Brett Favre was fined $50,000 today for what is being labeled a “failure to cooperate” by the NFL as it concluded the investigation regarding inappropriate texts and photos he allegedly sent to former Jets hostess Jenn Sterger.

Are you kidding me?

According to a report by Yahoo! Sports today the NFL concluded that Favre was:

“not candid in several respects during the investigation resulting in a longer review and additional negative public attention for Favre, Sterger and the NFL,”.

In the same report the league stated:

“The review found no evidence to contradict the statements of both Favre and Sterger that they never met in person, nor was there anything to suggest that Sterger engaged in any inappropriate conduct,” its statement announcing the fine said.

The NFL will apparently use Favre’s fine to fund a formal sexual harassment training program, according to a memo commissioner Roger Goodell sent to NFL teams on Wednesday.

That seems like a pretty lame comment, by the way. The NFL has more than enough money to fund a training program that should’ve been in place already. They would have been better off just saying they made the decision to create one without using Favre’s fine.

Nevermind that said “fine” is mere pocket change for Favre considering he makes that amount by playing just a few minutes in a single game.

Punishment? Not quite.

Is this really the end of this soap opera? “Failure to cooperate” is what the NFL came up with from weeks of investigative work? Why fine him at all?

All this appears to be is a public relations coup in order to show that Favre indeed was punished without actually punishing him for the alleged transgressions.

Indeed, by fining Favre for failure to cooperate they navigated around the biggest hazard facing the NFL in this investigation - a challenge to the personal conduct policy that would have turned the sporting world on its ear.

Think about it: If the NFL found Favre guilty of sexting and sending crude pictures what kind of message would that send to professional athletes everywhere?

By punishing him in that manner they would be entering into his personal life, which I’m sure was the last place they wanted to tread.

I don’t know what’s true or false any more than I did when these accusations became public and I fear that this is far from over.

The Sterger camp is disappointed with the outcome, to put it mildly:

*“*My client and I are extremely disappointed, but not surprised, at today’s NFL announcement that Brett Favre did not violate the NFL ‘workplace conduct’ policy. While I am not privy to how Mr. Goodell reached such a finding, we strongly disagree with his conclusion that there was insufficient evidence to support a violation of the policy. To the contrary, our evidence and the personal testimony of Ms. Sterger clearly showed a pattern of lewd and offensive behavior by Mr. Favre that lasted all of the 2008 season.

“As noted in the NFL’s release, ‘there was no evidence to suggest that Sterger engaged in any inappropriate conduct.’ In addition to the offensive messages, there was ample evidence to show that the sexually explicit photographs were part of Favre’s inappropriate behavior. Our evidence clearly showed that the photos were sent by Favre.

[…]

“Furthermore, the fact that the League took the step of fining Favre for ‘not being candid in several respects during the investigation’ is disturbing in the message it sends. It clearly shows that an NFL star player was given preferential treatment and tells all other players that failure to cooperate may cost you some money but will not result in other punishment. Additionally, today’s decision is an affront to all females and shows once again that, despite tough talk, the NFL remains the good old boys’ league.”

The Yahoo! Sports column also states that Deadspin, the website now infamous for delivering the video and texts to us, paid a third party for the information and could not guarantee its authenticity.

Shocking!

Remember, Favre has yet to be charged with anything by the Sterger camp, so where was this really going to go anyway? If they suspended him the Favre camp, and a host of other media venues, would likely have lashed out due to the fact that charges had never been filed and there was absolutely no concrete proof that Sterger did not initiate some of the contact between the two.

On the surface it looks like Goodell took the easy way out. After a long, apparently arduous investigation process all they could muster was failed cooperation by the accused party. Somehow the NFL managed to not make any type of judgment on the scandal whatsoever and, while I’m not going to assume Favre is guilty before being proven innocent, this sure reeks of the NFL protecting Brett Favre as opposed to settling the case once and for all.

I understand the desire to avoid a court battle involving sexual harassment charges. I think the NFL would have almost been better off with Sterger charging him with sexual harassment as it would have released the NFL from judgement.

Of course, that didn’t happen and now we have our… verdict?

Honestly, this is a terrible decision in my eyes. If you didn’t find him guilty then the case should be closed and a fine should never have been imposed.

Now it remains WIDE OPEN and the Sterger camp may elect to drag this issue on well into the 2011 calendar year.

Doesn’t this just sound like a terrible joke to you? Can someone please pinch me?

All I know is that I don’t believe we’ve seen the last episode of this ongoing soap opera.

What do you think? Is the punishment relevant? Should the penalty have been worse?