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Spygate to Deflategate: Inside the history of cheating that split the NFL and Patriots

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Spygate to Deflategate: Inside what split the NFL and Patriots apart

This story appears in ESPN The Magazine's Sept. 28 Transactions Issue.

His bosses were furious. Roger Goodell knew it. So on April 1, 2008, the NFL commissioner convened an emergency session of the league's spring meeting at The Breakers hotel in Palm Beach, Florida. Attendance was limited to each team's owner and head coach. A palpable anger and frustration had rumbled inside club front offices since the opening Sunday of the 2007 season. During the first half of the New England Patriots' game against the New York Jets at Giants Stadium, a 26-year-old Patriots video assistant named Matt Estrella had been caught on the sideline, illegally videotaping Jets coaches' defensive signals, beginning the scandal known as Spygate.


From 2000 to 2007, the Patriots videotaped the signals of opposing coaches in 40 games.​


Behind closed doors, Goodell addressed what he called "the elephant in the room" and, according to sources at the meeting, turned over the floor to Robert Kraft. Then 66, the billionaire Patriots owner stood and apologized for the damage his team had done to the league and the public's confidence in pro football. Kraft talked about the deep respect he had for his 31 fellow owners and their shared interest in protecting the NFL's shield. Witnesses would later say Kraft's remarks were heartfelt, his demeanor chastened. For a moment, he seemed to well up.

Then the Patriots' coach, Bill Belichick, the cheating program's mastermind, spoke. He said he had merely misinterpreted a league rule, explaining that he thought it was legal to videotape opposing teams' signals as long as the material wasn't used in real time. Few in the room bought it. Belichick said he had made a mistake -- "my mistake."

Now it was Goodell's turn. The league office lifer, then 49 years old, had been commissioner just 18 months, promoted, in part, because of Kraft's support. His audience wanted to know why he had managed his first crisis in a manner at once hasty and strangely secretive. Goodell had imposed a $500,000 fine of Belichick, a $250,000 fine of the team and the loss of a first-round draft pick just four days after league security officials had caught the Patriots and before he'd even sent a team of investigators to Foxborough, Massachusetts. Those investigators hadn't come up empty: Inside a room accessible only to Belichick and a few others, they found a library of scouting material containing videotapes of opponents' signals, with detailed notes matching signals to plays for many teams going back seven seasons. Among them were handwritten diagrams of the defensive signals of the Pittsburgh Steelers, including the notes used in the January 2002 AFC Championship Game won by the Patriots 24-17. Yet almost as quickly as the tapes and notes were found, they were destroyed, on Goodell's orders: League executives stomped the tapes into pieces and shredded the papers inside a Gillette Stadium conference room.

To many owners and coaches, the expediency of the NFL's investigation -- and the Patriots' and Goodell's insistence that no games were tilted by the spying -- seemed dubious. It reminded them of something they had seen before from the league and Patriots: At least two teams had caught New England videotaping their coaches' signals in 2006, yet the league did nothing. Further, NFL competition committee members had, over the years, fielded numerous allegations about New England breaking an array of rules. Still nothing. Now the stakes had gotten much higher: Spygate's unanswered questions and destroyed evidence had managed to seize the attention of a hard-charging U.S. senator, Arlen Specter of Pennsylvania, who was threatening a congressional investigation. This would put everyone -- players, coaches, owners and the commissioner -- under oath, a prospect that some in that room at The Breakers believed could threaten the foundation of the NFL.


"Goodell didn't want anybody to know that his gold franchise had won Super Bowls by cheating," ... "If that gets out, that hurts your business."​


Goodell tried to assuage his bosses: He ordered the destruction of the tapes and notes, he insisted, so they couldn't be exploited again. Many in the room didn't believe it. And some would conclude it was as if Goodell, Kraft and Belichick had acted like partners, complicit in trying to sweep the scandal's details under the rug while the rest of the league was left wondering how much glory the Patriots' cheating had...​

Wow. Calls into question the outcomes of the NFL, imo.
 
The1ApplePie said:
Saw this on Deadspin
http://deadspin.com/bombshell-espn-report-the-patriots-were-huge-cheaters-1729286402

Can't believe that ESPN would actually bite the hand that feeds them, after all the kowtowing they have done in the past.
Click to expand...

