Dear Mr Florio,

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Specifically regarding your recent statements about the suspension of Jameis Winston. Recently you insinuated that, because the letter sent to Winston had not been leaked, the investigation by the NFL into the alleged misconduct had found the information so terrible and damning that it would have ended the career of Jameis Winston.

Yes insinuated is the correct word because you dropped that particular bombshell in so innocuously that you have used your position as a respected NFL reporter to purport it as fact. I’m sure many people accepted those comments with a sense of “Florio said it and he’s got his ear close to the door so it must be right.”

You justify your opinion by bringing up the six game suspension of Ezekiel Elliot and “the six page letter, chronicling his misdeeds”.

There’s only one problem with that argument: it’s based purely on conjecture and “maybe”! Looking at the cases between Elliot and Winston they couldn’t be more different! You try to say that because no letter has been leaked it MUST be worse than what was alleged with Elliot.

Maybe, just maybe, Elliot was suspended for six games because that’s the standard for domestic violence under the NFL personal conduct policy? Maybe it had something to do with the fact the woman accusing Elliot of domestic abuse went to the police on several occasions and Elliot was interviewed by the police in connection with the allegations? Maybe even after the appeals the suspension was upheld because there was substance to the allegations?

In the case of Winston it’s more than likely that there was no letter detailing sin after sin, because the NFL found no seedy underbelly? Maybe the difference is that despite not finding all the evidence seemingly found against Ezekiel Elliot, Winston was suspended for three games for violating the Personal Conduct Policy of the NFL.

What has to be remembered in this issue that, while Jameis is a Tampa Bay Buccaneer, he is an employee of the NFL and as such must conduct himself in a manner that does not cast a negative light upon his employers. After all Winston was accused of sexual assault.  Sure he didn’t appeal the sentence, but is that an admission of guilt? NOPE!

Only those in the inner circle know what was said and for all we know the Bucs front office told Winston to swallow the suspension and move on. Maybe the GM and Coaching staff are thinking playoffs and by appealing the sentence, could actually blow up in their faces and derail the whole season if those 3 games are upheld. What if the Buccaneers brass is thinking “hey, what if we’re in the middle of a run to the playoffs and we lose our starting QB?”

But that doesn’t really fit the anti-Winston rhetoric does it?

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