Boston Globe's Dan Shaughnessy: Worst NFL week finally comes to a close

Kickoff could not come fast enough.

The worst week in the history of the National Football League finally came to a close Sunday when the last of the suspended and the suspected were ruled out of Sunday's games and finally America had football again. And everything went on the way it always does.

Here on the campus of the University of Minnesota, in the shadow of the venerable Williams Arena where Kevin McHale and so many other Gophers ran on the elevated hardwood, the New England Patriots easily dismantled the Minnesota Vikings, 30-7 in front of 52,350 fans, including hundreds of folks wearing the number 28 jersey of Adrian Peterson. The Vikings were without their star running back; they deactivated Peterson on Friday night after he was arrested for whipping his 4-year-old son with a switch.

I went down to the main concourse during the third quarter of the Pats rout. I was hoping to find the young woman who was photographed before the game wearing her Peterson jersey and carrying a switch designed for child punishment. She looked pretty happy with herself in the tailgating photo and I wanted to know what was going through her mind as he selected her outfit for the game.

Alas, no sign of the switch-wielding woman. But I had a chance to talk to dozens of other locals who had made the conscious decision to don the jersey of an accused child-abuser before traipsing over to TCF Bank Stadium on a perfect fall afternoon.

"I'm not saying anyone wants to see someone who beats his son, but he's been a very good player for so long," said 22-year-old Marc Instrum. "And I think things are different in the south."

Charles Barkley says Amen to that. The inimitable Mound of Rebound was summoned to the CBS Gameday set to tell us, "every black parent in the south is going to be in jail under those circumstances."

"I just wore it because it's the only Vikings jersey I have," said one of the teens. "But it would not be cool if some of the things they say he did turn out to be true."

While the rout continued down below on the field, it was learned that commissioner-under-siege Roger Goodell had cancelled his long-awaited appearance at the San Francisco 49ers dedication game at Levi Field. It's evident that fallout from the Ray Rice domestic violence scandal and the Peterson arrest changed the commissioner's plans.

After being routed by the Pats, the Vikings didn't have much to say about Peterson. Minnesota head coach Mike Zimmer said he'll address the Peterson situation "at another time," but admitted, "if you took the best player off of every team, it would have an impact."

"Not my business," said Vikings guard Brandon Fusco.

Believe it or not, Belichick was relatively expansive on the topic. After winning his 200th career victory in the league, the vaunted coach was asked as a historian and one who loves the league what can he do to move forward and make things better.

You could tell he wanted to say more. This is a man who has dedicated his life to the Shield and it's got to hurt to see what has happened to the NFL's image in the last week

"I have a lot of personal respect for Adrian and Ray," said Belichick, "and the situation is really unfortunate, and the events of what happened. We all know what that is. So, it's an unfortunate situation."

I wanted to ask Brady the same question. He's invested 15 years in the NFL and presents like a man who someday may run for public office. Surely he has feeling about the damage done to the NFL over the past week. Unfortunately, Brady was in a bad mood for a man who just won a football game by 23 points. After a few short answers, Tom bolted with his patented, "Thanks, guys."

There is one final member of the Patriots' holy trinity who could answer some questions about the NFL's decaying image and his approval of all things Goodell. Bob Kraft went on the airwaves of user-friendly CBS early last week to talk about the swell job Goodell's been doing. He rejected a pair of Globe interview requests during the awful week and yours truly didn't have any luck Sunday when I took the charge in the hallway outside the winner's locker room.

What about it, Bob. Any comment on this past week in the NFL?

"No," was all said.