I want to hug and kiss this beautiful story from ESPN’s Don Van Natta Jr. and Seth Wickersham and take it out to a fancy dinner. Splendidly reported and brutally damning of both the New England Patriots and Roger Goodell, it alleges that the Patriots’ Spygate scandal was worse than anyone imagined—and was actively swept under the rug by the commissioner and the NFL.

You should read the story immediately, but the thrust is this—citing interviews with 90 sources in and around football as well as primary documents, ESPN reports that Bill Belichick and the Patriots videotaped opposing teams’ signals from 40 different games from 2000 through 2007. And when the scandal broke, Goodell did everything in his power to protect Robert Kraft, who was one of his strongest supporters and without whom he would not have been named commissioner. The thesis statement in this story is that the cover-up—and if this report is accurate, the league’s actions can’t be called anything else but a cover-up—so rankled other owners that Goodell came down extra-hard on New England and Tom Brady for Ballghazi as “a makeup call.”

The Patriots’ defense for Spygate—when they were caught taping a Jets practice—has always been that it was an honest mistake, that they had misinterpreted the rules. Their track record implies otherwise. Belichick reportedly placed his complex spying program in the hands of Ernie Adams, the Patriots’ mysterious “director of football research.” It began way back in 2000, Belichick’s first year as New England coach, and only became more efficient as time went on.

As the Patriots became a dynasty and Belichick became the first coach to win three Super Bowls in four years, an entire system of covert videotaping was developed and a secret library created. “It got out of control,” a former Patriots assistant coach says. Sources with knowledge of the system say an advance scout would attend the games of upcoming Patriots opponents and assemble a spreadsheet of all the signals and corresponding plays. The scout would give it to Adams, who would spend most of the week in his office with the door closed, matching the notes to the tapes filmed from the sideline. Files were created, organized by opponent and by coach. During games, Walsh later told investigators, the Patriots’ videographers were told to look like media members, to tape over their team logos or turn their sweatshirt inside out, to wear credentials that said Patriots TV or Kraft Productions. The videographers also were provided with excuses for what to tell NFL security if asked what they were doing: Tell them you’re filming the quarterbacks. Or the kickers. Or footage for a team show.​

Former Patriots coaches and employees say the videotaping was just the tip of the iceberg.

Several of them acknowledge that during pregame warm-ups, a low-level Patriots employee would sneak into the visiting locker room and steal the play sheet, listing the first 20 or so scripted calls for the opposing team’s offense. (The practice became so notorious that some coaches put out fake play sheets for the Patriots to swipe.) Numerous former employees say the Patriots would have someone rummage through the visiting team hotel for playbooks or scouting reports. Walsh later told investigators that he was once instructed to remove the labels and erase tapes of a Patriots practice because the team had illegally used a player on injured reserve. At Gillette Stadium, the scrambling and jamming of the opponents’ coach-to-quarterback radio line — “small s—-” that many teams do, according to a former Pats assistant coach — occurred so often that one team asked a league official to sit in the coaches’ box during the game and wait for it to happen. Sure enough, on a key third down, the headset went out.​

The Patriots’ taping apparently went undetected until 2006, when Packers security caught cameraman Matt Estrella filming illegally. (He claimed he was merely taking scenic shots for “Kraft Productions.”) That offseason, the NFL warned the Patriots in writing. Before the next year’s opener the Jets set up a sting operation, with the assistance of team and NFL security, to catch the Patriots in the act.

They caught Estrella filming, and actively trying to hide his employer.

During the first half, Jets security monitored Estrella, who held a camera and wore a polo shirt with a taped-over Patriots logo under a red media vest that said: NFL PHOTOGRAPHER 138. With the backing of Jets owner Woody Johnson and Tannenbaum, Jets security alerted NFL security, a step Mangini acknowledged publicly later that he never wanted. Shortly before halftime, security encircled and then confronted Estrella. He said he was with “Kraft Productions.”​

That’s when the NFL stepped in, and by all accounts, never had any interest in anything other than making it all go away.

