no credibility. Oh, I am sorry, they also have the "fact" that Elliott can't explain how the girl got bruises, therefore he must have done it.

Going even further, as they proceeded through the investigation, they tried to minimize the exposure to other parties involved in this to the scathing report found by THEIR OWN LEAD INVESTIGATOR. Why? Because they know they don't have crap on Elliott but to make the case, they have to string together whatever flimsy evidence they do have and make sure to weed out all the evidence that undercuts them.

And that's what the league did here. I don't know about conspiracy against the Cowboys or what, but I do believe that the league used this as a PR move because of the amount of bad PR they've gotten over other botched handlings of DV cases. So they found themselves in a situation where a big name player gets accused of DV and they can string together a flimsy case against him. That gives them the opportunity to throw the book at him and tell all their detractors, "Hey, look, we take this stuff seriously. We just suspended one of our biggest stars 6 games!'

That smells kind of like a conspiracy to me.

 

[jday]

But when Friel is telling everyone that only 1 of the 5 incidents was not credible. And Kia Roberts concerns about the creditability on all the incidents is not mentioned or included in the file. It seems to conflict with him (or the advisors) being aware unless he was the one who did the conspiring which is even more damning.

At this point, there is only three conclusions we can draw from what has come to light thus far:

Either there truly is a Cowboys bias in the NFL

or (and more plausible, by the way)

This was a purely political stunt to seize upon the opportunity to right the wrongs of previous sins (Ray Rice / Josh Brown) and take down a high profile player. That's the key, in my opinion. If Zeke were a bubble player, this case would have been dismissed along time ago. In an effort to polish the NFL shield, they needed a high profile player whose case would garner national attention to show the world that they are in fact taking a hard and sensitive stance towards domestic violence.

or (equally plausible, given many of the investigators team allegiances that is now a part of public records, e.g. Lisa Friel reportedly is a Giants fan)

It's a combination of both.

 

[mahoneybill]

It puts Goodell back in front of the target, however he had little choice.
If Goodell tries to hide behind the offered fig leave, the others would point the finger at him.
He is ultimately better off in front protecting the others than trying to hide and having whatever support he has collapsing under him.

That is not to say the union did not anticipate this.
They filed saying Goodell did not know because they had no proof that Goodell knew.
Now that the NFL acknowledged that Goodell knew, it is now game on.

Flushed him out with the filing.

 

[adbutcher]

Looks like the NFL has made their decision to go all in ..

I expected this. Conspirators always fail because of their hubris. All we need is Goodell proclaiming, "I'm not a crook!"

 

[DogFace]

Yes, so is Mara

 

[adbutcher]

The league office is either incompetent or corrupt. Take your pick

I'll take option C, incompetently corrupt.

 

[trickblue]

Goodell is either lying or he just does not care and wants to shoot his rifle at a target even after everyone has told him it is full of dummy rounds.

Either way, does not look good for the Commish right now.

post image link

 

[The Quest for Six]

Exactly, that is the point....to keep it at 2 playoff victories in 23 years. The fact that they have an in house Giants fan doesn't bother you one bit? It doesn't bother you one bit that they gave a 1 game suspension to a former Giants Kicker? They did that because they knew that not one NFL team was going to hire a kicker with that history and thus his career was over once he admitted to beating his wife.

Zeke can't win on the findings of fact (51%, etc, that is correct), but maybe they can win on procedural errors......

Tell me again how keeping the Cowboys to 2 playoff wins benefits the league, since Dallas is the marque team in the league...wouldn't that be like cutting off your face in spite your nose!......Jerry managed to do that all by himself with drafting of players and just because one individual is a giant fan doesn't bother me at all, these are career professionals, that sounds like a lame excuse.....what about the other three on the panel were Cowboy fan and still believed Zeke hit the woman, would you be OK with the result then, probably not, right???

Brown's wife wouldn't cooperate, the Prosecutor wouldn't cooperate and give the NFL their file and the NFL didn't know of the other incidents until after the one game suspension, if they didn't know of the other incidents, how could Brown be suspended longer....when the other incidents came to light, the Giants cut him and the league indefinitely suspended him.....

 

[SoCalCowboyFan]

or (equally plausible, given many of the investigators team allegiances that is now a part of public records, e.g. Lisa Friel reportedly is a Giants fan)

Being the NFL's Special Counsel for Investigation now we know why the Giants kicker gets 1 game and Zeke gets 6. This article describes her as a rabid Giant fan

https://www.nytimes.com/2016/02/05/...-do-as-the-nfls-top-investigator.html?mcubz=0

Conflict of interest much!

 

[goshan]

I expected this. Conspirators always fail because of their hubris. All we need is Goodell proclaiming, "I'm not a crook!"

I don't see the argument for conspiracy. He made the decision based upon all the information and evidence. He is saying he had it all. He went against the lead investigator. It doesn't imply a conspiracy at all.

 

[Yakuza Rich]

So your lead investigator tells you something and you just completely ignore it. That's a crack system you've got there, Goodell.

Like a smoking crack system.


YR

 

[waldoputty]

Oh god, the troll is back...

 

[Yakuza Rich]

I don't see the argument for conspiracy. He made the decision based upon all the information and evidence. He is saying he had it all. He went against the lead investigator. It doesn't imply a conspiracy at all.

It does when you Lisa Friel says that she doesn't find the accuser credible at all and still suggests a 6-game suspension. And when one of your advisers states, point blank, that Tiffany Thompson was the eyewitness to her own accusation...while ignoring the actual eyewitnesses who gave sworn affidavits stating the opposite of Thompson.





YR

 

[jday]

I don't see the argument for conspiracy. He made the decision based upon all the information and evidence. He is saying he had it all. He went against the lead investigator. It doesn't imply a conspiracy at all.

Think about it, bro. The lead investigator was the only person that interviewed the accuser Tiffany Thompson. That investigator is reportedly a body language expert and can tell when someone is lying. She did not believe Tiffany. Regardless of rather or not Goodell saw the report or not is ridiculously beside the point because he is part of the NFL. All this means, if he did in fact see her findings is that he is in fact part of the conspiracy.

 

[AzorAhai]

They have so little credibility anymore when they do come forward.

This whole thing makes me enjoy football less. Goodell has his fingers around the neck of the Golden Goose and is squeezing for some reason. I don't get it.

The NFL is not untouchable despite how the commissioner and his office have acted over recent years. With enough scandals, there's going to be some long term consequences for the health of the league. Godell is doing everything in his power to damage the brand.