For a second straight summer, Joe Thomas joined Tom Brady's team -- unofficially, of course. Thomas is still the Browns' Pro-Bowl tackle and Brady is still the Patriots' starting quarterback (as Bill Belichick has repeatedly made clear), but that doesn't mean Thomas isn't on Brady's side.
Last summer, Thomas backed Brady's fight with the NFL over Deflategate, using phrases like "outrageous, ridiculous witch hunts," and comparing Brady's alleged crime and punishment to speeding by a single MPH and getting the death penalty. Brady avoided that penalty last season, but he'll serve his four-game suspension this fall.
Still, Thomas continues to support Brady. This time around, he said he wishes Brady had continued to fight his four-game suspension.
"I was disappointed that he didn't keep appealing, from a player's standpoint because it kind of gives the commissioner a little bit more power that maybe was not necessarily already negotiated or settled," Thomas said, per the Associated Press.
As Thomas noted, the fight between the NFL and Brady became less about the PSI levels of footballs and more about how much power NFL commissioner Roger Goodell holds. And that's why the NFLPA might continue Brady's fight for him, which our Jared Dubin explained when Brady officially gave up:
So, while Brady's end of the Deflategate saga has definitively come to an end, the fight over Goodell's powers in player discipline may not have. While this whole episode started with the (alleged, but definitively not proven) use of under-inflated footballs and the (alleged, but not definitively proven) knowledge of that use on Brady's part, the legal fight has been (and will continue to be, if the NFLPA petitions for cert) far more about the leeway the commissioner is afforded in delineating and arbitrating punishment doled out to NFL players.
That remains an important issue for the NFLPA, and the most recent ruling went against them.
It would not be surprising if they pursued the final legal option available to them in hopes of obtaining a more favorable ruling that would then be in effect until the next round of CBA negotiations, when the issue will presumably be on the table once again.
Funnily enough, Thomas will be rewarded for his undying support of Brady by going up against Brady in his first game of the season. Rather, some of Thomas' teammates on the defensive side of the ball will be forced to face a very motivated Brady.
That's not ideal.
"I was hoping he would appeal for like one game," Thomas jokingly said. "So he would be suspended Week 5 and we didn't have to see him."
As Jason Bourne, himself, said, a pissed-off Brady is great for the Patriots -- and not so great for every team that'll stand in his path during his official revenge tour of 2016.
