Brady stands to lose $5-6 million directly in salary and maybe more in endorsements. It will be a great show to see what would happen in a civil action when Brady’s pack of Doberman lawyers got the League Office fearless leaders on the witness stand.
There can't be any civil action against the league. The league has the power to fine and suspended and a player a chance to appeal under the NFL collective bargaining agreement.
1. It isn't worth the time and energy, and the distraction.
2. In order to prove in a court of law that he actually suffered $5M to $6M in damages he is going to have to demonstrate that he took whatever steps he could to mitigate his damages. The fact that he did not cooperate with the NFL in their investigation is going to be a major hurdle for him to deal with in this regard.
3. In a lawsuit there's this inconvenient thing called a discovery process, where the NFL would have access to a lot of information and would be able to call a lot of witnesses to give depositions. Somehow, I don't see Brady wanting to go through with that.