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AsylumGuido · 09-02-2012, 02:07 PM

(09-02-2012 02:27 AM)hitwriter Wrote: If there was any news the troll would be dancing a jig on here... He's toast the same as his team!! Why is anyone still arguing with this Goofduio?

If I were an admin his ass would have been kicked from here a long time ago!

Here anyway...

http://www.nfl.com/news/story/0ap1000000...to-dismiss

I think papachaz was talking about the appeal hearing on this past Friday, August 30th, that was appealing the arbitrator's ruling that Goodell had the rights under the CBA to rule on the players and/or their appeal.

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NEW YORK (AP) -- A three-member panel has finished hearing an NFL Players Association appeal challenging Commissioner Roger Goodell's authority over four players punished in the league's bounty investigation of the New Orleans Saints.

The panel consists of retired federal Judge Fern Smith of San Francisco, retired federal Judge Richard Howell of New York, and Georgetown professor James Oldham. The players union wants the panel to overturn a ruling by NFL system arbitrator Stephen Burbank, who concluded that Goodell had the authority to hear and rule on the players' appeals of their suspensions.

NFLPA attorney Jeffrey Kessler, who argued before the panel Thursday, says Burbank's ruling was flawed and that Goodell overstepped his authority. Attorney Gregg Levy offered counter arguments for the NFL.

Panel members say they'll try to issue an opinion next week.

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I have heard they may rule by Tuesday. However they rule, Judge Berrigan could then rule on Vilma and the others restraining order on the suspensions. She wanted to wait upon that appeal before she ruled, although she has indicated the direction she was clearly leaning after hearing all of the testimony from the players, coaches and league attorneys.

AsylumGuido · 09-02-2012, 02:14 PM

(09-02-2012 10:31 AM)phocis850 Wrote: A judge siding with someone before the case is presented. Lol. Yea, like that isn't going to be repealed.

The case was heard, phocis. One of the NFL legal analysts said that the comments by the Judge on how she would likely rule, while uncommon, were not unprecedented especially in such a one-sided case. As I stated, seven different Saints players and coaches who were in every defensive meeting swore under oath that no bounties were ever offered by Vilma or any other for injury to opposing players as the league had claimed. The NFL were not able to supply any witnesses to support their claims.

TeamPlayer1 · 09-02-2012, 03:09 PM

Your Honor, I call Coach Williams to the stand to tell the whole truth and nothing but the truth.

"Mr. Payton, why did you accept a year suspension without a protest if you had no knowlege of a bounty program?"

"Mr. Payton, you are under oath, did Drew Brees have any knowledge of any pay for performance program on the defense?"

"Mr. Goodell, will you name every Saints player who gave testimony against the suspended players in order to avoid their own suspensions?"

***phocis850*** · 09-02-2012, 03:14 PM

(09-02-2012 02:14 PM)AsylumGuido Wrote: The case was heard, phocis. One of the NFL legal analysts said that the comments by the Judge on how she would likely rule, while uncommon, were not unprecedented especially in such a one-sided case. As I stated, seven different Saints players and coaches who were in every defensive meeting swore under oath that no bounties were ever offered by Vilma or any other for injury to opposing players as the league had claimed. The NFL were not able to supply any witnesses to support their claims.

She basically made her ruling before even listening to the case or the defense presenting any facts.

I feel in my heart, lol, that Goodell is actually doing the team a favor. They have presented enough evidence to show the leagues ruling as fair. The problem you and everyone else has, is that you/they feel that its not enough evidence. So, Vilma does a stupid thing and tries to get the info out there by making this an outside court matter. Time will tell, but I have a feeling that the locker room is gonna get down right nasty. If you feel like your team is full of good hearted and honest people, just wait till that info comes out. Your locker room is going to be split in half and damaged for years to come.

I don't care about the Saints. I don't care what happens to them. My bias is on the football field. But your emotional attachment to this ordeal is nothing outside of what we had for Vick. We all got burnt on him. We believed, in our hearts, that he was an honest and good guy that wouldn't do anything of the sort. Low and behold we went 3-13 that next season. Still we have fans that blame him for ruining the franchise.

It is what it is. The facts that you are presenting are opinions and bias reports. As I stated before, you and I both don't know a damn thing about what happened there. It's absolutely stupid to believe that Roger Goodell would put his $20 million dollar PER YEAR job on the line.