On Monday, the day after the game, the tape arrived at NFL headquarters. On Wednesday, Goodell spoke to Belichick over the phone, and the Pats coach assured the commissioner he had misinterpreted the rules and that it was a small mistake that didn’t give the team a significant edge. In this conversation, according to ESPN’s sources, Goodell “did not believe” the Patriots’ explanation, but did not press for details. “Goodell didn’t want to know how many games were taped,” another source said.

On Thursday, the NFL announced the Patriots punishment. The entire official investigation had taken three days.

Privately, the NFL continued to act. The next week the league dispatched three executives, including general counsel Jeff Pash, to Foxborough. There they obtained eight videotapes of opposing teams and a stack of documents containing notes on other teams’ signals. Goodell ordered all the evidence to be destroyed.

This part of the report is unimpeachable—it comes directly from the Patriots’ counsel.

Inside a room accessible only to Belichick and a few others, they found a library of scouting material containing videotapes of opponents’ signals, with detailed notes matching signals to plays for many teams going back seven seasons. Among them were handwritten diagrams of the defensive signals of the Pittsburgh Steelers, including the notes used in the January 2002 AFC Championship Game won by the Patriots 24-17. Yet almost as quickly as the tapes and notes were found, they were destroyed, on Goodell’s orders: League executives stomped the tapes into pieces and shredded the papers inside a Gillette Stadium conference room.​

Jeff Pash stomped the tapes!

The next step was to get the controversy to blow over. Coaches and executives from the Steelers (who believed they had been taped prior to their 2002 AFC championship loss) and Eagles (the 2005 Super Bowl) put out public statements denying that the spying had anything to do with the games’ outcomes and supporting the NFL’s investigation. We do not know if they were pressured to do so, but former Rams coach Mike Martz says Roger Goodell called him personally and urged him to do the same regarding the 2002 Super Bowl.

During a five-minute conversation, Martz recalls that the commissioner sounded panicked about Specter’s calls for a wider investigation. Martz also recalls that Goodell asked him to write a statement, saying that he was satisfied with the NFL’s Spygate investigation and was certain the Patriots had not cheated and asking everyone to move on — like leaders of the Steelers and Eagles had done.

“He told me, ‘The league doesn’t need this. We’re asking you to come out with a couple lines exonerating us and saying we did our due diligence,’” says Martz.​

Martz believes the statement he gave was later changed by the NFL before being released.

Shown a copy of his statement this past July, Martz was stunned to read several sentences about Walsh that he says he’s certain he did not write. “It shocked me,” he says. “It appears embellished quite a bit — some lines I know I didn’t write. Who changed it? I don’t know.”​

With the NFL’s power brokers in lockstep, the league managed to avoid a congressional investigation. It appeared to be the end of things, but, apparently, not in the minds of the other owners.

ESPN’s interviews with owners and executives paint a picture of an NFL as resentful of the Patriots’ special treatment as they were jealous of the team’s onfield success. So when the Patriots were accused of illegally deflating footballs—an overblown scandal if there ever was one—Goodell decided to bring down the hammer. The massive investigation, the unprecedented penalties, the preemptive court filing? All were apparently efforts to assuage other owners sick and tired of the Patriots getting away with things. One NFL owner declared Goodell’s heavy-handed response was his “makeup call.”

Ballghazi looks very different in this context. Not merely the NFL’s usual clownish mishandling, it’s the culmination of 15 years of the Patriots bending and breaking the rules, and of pent-up acrimony accrued by Goodell’s chummy relationship with Kraft. The NFL, attempting to trump up the charges against Tom Brady, relied largely on his destruction of evidence—a tactic, it turns out, with which the league’s investigators had firsthand familiarity.​


If the first is TL;DR, this captures some of it.
 
Cheating wins championships. That's the lesson. Even if you get caught, you keep the trophy.
 
eriadoc said:
Cheating wins championships. That's the lesson. Even if you get caught, you keep the trophy.
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Well, cheating is a part of the game of football. You just don't do it blatantly.

As someone on another board pointed out, the Raiders in their prime were open cheats and made it part of their public culture, they were honest about it, and people loved them for it. The Pats are cheats, but try to cover it in a veneer of legitimacy, and look far worse.
 
The1ApplePie said:
Well, cheating is a part of the game of football. You just don't do it blatantly.

