Tom Brady cemented his place alongside four-time Super Bowl champion quarterbacks Joe Montana and Terry Bradshaw with the Patriots' Super Bowl XLIX victory, adding excitement to the biggest sporting event in the U.S.
Now, Brady's agent is suggesting that the NFL was out to get the superstar quarterback only two weeks earlier.
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Don Yee, Brady's agent, went on the offensive shortly after the league announced a four-game suspension for the four-time Super Bowl champion Patriots quarterback. New England also was fined $1 million and lost its first-round draft choice for next season and a fourth-rounder in 2017.
USA TODAY Sports reported that Yee accused the NFL of collaborating with the Indianapolis Colts on "discovering" the underinflated balls to stick it to the Patriots and Brady.
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"The report also presents significant evidence the NFL participated with the Colts in some type of pre-AFC Championship Game planning regarding the footballs," Yee said, according to USA TODAY Sports. "This fact may raise serious questions about the integrity of the games we view on Sundays.
"We will appeal, and if the hearing officer is completely independent and neutral, I am very confident the Wells Report will be exposed as an incredibly frail exercise in fact-finding and logic. The NFL has a well-documented history of making poor disciplinary decisions that often are overturned when truly independent and neutral judges or arbitrators preside, and a former federal judge has found the commissioner has abused his discretion in the past, so this outcome does not surprise me.
"Sadly, today's decision diminishes the NFL as it tells its fans, players and coaches that the games on the field don't count as much as the games played on Park Avenue (site of NFL headquarters)."
Ironically, if Brady's punishment sticks after a likely appeal - he would return in week five in Indianapolis against the Colts.
Patriots owner Robert Kraft, a staunch supporter of Brady throughout the process, also spoke out against the league's decision, doled out by former New England Patriot Troy Vincent.
"Despite our conviction that there was no tampering with footballs, it was our intention to accept any discipline levied by the league," Kraft said, according to ESPN. "Today's punishment, however, far exceeded any reasonable expectation. It was based completely on circumstantial rather than hard or conclusive evidence."
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