AsylumGuido · (This post was last modified: 09-02-2012 05:38 PM by AsylumGuido.)

(09-02-2012 03:14 PM)phocis850 Wrote: She basically made her ruling before even listening to the case or the defense presenting any facts.

I feel in my heart, lol, that Goodell is actually doing the team a favor. They have presented enough evidence to show the leagues ruling as fair. The problem you and everyone else has, is that you/they feel that its not enough evidence. So, Vilma does a stupid thing and tries to get the info out there by making this an outside court matter. Time will tell, but I have a feeling that the locker room is gonna get down right nasty. If you feel like your team is full of good hearted and honest people, just wait till that info comes out. Your locker room is going to be split in half and damaged for years to come.

I don't care about the Saints. I don't care what happens to them. My bias is on the football field. But your emotional attachment to this ordeal is nothing outside of what we had for Vick. We all got burnt on him. We believed, in our hearts, that he was an honest and good guy that wouldn't do anything of the sort. Low and behold we went 3-13 that next season. Still we have fans that blame him for ruining the franchise.

It is what it is. The facts that you are presenting are opinions and bias reports. As I stated before, you and I both don't know a damn thing about what happened there. It's absolutely stupid to believe that Roger Goodell would put his $20 million dollar PER YEAR job on the line.

Sorry, but you are wrong. The judge made her statement after ALL the testimony was delivered. She said, depending upon her determination of jurisdiction she would rule for Vilma based upon ALL of that testimony.

And, I have no clue what you are talking about when saying the locker room is going to be nasty and split. Why would it be split? Everyone knows who the so-called witnesses are. Goodell himself said that the only player interviewed was Hargrove. He said that Williams and Vitt were the other two in-house witnesses and the secret witness has been determined to be Mike Cerullo.

Do you honestly believe Tom Benson would hire the Freeh Agency to investigate this whole affair if he didn't believe what his coaches and Loomis have told him?

And Goodell has made some serious errors in judgement concerning this whole affair. No, he most certainly didn't intentionally put his job on the line, but putting his trust in an ex-employee who was fired for lying to Saints mangament on multiple occasions may very well cost him that job.

AsylumGuido · (This post was last modified: 09-02-2012 05:36 PM by AsylumGuido.)

(09-02-2012 03:09 PM)TeamPlayer1 Wrote: Your Honor, I call Coach Williams to the stand to tell the whole truth and nothing but the truth.

This, of course would be Ginsberg, Vilma's lawyer, since Williams would be a witness for the plaintiff.

(09-02-2012 03:09 PM)TeamPlayer1 Wrote: "Mr. Payton, why did you accept a year suspension without a protest if you had no knowlege of a bounty program?"

"I was forced to accept the suspension even after my appeal in which I presented several witnesses that stated that no bounty existed and I was unaware of the pay for performance program allegedly run by the defensive squad. I had no recourse and was instructed by Mr. Goodell to make no comments on the case if I wanted to be reinstated."

(09-02-2012 03:09 PM)TeamPlayer1 Wrote: "Mr. Payton, you are under oath, did Drew Brees have any knowledge of any pay for performance program on the defense?"

"I can't say for certain, but the offensive and defensive units are extremely segregated and it is my understanding that those type of programs stay in the defensive meeting rooms. I do understand that Mr. Brees has sworn, under oath, that he had no knowledge of any program."

(09-02-2012 03:09 PM)TeamPlayer1 Wrote: "Mr. Goodell, will you name every Saints player who gave testimony against the suspended players in order to avoid their own suspensions?"

"Um, well, ... er, the only player we interviewed at all was Anthony Hargrove, but now he is complaining that we took his statements out of context and put words in his mouth. All other players refused to meet with me after I made these claims. But, I know it all happened because Mike Cerullo told me so."

JDaveG · 09-02-2012, 08:13 PM

(09-02-2012 01:42 PM)AsylumGuido Wrote: They were "chosen" because Goodell thought he would be able to make an example of them given his trustworthy informant, Mike Cerullo. It could have just as easily been any one of the other many teams in the NFL with exactly the same sort of program going on. But, the Saints just happened to have an ex-defensive quality control coach who was fired for lying to management on multiple occasions and had repeatedly blamed Loomis and Payton for having him black-balled from the NFL. In fact, he never did get a job within the NFL since.

