Former Broncos defensive coordinator Jack Del Rio said the Deflategate penalty is an “overreaction.” (Steve Nehf, The Denver Post)
Former Broncos defensive coordinator and new Raiders head coach Jack Del Rio said he believes the Deflategate penalty handed to Tom Brady and the Patriots is an “overreaction,” much like the 2010 NCAA sanctions against Reggie Bush and Southern California.
“I think there are some similarities in terms of an overreaction, from my standpoint,” he told The Associated Press before his induction into the USC Athletics Hall of Fame. “I think it was a little bit overdone, but that’s somebody else’s problem right now.”
The NCAA found that Bush and basketball player O.J. Mayo received gifts from agents. USC’s football program was placed on four years of probation, forced to vacate the final two wins of its 2004 season and all of its wins in 2005. It was also banned from bowl games for two years, lost 30 scholarships and Bush forfeited his 2005 Heisman Trophy. The basketball team had to give up all of its 2007-08 victories and sit out the 2010 postseason.
In the Deflategate case, in which the Patriots were found to have illegally deflated footballs in the AFC championship game, Brady was suspended four games, and the Patriots were fined a record $1 million and stripped of two draft picks.
Del Rio told the AP that a warning would have sufficed.
“Everybody understands that quarterbacks all want to get the balls how they like them, and why not?” Del Rio said. “They throw these balls around, and one of the reasons the sport is so popular is the ability of guys like Peyton (Manning) and Brady to throw the ball the way they do.”