As someone on another board pointed out, the Raiders in their prime were open cheats and made it part of their public culture, they were honest about it, and people loved them for it. The Pats are cheats, but try to cover it in a veneer of legitimacy, and look far worse.
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I get that, but comparing the two is like comparing the petty thief to the multi-million dollar embezzler, in my mind. The Pats were doing stuff on a grand scale. The football deflating was more akin to something the Raiders would have done. They'd gouge your eyes out at the bottom of a pile or put stick'em on their hands to catch better. Yeah, it's all cheating, but scale matters.

Or hell, maybe it doesn't. I don't know. Was never a fan of the Raiders either.
 
Is it really a surprise that Goodell is the at the center of all of this? The guy is a crook who cares more about image and perception than legitimacy and reality.
 
Belichick supposedly thought the videotaping was legal(misinterpreted rules), but...

AS THE PATRIOTS became a dynasty and Belichick became the first coach to win three Super Bowls in four years, an entire system of covert videotaping was developed and a secret library created. "It got out of control," a former Patriots assistant coach says.

Sources with knowledge of the system say an advance scout would attend the games of upcoming Patriots opponents and assemble a spreadsheet of all the signals and corresponding plays. The scout would give it to Adams, who would spend most of the week in his office with the door closed, matching the notes to the tapes filmed from the sideline. Files were created, organized by opponent and by coach.

During games, Walsh later told investigators, the Patriots' videographers were told to look like media members, to tape over their team logos or turn their sweatshirt inside out, to wear credentials that said Patriots TV or Kraft Productions. The videographers also were provided with excuses for what to tell NFL security if asked what they were doing: Tell them you're filming the quarterbacks. Or the kickers. Or footage for a team show.​


Why go to such lengths to hide it if you think it's legal???
 
I'll say it, if the Texans cheated and won Super Bowls I wouldn't be mad at all. What's it cost the Patriots? A couple 1st round picks? A couple of million? Yeah...it's worth it.
 
Former head coach Cowher: Steelers tried stealing signals, too

The New England Patriots weren't the only team trying to steal signals during the time of the Spygate scandal. The Steelers were, too, former coach Bill Cowher said Wednesday.

Cowher, during a segment on 93.7 FM, said the Patriots' spying didn't beat the Steelers during the 2004 season's AFC championship game. A better Patriots team beat them, he said.

Cowher was asked why he didn't question Patriots coach Bill Belichick about Spygate during Cowher's interview with Belichick that ran Sunday on “The NFL Today” pregame show on CBS.

“We didn't lose the game because of any Spygate, because of them having any additional things,” Cowher said, referring to the 41-27 loss to New England that ended the Steelers' season following a 15-1 regular season. “I think if they're guilty of anything, they're guilty of arrogance because they were told not to do something. But it was something that everybody does.”

--------------------------------

“The only thing they got caught (was) doing it with a camera,” Cowher told the radio station. “We had people that always tried to steal signals. Stealing someone's signals was a part of the game, and everyone attempted to do that.”

Full article
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Posted not to excuse the Patriots, but rather point out that finding "competitive advantages" are not exclusive to NE.

Maybe the reason the Texans have not had much success is because they are not finding and exploiting loopholes like the rest of the league... :thinking:
 
Double Barrel said:
Posted not to excuse the Patriots, but rather point out that finding "competitive advantages" are not exclusive to NE.

Maybe the reason the Texans have not had much success is because they are not finding and exploiting loopholes like the rest of the league... :thinking:
Click to expand...

The OP article says all teams steal signals and take notes. The difference is the video taping which is specifically banned.

I think its safe to say Goodell will "retire" in the not-to-distant future. Destroying evidence is a PR problem if nothing else.
 
Belichick didn't know this was against the rules, I guess...

In fact, many former New England coaches and employees... acknowledge that during pregame warm-ups, a low-level Patriots employee would sneak into the visiting locker room and steal the play sheet, listing the first 20 or so scripted calls for the opposing team's offense... Numerous former employees say the Patriots would have someone rummage through the visiting team hotel for playbooks or scouting reports.​
 
During a five-minute conversation, [the Rams Head Coach Mike] Martz recalls that the commissioner sounded panicked about [Senator Arlen] Specter's calls for a wider investigation. Martz also recalls that Goodell asked him to write a statement, saying that he was satisfied with the NFL's Spygate investigation and was certain the Patriots had not cheated and asking everyone to move on -- like leaders of the Steelers and Eagles had done.

