Bell: Richard Sherman sees Deflategate double standard

RENTON, Wash. — It was hardly a “U mad bro?” type of moment for Richard Sherman when Tom Brady’s name came up after the Seattle Seahawks finished off a camp practice this week.

It was more a matter of Sherman feeling Brady’s pain.

The spirited all-pro cornerback sympathizes for the New England Patriots quarterback who beat the Seahawks in Super Bowl XLIX, contending that Brady has unfairly taken the brunt of the still-unresolved punishment flowing from the Deflategate saga.

“You’re fining players more than you’re fining organizations?” Sherman told USA TODAY Sports, comparing the team discipline to the roughly $2 million in lost salary Brady currently faces due to a four-game suspension.

“That should bring up some red flags. But nobody’s talking about that.”

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With Brady’s case in the midst of settlement talks ordered by federal judge Richard Berman, it’s possible that he and the NFL could agree to reduce the suspension.

Yet Sherman, like many, is perplexed that it has come to this, and that the case of deflated footballs dominated the NFL’s offseason.

“At the end of the day, it’s going to have minimal impact on the season, minimal impact on the rules,” Sherman contended. “So it’s just a minor annoyance, really.”

I’ll disagree with Sherman’s assessment on how the case can impact the season. If Brady misses four games and his Patriots are forced to start young, untested Jimmy Garoppolo, it might be a swing factor to weigh on whether New England can claim the home-field advantage they used on the path to the crown last season.

But Sherman — who wears passion on his sleeves, as exhibited when he got in Brady’s face and asked if the quarterback was mad following a victory in 2012 — was on a roll. No need to stop him.

“Last year, Jim Irsay got fined what, 500 grand?” Sherman said, referring to the Indianapolis Colts owner, who was suspended for six games and fined $500,000 as discipline for his misdemeanor DUI case.

“Owners can only be fined so much. There’s a cap. And Brady gets fined (roughly $2 million). Whether the crimes are the same or not, a suspension is a suspension, a fine is a fine. Game checks.”

Sherman’s point was that Irsay should have faced a stiffer monetary penalty. He maintains that owners benefit from a double standard when it comes to discipline for off-the-field issues.

Then there was the punishment that Patriots owner Robert Kraft accepted for Deflategate, a $1 million fine and loss of two draft picks, including a first-rounder in 2016. It ranks among the stiffest team discipline in NFL history.

Sherman’s not impressed.

Months after he questioned whether Roger Goodell would come down hard on Kraft — and pointed out the commissioner’s presence at a party at the Patriots owner’s home on the eve of the AFC title game — he maintains that the punishment on the team amounted to “pats on the wrist.”

“People are just so focused on, ‘Oh, that’s a huge fine for the organization,’ “ Sherman added. “It’s not. A million dollars is peanuts to the Patriots, who will make (hundreds of) million dollars this year. Brady ... you take away four game checks, and you’re doing this to the organization.”

While Sherman downplayed whether Brady was involved in a plot to intentionally deflate footballs, it’s the process of the NFL’s investigation and the discipline that strikes a nerve.

It is not surprising that Sherman, a strong supporter of the NFL Players Association, sees the punishment on Brady as another example that Goodell holds too much power in issuing discipline — a standard position by the players’ union that is being hashed out in court, but is essentially written into the collective bargaining agreement.

Still, it’s seemingly a gray area that is becoming more subject to interpretation with each of the legal challenges the union has waged against the league.

During a hearing in Manhattan on Wednesday, Sports Business Journal reporter Daniel Kaplan tweeted that Berman called it a “quantum leap” for Brady to be characterized in the Wells Report as “generally aware” of issues with the inflation of the team’s footballs to being considered as part of a scheme when Goodell ruled on his appeal, keeping the suspension intact.

Assistant equipment manager John Jastremski and Jim McNally, a game-day locker room attendant, were also implicated in the case and have been suspended by the team.

“It wasn’t just him,” Sherman said, referring to Brady. “There’s no way nobody else knows about it. So, he shouldn’t be punished so severely.”

With that opinion, Brady and his legion of followers would have no reason to be mad at Sherman now.

Follow Jarrett Bell on Twitter @JarrettBell.