The prevailing thought around the NFL is that the Falcons received a rather light tap on the wrist for violating the league’s crowd noise rules.
The Falcons, who pumped artificial crowd noise into the Georgia Dome over the course of the 2013 and 2014 season, were given a fine of $350,000, forfeiture of a fifth-round draft pick in 2016 and president Rich McKay was suspended Monday from the league’s competition committee for at least three months.
“Everyone around the league, the insiders, are telling me that … they are kind of raising their eyebrows at the severity of the punishment,” said Andrew Brandt, a former executive of the Green Bay Packers, on 92.9 The Game. “Because what we heard, and maybe this was put out there as fodder, that they were taking this extremely seriously, this piped-in noise and how much it violated the integrity of the game. Yet the punishment was seemingly very light.”
Brandt covers the business of football for Sports Illustrated’s The MMQB.com.
Falcons owner Arthur Blank and McKay declined to comment for this article through a team spokesman.
“I think they got off light,” longtime NFL writer Peter King of The MMQB said.
The NFL declined comment and said that it will stand behind the prepared statement that was released by Troy Vincent, the senior vice president of football operations.
The investigation concluded in November, and the penalties were strategically released.
“It was very conveniently timed for Rich McKay and the Falcons,” Brandt said. “Certainly, they had this announcement before last week when they had the annual meetings and everyone was gathered together in Phoenix. I think it was kind of a nod to the teams and the executives that they weren’t going to announce this with everyone gathered there.
“They saved the guys the embarrassment of walking around with these punishments. That’s the first way that it’s been conveniently timed.”
McKay was suspended despite the league concluding that he was unaware of the audio file. Former director of marketing Roddy White was painted as a rogue employee operating outside the scope of the team structure in the league’s statement.
McKay’s penalty does not seem severe.
The competition committee’s work essentially is completed for the offseason. There is only a one-day meeting in May left on their agenda.
“Rich McKay has no time served with the Falcons,” Brandt said. “It’s with the competition committee. … I can look at Rich McKay’s suspension from the competition committee that goes through the end of June and say, that’s a one-day suspension.”
The $350,000 fine doesn’t seem like it will deter the Falcons or any of the other 31 franchises from committing future crowd-noise infractions.
Now, there is a debate on the value of a fifth-round pick.
Coach Dan Quinn comes from Seattle, which picked All-Pro cornerback Richard Sherman in the fifth round (154th overall) of the 2011 draft.
Falcons general manager Thomas Dimitroff has not hit as big with his fifth-round picks since 2008. He’s made 12 picks in the fifth round and only Kroy Biermann (2008) has become a starter. Also, Jacquizz Rodgers (2011) was a dependable back and special-teamer for the past four seasons.
Rodgers, who was selected nine picks before Sherman, signed with Chicago on Tuesday.
“(The fifth round) is negligible,” Brandt said.
Crowd noise was on the mind of the organization during the course of the 2014 season.
During the course of gathering almost 280,000 words, or 937 pages of transcribed quotes, from team officials, coaches and players — ranging from the NFL scouting combine to the coach Mike Smith’s firing — there were 16 references to crowd noise.
They ranged from offensive coordinator Dirk Koetter worrying about how loud it was going to be in the Superdome to how the team had to use its silent signals at home when the Chicago Bears’ fans took over the Georgia Dome and drowned out the hometown fans.
Another instance included former running back Steven Jackson instructing the fans in London on when to create crowd noise and when not to create crowd noise.
“I don’t know if we can take the crowd out,” Koetter said before facing Saints, who were coming off a seven-sack performance. “It’s going to be the loudest game ever played. That will be one of our major issues, handling the crowd noise.”
After the Falcons lost the game in London, wide receiver Julio Jones noted that the UK fans followed Jackson’s instructions on when to make crowd noise.
“It was a home game,” Jones said. “When our defense was out there, the crowd was cheering (and) making a lot of noise, making it hard for the quarterback, so it did feel like a home game.”
Could that atmosphere, with a team clearly conscious of crowd noise at home, on the road and in neutral environments, have led White to try to at least help the football operation at home?
Did the culture of the organization create an environment that tacitly — directly or indirectly — encouraged White to fabricate the “stadium experience?”
“The Falcons and all of our other businesses are built upon a foundation of values that drive our decision-making,” Blank said. “This issue was a clear failure in that regard.”
The culture of football also accounts for crowd noise and that may have led to this situation.
About the only loser in noise gate was White, the executive not the wide receiver, who lost his job.
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