"He told me, 'The league doesn't need this. We're asking you to come out with a couple lines exonerating us and saying we did our due diligence,'" says Martz, now 64 years old and out of coaching, during a July interview at his summer cabin in the Idaho mountains.

A congressional inquiry that would put league officials under oath had to be avoided, Martz recalls Goodell telling him. "If it ever got to an investigation, it would be terrible for the league," Goodell said.

Martz says he still had more questions, but he agreed that a congressional investigation "could kill the league." So in the end, Martz got in line. He wrote the statement that evening, and it was released the next day, reading in part that he was "very confident there was no impropriety" and that it was "time to put this behind us."

Shown a copy of his statement this past July, Martz was stunned to read several sentences about Walsh that he says he's certain he did not write. "It shocked me," he says. "It appears embellished quite a bit -- some lines I know I didn't write. Who changed it? I don't know."​

#FireGoodell
 
The Ginger Hammer sealed his fate by poking the bear that is King Kraft.

I was never really offended by deflate gate, at least not beyond my usual Patriot hate. I'm pretty sure that the Pats got a worse punishment for deflating footballs than the Saints got for trying to kill Brett Favre.
 
Double Barrel said:
The league is slowly devolving into the WWE. When you start question the integrity of championships, then you start to wonder about teams, owners, coaches, players, and the league itself.
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My inside sources tell me that the NFL had originally booked Seattle to retain the title this year and lose next year while going for a three-peat, but Carroll refused to drop the title in his native California. He agreed to drop it to his buddy Belichick this year but only if he can get his win back next year. I hear they're gonna put a stipulation on the match. Seattle vs. New England in a steel cage and all the footballs have to be over-inflated until they are the size of a beach ball.

Who cares if most of that isn't true. More believable than anything the NFL has put out in statement in quite a while.
 
Thanks, Playoffs for getting this out to us. I look forward to the Patriots looking over their shoulder from here on out. I would take joy in seeing Brady and the Patriots enjoying an unbearable losing season.
 
Wow. Good reads. My tin hat was going off at the 2002 Super Bowl when it was shortly after 9/11 . That "The PATRIOTS" would be a symbolic win for America.

Then i took my tin foil hat off and remembered Martz was a dumbass and tried to be the smartest guy in the room and not use Marshall Fauk more in the 2nd half

:kitten:

Seriously though great read. As DB was pointing out ..WWE style..what makes more money for the league than great storylines
 
bah007 said:
My inside sources tell me that the NFL had originally booked Seattle to retain the title this year...
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I wonder if Pete Carroll has been ruminating on that failed play in light of this history? Part of me is wondering, now. Malcolm Butler: 'We knew what was going to happen'
 
Playoffs said:
I wonder if Pete Carroll has been ruminating on that failed play in light of this history? Part of me is wondering, now. Malcolm Butler: 'We knew what was going to happen'
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In a league where talent is not enough, where every player is a hard worker and has skill, having the other team's playsheet would be a tremendous advantage.
 
I think a lot of teams have done the same things the Patriots are accused of doing, but the difference is that NE has been successful with it and those other teams not so much. If the Jags were the subject of cheating, nobody would give a crap because it's the freakin' Jags.

I've read books about the Oilers early days, and teams used to plant spies all over the place, including hotel rooms overlooking practice fields, in order to get a competitive advantage. Why are these stories celebrated as football lore but the Patriots are evil? Is the only difference video tape?

I'm not saying it is right, but only that I seriously doubt 31 teams are bastions of high morality and beacons of competitive purity.
 
Double Barrel said:
Is the only difference video tape?
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Consider baseball. If you're on second base and you somehow key on a signal from the catcher, you can and should relay that to the batter. If you plant a camera in centerfield for that purpose, you're getting penalized by MLB. Yes, the cameras and ability to archive, review, and trend makes all the difference. It takes it from gamesmanship to institutional cheating.
 
