Barnwell: Patriots primed to ‘survive’ Brady suspension

2:54 PM ET

The NFL’s on-again, off-again suspension of New England Patriots quarterback Tom Brady flipped to the “on” switch Monday morning. A panel of the United States Court of Appeals reinstated Brady’s four-game suspension resulting from the Deflategate incident, arguing that the league and commissioner Roger Goodell acted within the rules of the collective bargaining agreement in suspending Brady for a quarter of the regular season. Just when we were getting a little short on off-field intrigue, right?

To some extent, this isn’t a surprise. As the NFL Network’s Ian Rapoport pointed out on Twitter, Brady dropped his base salary from $9 million to $1 million as part of his new contract restructuring/extension, which means he’ll only lose $250,000 as part of a four-game suspension as opposed to $2.25 million. Oral arguments suggested that the NFL’s chances of winning the appeal were strong.

The case will undoubtedly continue through the legal system, but the current lay of the land suggests that Brady will miss the first four games of 2016, so let’s approach the Patriots’ state of affairs with that likelihood in mind. Are they doomed? Does this dramatically shift the balance of power in the AFC East or the AFC as a whole?

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Deflategate is not over. Its likeliest conclusion is more obvious now, but no one can say for certain that Tom Brady will miss 2016’s first four games.

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The U.S. appeals court ruling to reinstate New England Patriots QB Tom Brady’s four-game suspension means Jimmy Garoppolo will likely start Week 1.

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We can’t predict the future, of course, but most evidence indicates that the dropoff from Brady to backup Jimmy Garoppolo won’t be quite the doomsday scenario one could have in mind. When Brady was due to be suspended for the first four games of the 2015 season, I looked into this very topic for Grantland and found that the difference between four games of Brady and four games of Garoppolo was a little more than a half-win, and the Vegas over/under line for the Patriots’ full-season win total moved by a similar amount.

The idea of going from a Hall of Fame quarterback like Brady to a relatively inexperienced backup like Garoppolo seems like it would inspire an enormous swing, but the reality is that the Patriots are well-equipped to handle such adversity. Even without Brady, they have a defense that was above-average by DVOA last year despite losing stars like Jamie Collins, Dont’a Hightower and Devin McCourty for parts of the season with injuries. And barring an offseason injury, New England’s offensive infrastructure — notably Rob Gronkowski and Julian Edelman — will both be in the lineup to start the year, when Garoppolo would be forced into the lineup.

Even with Tom Brady set to miss four games, Bill Belichick & Co. will be just fine. AP Photo/Steven Senne

It also helps that the coaching staff will still be there. The Patriots still have Bill Belichick, one of the …

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