Ray Rice 1, NFL 0

Another day, another loss for Roger Goodell. It's like the New England Patriots waking up one day and discovering they've become the Oakland Raiders.

This upon the news that Ray Rice won his appeal and has been reinstated to playing status, a not wholly unexpected turn of events. When you hand down a two-game suspension and then arbitrarily decide to overturn yourself simply because you caught a lot of  heat for it, these things will happen. The law tends to look down on do-overs in these matters. Especially when it's this capricious.

"Well, you see, your Honor, it was like this. We thought two games was enough, but then people started being really mean and calling us names, so we decided to pretend we hadn't already ruled on this and changed the two-game suspension to an indefinite suspension. Which we thought was OK because we're the NFL and all, and who's gonna tell the NFL it can't play games with its own disciplinary procedures?"

To which the judge obviously replied: "Ahem."

And so Rice is free, and his wife, Janay, has given an interview telling her side of the story (which basically amounts to her writing off his slugging her as a "bad day"), and now the clock is ticking on a couple of fronts:

1. Which NFL team will swallow hard, take the leap and sign the guy?

Because some team will. Running backs are a precious commodity, and Rice is, or was, a pretty good one.

Early line favorite: The Patriots. Because the Patriots don't care what you think.

(Although this guy says it's the Colts. Enjoy, Indy).

2. When will the Rices have another "bad day?"

Because the cynic (or perhaps the realist) in me says they will. Guys who slug their wives/girlfriends usually don't do it just once, no matter what Janay Rice says. Nor does it matter what she says about having slapped him. It's irrelevant.

You. Don't. Hit. Women. Ever.

But why do I think Rice will again, some day?