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Double Barrel said:
I think a lot of teams have done the same things the Patriots are accused of doing, but the difference is that NE has been successful with it and those other teams not so much. If the Jags were the subject of cheating, nobody would give a crap because it's the freakin' Jags.

I've read books about the Oilers early days, and teams used to plant spies all over the place, including hotel rooms overlooking practice fields, in order to get a competitive advantage. Why are these stories celebrated as football lore but the Patriots are evil? Is the only difference video tape?

I'm not saying it is right, but only that I seriously doubt 31 teams are bastions of high morality and beacons of competitive purity.
Click to expand...

There's an old racecar driver named Smoky Yunick who once said something along the lines of "There are two types of racers, cheaters and losers".
 
eriadoc said:
Consider baseball. If you're on second base and you somehow key on a signal from the catcher, you can and should relay that to the batter. If you plant a camera in centerfield for that purpose, you're getting penalized by MLB. Yes, the cameras and ability to archive, review, and trend makes all the difference. It takes it from gamesmanship to institutional cheating.
Click to expand...

In the past (and most likely present), teams had employees going to future opponents' games in order to decipher signals. This is why teams change them all the time, and some even have fake signal callers on the sidelines in order to confuse opponents that are watching them.

Players routinely give away signals and playbooks of their former teams to their new teams. Visiting team locker-rooms are always scrubbed clean of playbooks and chalkboard diagrams because it could give away things. Heck, I've read for years that the teams use All-22 film to decipher signals.

Real time analysis of signals in games to be relayed to the field is impossible. There is not enough time for a chain to relay that signal to a defensive captain. And if teams are not changing their signal calls that can be lifted from All-22 and even broadcasts, then that's on them for being complacent. These are tactics that have been implemented by teams for many decades.

Belichick did not invent this. He learned it from Bill Parcells, who learned it from Ray Perkins and on and on. This is nothing new under the sun stuff.
 
To me the thing that I can't not think about is that this all supposedly ended when they were caught and they busted up a bunch of video tapes and shredded a bunch of pages of notes. Then this stopped happening and the Patriots winning percentage actually got better?

Video tapes and notes on paper. In what? 2007?

Nobody looked through any computers? No floppy disks or "Zip drives" were involved? Nobody looked through any data? I bet the league destroyed a bunch of crap that the Patriots couldn't have cared less about and left the majority of the evidence where it always was, on some coach's computer. I believe they probably still do it or something similar to it. Maybe just in their house and maybe they use cameras that are fixed in place and not walking around with some poorly disguised staffer but I bet they still study other teams signals and I bet they mine that data for ways to get an advantage.

I bet they're just much more careful about it today than they were back then.
 
I agree, Herv. And I doubt the Patriots are the only team doing it.

p.s. and if it means a chance at a championship, I wish the Texans would do it! ;)
 
PapaL said:
I'll say it, if the Texans cheated and won Super Bowls I wouldn't be mad at all. What's it cost the Patriots? A couple 1st round picks? A couple of million? Yeah...it's worth it.
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Thanks for your honesty. But I would be ashamed and dismayed if a team I supported won by illegal means. How you win matters. I'm really dismayed at the board for having so many willing cheaters ready to win by any means.

It's sad (but not surprising) integrity has so little value.
 
Marshall said:
Thanks for your honesty. But I would be ashamed and dismayed if a team I supported won by illegal means. How you win matters. I'm really dismayed at the board for having so many willing cheaters ready to win by any means.

It's sad (but not surprising) integrity has so little value.
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What if it was something that blurred the line between cheating and run of the mill gamesmanship? What if something they were accused of doing wrong wasn't seen by people at large at a consensus of guilt?

Point is, teams, players, coaches are always seeking to find an edge. To play through the echo of a whistle here or play through the letter of the law there. That's why there's ever a need for referees or commisioners to begin with. I wouldn't be too happy if my team were spiking the other team's gatorade, of course, but taking advantage of a complacent team letting their signals be stolen or calling in an ex-player of a team we're preparing for to go over some info is reasonable tactical fair game.
 
Mollywhopper said:
What if it was something that blurred the line between cheating and run of the mill gamesmanship? What if something they were accused of doing wrong wasn't seen by people at large at a consensus of guilt?

