Misreporting of Legal News: NFL Edition

No new cases Wednesday.  Two new cases Thursday, both affirming criminal convictions.  

So, just for fun, let's not look at the government, let's look at private legal process.  A few months back the NFL (through its commissioner) suspended several New Orleans Saints players for taking part in a "bounty" arrangement, under which the players were alleged to have promised and received rewards from "pool" for injuring opposing players.  The players appealed the suspensions, and, because of the agreement between the NFL and its players, the appeal was heard by a private arbitration panel.  

Today it was announced that the penalties were overturned.  Which is certainly true.  One of the players tweeted ""Victory is mine!!!! -stewie griffin,"".   The headline(s) all consistently played up the overturning of the suspensions.

It's a shame no one bothered to read the actual decision.  (Take a look at http://assets.espn.go.com/pdf/2012/0907/Saints%20Summary%20Decision.pdf)  The decision itself is not very favorable to the players, and, in fact, subjects them to more, and not less, discipline.  By way of background, the players argued the commissioner had no right to suspend the players for what was basically a pay issue, because pay issues were governed by a "system arbitrator," and that therefore the commissioner had no authority to act.  The commissioner argued that he had the right to punish "conduct detrimental" to the NFL and it was not a pay issue at all.  The panel agreed with both sides, essentially.  The panel decided that the commissioner can punish "conduct detrimental" but not compensation violations, and that the "system arbitrator" can punish pay violations but not "conduct detrimental." So what the panel decided was that because at least some of the punishment had to do with pay, and not conduct, the commissioner had to restate the penalty for just conduct, and the "system arbitrator" could impose a penalty for the pay violations. 
These players may wake up in a couple of weeks and be serving two sentences, which add up to more than the one that got overturned.

Let's see how long it takes someone to point this out.