MANHATTAN (CN) - Rejecting the National Football League's "own brand of industrial justice," a federal judge on Thursday vacated the suspension of New England Patriots quarterback Tom Brady for his supposed involvement in Deflate-gate.
NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell had tried to bench Brady for the first four games of the upcoming season after a league investigation found that the QB was "generally aware" of ball tampering back in January.
With the Patriots set to kick off their next season on Sept. 19, U.S. District Judge Richard Berman had promised to rule swiftly.
The judge's scathing decision Thursday echoes his criticism of Goodell at a hearing for calling steroids the "closest parallel" to ball tampering.
A policy about steroid use "cannot, as a matter of law, serve as adequate notice of discipline to Brady," the 40-page ruling states.
"It also cannot reasonably be used as a comparator for Brady's four-game suspension for alleged ball deflation by others in the first half of the AFC Championship Game and for non-cooperation in the ensuing investigation," Berman added.
Nothing about the "testing procedures" or other principles of the steroid policy have "anything to do with Brady's conduct and/or his discipline," the ruling states.
"The court is unable to perceive 'notice' of discipline, or any comparability between a violation of the steroid policy and a 'general awareness' of the inappropriate activities of others, or even involvement in a scheme by others to deflate game balls on January 18, 2015, and noncooperation in a football deflation investigation," Berman wrote.
Berman put the next section of his ruling in bold letters.
"The court finds that no player alleged or found to have had a general awareness of the inappropriate ball deflation activities of others or who allegedly schemed with others to let air out of footballs in a championship game and also had not cooperated in an ensuing investigation, reasonably could be on notice that their discipline would (or should) be the same as applied to a player who violated the NFL Policy on Anabolic Steroids and Related Substances. Brady had no such notice."
It was during halftime in an AFC championship matchup between the Patriots and the Indianapolis Colts on Jan. 18, 2015, when referees determined that Brady had been using balls deflated below minimum standards.
Undermining the claim that the underinflated footballs gave Brady a competitive advantage, the QB's passes connected more frequently during the second half when using balls pumped up to the proper pressure.
After the quarterback led his team to a 45-7 win in that game, the Patriots went on to beat the Seattle Seahawks at Super Bowl XLIX.
Though Goodell's investigator had acknowledged that "there is less direct evidence linking Brady to tampering activities," the league's report called it "unlikely that an equipment assistant and a locker room attendant would deflate game balls without Brady's knowledge and approval."
Brady has long blamed the deflated balls on the "ideal gas law," a principle of physics discovered in the 19th century establishing a relationship between that the temperature of a gas and its pressure.