They were "chosen" because Cerullo laid them out on the alter.

As I have pointed out countless times before, I don't feel Goodell lied about the whole thing. I truly think he felt justified due to what he was told by Cerullo and by what he interpreted by interviewing Williams, Vitt and Hargrove. I also feel that he was predisposed to the end findings and ignored many important facts and made many faulty conclusions.

As you pointed out:

"The bounty prohibition forbids offering or accepting any reward - cash or otherwise - for on-field misconduct, plays that incentivize or result in injury to opposing players, or for performance against an opposing player, group of players, or team."

But, this had never been called a "bounty prohibition" before and this was not why they were all so severely punished. From the beginning the Saints were accused of placing bounties on the heads of specific players who were to be targeted for intentional injury. Seven Saints players and coaches swore under oath in court before Judge Ginger Berrigan that no bounties were ever in place as Goodell had claimed.

If there had been the punishments may have been justified, but there should have NEVER been year long suspension and such for the breaking of a rule while playing the game as it is played every week by every player on every team. And Judge Berrigan said as much in her statement that she would likely grant Vilma the restraining order because she found the NFL's disciplinary process in the bounty matter unfair and the punishment excessive.

I ask you a question in 2 sentences and you write 7 paragraphs in response. Wonder why people here think you are a troll?

Lets boil down your answer to the brass tacks -- the reason Goodell "chose" the Saints is because he had EVIDENCE that the Saints were involved in a bounty program.

Your response boils down to "yeah, but I don't like the evidence."

Fine. But as judges like to tell me when I try to keep damaging evidence out, that goes to weight, not admissibility. The rest of us, quite clearly, place different weight on the evidence than you do. So lets quit pretending the Saints are innocent victims here. At the VERY LEAST, they were continuing a "pay for performance" program 2 full years after they were told in simple declarative sentences to stop it. If you want to blame someone, blame the moron who made that decision.

***phocis850*** · 09-02-2012, 08:20 PM

Guido thinks he knows everything because the pieces fit his puzzle better. Lost soul is he.

AsylumGuido · 09-02-2012, 09:02 PM

(09-02-2012 08:13 PM)JDaveG Wrote: I ask you a question in 2 sentences and you write 7 paragraphs in response. Wonder why people here think you are a troll?

Lets boil down your answer to the brass tacks -- the reason Goodell "chose" the Saints is because he had EVIDENCE that the Saints were involved in a bounty program.

Your response boils down to "yeah, but I don't like the evidence."

Fine. But as judges like to tell me when I try to keep damaging evidence out, that goes to weight, not admissibility. The rest of us, quite clearly, place different weight on the evidence than you do. So lets quit pretending the Saints are innocent victims here. At the VERY LEAST, they were continuing a "pay for performance" program 2 full years after they were told in simple declarative sentences to stop it. If you want to blame someone, blame the moron who made that decision.

No,the reason Goodell "chose" the Saints was because he thought he had evidence. That evidence included two emails that contained a running joke about bounties based upon the false charges in 2010 by the league that the Saints had a bounty on Favre. It included a ledger that was supposed to be for a game against the Bill but was changed to be a game against a different team after it was shown that it had no correlation to the Bills game. It also had no correlation to the second game given. It included a handwritten ledger stating that Vitt gave $5000 as a bounty, which was admitted to be in error by Goodell. It included the claim that Vilma offered $10000 to take out Favre and Warner, a claim denied, under oath in District Court by seven Saints players and coach that were in every defensive meeting since 2009.

And yes, they were guilty of running a pay for performance program and I do blame the moron who made that decision ... Gregg Williams. But, that does not warrant penalties that were administered for something far, far more sinister without any justification.

Obviously Judge Berrigan agrees and that was after hearing the case from the NFL lawyers.

AsylumGuido · 09-02-2012, 09:08 PM

(09-02-2012 08:20 PM)phocis850 Wrote: Guido thinks he knows everything because the pieces fit his puzzle better. Lost soul is he.

phocis, I absolutely know far more about this than you can imagine. Most people around here believe what they first heard and have not adjusted that thinking.

Besides, the pieces fit the puzzle because they belong, unlike the puzzle the league attempted to assemble as they have repeatedly thrown pieces away when they were proven not to fit.