BLOG: Welcome To Your Tape, Roger Goodell

Well, well, well, Roger, did you really think you'd slip through the cracks and not be here? Tom Brady, Bill Belichick and the Patriots are back in the Super Bowl for the eighth time.

Ok maybe this time is different. Did anyone really want to see a Philadelphia-Jacksonville Super Bowl? That probably would have been the first game where the NFL would've had to PAY advertisers for commercial spots, and Justin Timberlake would've, at the last minute, said "I pass." We were one play away in the AFC Championship game of having a one-man street band at halftime and an empty U.S. Bank Stadium.

It's a good thing the Patriots are in it. More eyes glued to their television sets on February 4, more butts in the seats, means more money in Goodell's pocket. But can Goodell really be happy seeing Belichick, Brady and the Patriots back in the Super Bowl for an eighth time?

These are the guys he went after two years ago. Plucking their 2016 first- and fourth- round draft picks. Fining the team the largest amount in the history of the NFL - $1 million. And suspending its Hall of Fame quarterback, who had won four out of six championships to that date, for four games to begin the 2016 season. Four games, four games, the same amount of games he suspended Dallas Cowboys' defensive end, Greg Hardy, who was accused of grabbing his girlfriend by her hair, throwing her into furniture, AND threatening to kill her.

Apparently being "generally aware" of deflating footballs and "failing to comply with the League's investigation" equates to domestic violence. Well, in Goodell's head.

In the first of six, 15-minute installments of Brady's newest documentary, "Tom vs. Time" on Facebook Watch, Brady admits to saving the official suspension letter in his 2016 scrapbook. A little extra motivation for a man who really doesn't need much more motivation. (He still sees himself as the sixth round draft pick no body wanted, who couldn't even start on his winless high school team.)

When the Patriots completed the historic comeback against the Falcons in last year's Super Bowl, Goodell looked embarrassingly uncomfortable standing on stage, as he handed the Lombardi Trophy to Bob Kraft for the eighth time. The following day at the Super Bowl MVP trophy presentation you could cut the tension with a knife.

You know all Goodell was thinking, as he handed the MVP trophy to Brady, "how the hell did you beat me again?" as he's standing there smiling in front of hundreds of cameras.

He did get you Mr. Goodell.