Point is, teams, players, coaches are always seeking to find an edge. To play through the echo of a whistle here or play through the letter of the law there. That's why there's ever a need for referees or commisioners to begin with. I wouldn't be too happy if my team were spiking the other team's gatorade, of course, but taking advantage of a complacent team letting their signals be stolen or calling in an ex-player of a team we're preparing for to go over some info is reasonable tactical fair game.
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I hope you're on my jury if I'm ever charged for a crime for which I am guilty. I could get away with anything.
 
Marshall said:
I hope you're on my jury if I'm ever charged for a crime for which I am guilty. I could get away with anything.
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And would you insist your guilt or just skip away from the courthouse?

(completely rhetorical btw, I know you can't possibly let your guard down on something like this)
 
Marshall said:
Thanks for your honesty. But I would be ashamed and dismayed if a team I supported won by illegal means. How you win matters. I'm really dismayed at the board for having so many willing cheaters ready to win by any means.

It's sad (but not surprising) integrity has so little value.
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You must hate baseball.

Stealing signs/scuffing baseballs/grease balls/spit balls and this doesn't even bring up steroid use. (Which wasn't illegal at the time many players were roiding up.)
 
steelbtexan said:
You must hate baseball.

Stealing signs/scuffing baseballs/grease balls/spit balls and this doesn't even bring up steroid use. (Which wasn't illegal at the time many players were roiding up.)
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I hate what all become when winning becomes more important than integrity, whether it's baseball, football, politics, religion or self delusion.
 
Marshall said:
I hate what all become when winning becomes more important than integrity, whether it's baseball, football, politics, religion or self delusion.
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Seeking advantage is playing within the rules to maximize our own talent. In deflategate, it would be to bring the balls to the ref at 12.5 lbs for inspection. Then KEEP THEM THERE after the inspection without further alteration. But the allegation is that the balls were intentionally altered after inspection which is intentional cheating. And it just happens to be the same team involved in other notorious cheating scandals which keeps getting away with minor or no punishment, unlike New Orleans. There is a double standard, but most think cheating to win is somehow virtuous. It's sad, but the way of the world in a backward/upside down society.
 
Marshall said:
But within the rules. Tactical deception is not the same as bearing false witness.
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I was halfway joking, I understand the distinction you're making, but for a lot of people the line is much more fuzzy. I don't like the cheating either, but if that's how the game is played, that's how the game is played.
 
Marshall said:
Seeking advantage is playing within the rules to maximize our own talent. In deflategate, it would be to bring the balls to the ref at 12.5 lbs for inspection. Then KEEP THEM THERE after the inspection without further alteration. But the allegation is that the balls were intentionally altered after inspection which is intentional cheating. And it just happens to be the same team involved in other notorious cheating scandals which keeps getting away with minor or no punishment, unlike New Orleans. There is a double standard, but most think cheating to win is somehow virtuous. It's sad, but the way of the world in a backward/upside down society.
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So you do equate stealing signs in baseball to stealing signs in football (spygate.)
 
steelbtexan said:
So you do equate stealing signs in baseball to stealing signs in football (spygate.)
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Pretty much. Though the rules are not as clear. But I was terribly disappointing whenever my pitcher was found to have scuffed the balls or applied a foreign substance to them AFTER it was clearly against the established rules.
 
I hear the Patriots doubled down on interfering with the headphones at tonight's game. Take away one cheat, find another. It's systemic.
From Spygate to deflategate to communications gate, all of which overlap. Cheating is an ongoing part of that organization.
 
Marshall....at least you know who not to play golf with. I am with you....I would rather lose with integrity than win with deceit.
 
Suppose an NFL owner had a pile of proof positive that the Patriots had systematically cheated in all of the ways mentioned in the OTL expose from 2000-2015...

What do you think that owner would do with that stack of irrefutable evidence???
 
Playoffs said:
Suppose an NFL owner had a pile of proof positive that the Patriots had systematically cheated in all of the ways mentioned in the OTL expose from 2000-2015...

What do you think that owner would do with that stack of irrefutable evidence???
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To keep the cash flowing - they might not do anything.
 
Mike Tomlin whining about cheating is pretty funny, all things considered...

Tomlin.jpg
 
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