NFL's Climate of Distrust Will Undermine Cam Newton Probe No Matter the Result

Maybe the NFL should hire Morgan Freeman to make all of its official announcements.

Freeman would make the league sound more authoritative. More enlightened. More...trustworthy. 

Read the beginning of the official statement by NFL spokesman Brian McCarthy about the Cam Newton concussion protocol investigation in what you imagine is the typical NFL headquarters voice (probably a cross between Roger Goodell's buttery evasiveness and the nasal-voiced lawyer from The Simpsons):

"

The NFL is committed to the proper application of the Concussion Protocol. In order to ensure that it is being uniformly applied across all 32 NFL teams, we have decided to initiate a review of the medical team's response to the Cam Newton tackle, under the procedure set forth by the collective bargaining agreement.

"

Newton, you will recall, absorbed multiple blows to the head at the hands of the Broncos defense in the Thursday night season opener. The worst came with 42 seconds left in a close game. Newton's helmet ricocheted from the launched helmet of Broncos defender Darian Stewart down to the turf. He writhed on the ground for several seconds before slowly climbing to his knees. Yet Newton somehow remained in the game instead of entering concussion evaluation protocols. Hence -- hoo-boy, here we go again -- an NFL investigation.

The phrase "NFL investigation" prompts memories of Bountygate, Deflategate and evidence of various concussion cover-ups and white-washes over the years. It inspires no hope of justice, or even clarity. Just the opposite: The confluence of a major superstar, the concussion dilemma and the NFL's investigative tomfoolery promises only the Emperor of All Boondoggles, a scandal that makes all the others feel like the tremors of Vesuvius.

It's impossible to imagine a result of an NFL investigation that anyone from the public to the players and owners would find believable, let alone satisfactory. If the NFL declares all concussion protocols were properly followed, it will be accused of conducting a bogus investigation. If it punishes an individual, it will be accused of scapegoating.

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Punish the Panthers too severely, and Jerry Richardson will become the next Robert Kraft. Let everyone off with a warning, and the whole process will be decried as lip service. If the investigation spirals into snooping around the Broncos' defensive meeting rooms in search of targeting evidence, it shakes up a whole new container of pressurized gases.

If the concussion protocol remains unchanged after the Newton investigation, players will be even more skeptical of its ability to keep them safe. If sweeping revisions are made, players will begin to wonder if any procedure or policy can really help them, particularly when the NFL is at the controls and fourth-quarter drama apparently supersedes player safety on its priority list.

Welcome to the no-win scenario the NFL created for itself. No one believes that the NFL can conduct a credible, honest investigation, just as no one believes a superstar quarterback would ever be taken out of a close game if he can stand on his feet and stammer out something that sounds like a play call.

The NFL currently operates in a climate of distrust. It's a big problem that compounds all the league's other big problems. It clouds everything the NFL does. It erodes the league's authority. It makes it nearly impossible for the league to do the right thing, even if it tries.

After Deflategate, teams have no reason to trust the NFL's investigative justice. After everything from the evasiveness about CTE research to the treatment of the Al Jazeera Four this summer, players don't believe the league enters an investigation with their best interests at heart.

There is no spirit of collaboration. The Panthers enter the investigation insisting they followed protocol to the letter. The NFLPA says it will investigate independently. A problem needs to be solved, but everyone approaches it and one another with swords drawn.

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The NFL brought this problem down upon itself after years of wavering in management style between Angry Caesar and cake-offering Marie Antoinette. It sailed beyond the Point of Counterproductivity somewhere around Day 200 of Deflategate. Now, the NFL cannot conduct an internal investigation of its own policy without a separate investigation by the NFLPA and a universal harrumph from the media and fans. That's a problem, because:

• The NFL needs a good concussion protocol to improve player safety, and the protocol in place is actually pretty good if enforced properly.

• The NFL must be able to conduct investigations to make sure its policies are being followed.

• The results of an NFL investigation must carry some basic legitimacy with stakeholders, rather than being perceived as PR spin/random lightning bolts from Olympus, for the league's most important policies to do anyone a lick of good.

Distrust obscures the big picture, making enforcement all about the exercise of power, not player safety. Distrust makes teams operate out of fear of consequences, not a desire to do the right thing.

Distrust makes it impossible to tell who is doing the right thing. If the NFL really did uncover some bad-apple physician or team employee and throw the book at him, would you believe the league? Would it deter the next bad apple, or would everyone still drive 90 miles per hour as soon as the flashers were out of sight?

Distrust will cause players to retire early. That's what the NFL should fear the most. Many current players cling to the hope of what the concussion protocol represents. They recognize the dangers of concussions and CTE but believe they have a measure of protection that players lacked even a decade ago. If players lose faith in the protocol—and it was hard to maintain faith in the protocol when the league's most incandescent superstar was subjected to a nationally televised pummeling without even a light being shined in his pupils—there will be even more early exits from the game.

The league must investigate what happened last Thursday night. But no one trusts the league to investigate anything. So there's a high probability that the inquiry will make things worse.

A climate of distrust, as you may have guessed, is a vicious circle.

The cycle can be broken if the league demonstrates a little bit more transparency, consistency and humility in both its policies and probes.

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Transparency means letting everyone know what triggers a concussion test. If the spotters aren't looking for a motionless quarterback lying on the turf after a blow to the head, what exactly are they looking for? Consistency means ensuring the same rules apply to a quarterback during a game-winning drive as a special teamer. Humility means being quick to address potential mistakes, not issuing "nothing to see here" statements to get through a news cycle.

The league needs to explain just what an investigation entails. What are the parameters? The limits? Thus far, an NFL inquiry could mean everything from Ted Wells going through your garbage to calling the local police for an incident report and hanging up at the busy signal. Everybody deserves to know what they are getting into when the league decides to investigate.

Just as important is the need to never utter the words "100 percent certain" about any sensitive issue, let alone an 18-month catastrophe like Deflategate.

There's nothing wrong about proceeding with caution and erring on the side of admitting a mistake. Maybe the NFL needs to order concussion tests on any player slow to get up for a while. Maybe some star quarterbacks must miss final drives to establish precedent and priorities. Maybe the league needs to acknowledge just how untrustworthy it has become. Look, we know you doubt our intentions and our sincerity, but we can only fix this situation if we work together.

Humility has its value.

Or maybe they just need Morgan Freeman. Read that announcement by Brian McCarthy again, this time in Freeman's inimitable benevolent-guardian-of-baby-penguins voice. The NFL is committed to the proper application of the Concussion Protocol…

Nope. It doesn't help. It just sounds like the NFL paid Freeman an oil tanker full of money in a callous PR move. The NFL's climate of distrust is so toxic that it could take the voice of heaven itself down with it.

The NFL doesn't need a spokesperson with authority. It needs to speak with authority. It lost that voice years ago. Until it returns, everything the NFL says and does is doomed to ring hollow.

Mike Tanier covers the NFL for Bleacher Report. Follow him on Twitter @MikeTanier.