Deflategate

Oh, you are one of those people who think the NFL would actually go out of its way to smear one of its most popular players. Please explain why the league would do that.

I'm not talking about the league pursuing the issue after the initial reports came out and the Patriots began to defend themselves. I'm talking about the start of this mess. Why would the league want to take down the Patriots? What possible benefit could there be?

 

Answer this question first.

Then prove it.

 

The punishment for this is similar to a spousal tirade about dirty dishes in the sink. It's incredibly out of line for the offense, but the blowup isn't about the immediate and seemingly minor incident but the accumulation of everything that preceded it.

My feeling is the league buried (burned?) what it found in the past to PROTECT THE SHIELD and when this occurred, had an, "...and this is how you repay me?!" moment.

There are no white hats in this; everyone involved pretty much sucks.

 

Only if you first explain why the league would deliberately mislead the public on the crux of the entire matter for months. What, no? Just going to stick with the "crying Patriots" theme. K.

Well, you see, the league has looked overly lax and out-of-touch in its handling of two recent, high-profile scandals (Peterson and Rice). In an effort to regain his mojo, Goodell, spurred on by overly zealous underlings (whose documented rationales for predisposed hatred of the Patriots is surely a coincidence), decided to investigate a team to which many NFL fans (just like you!) automatically and erroneously attribute a culture of cheating. They were too stupid to realize that A) weather affects ball pressure and B) disparate gauges provide disparate results and proceeded with an investigation that, in order to deliver a result other than "Wow, we're dumb. Our bad, guys!" relied on flawed, manipulated data for a result that saves face for the league.

And that's best-case-scenario since, again, no one can give a good explanation for why the NFL deliberately misled with the 2 PSI report and the entire issue of the unsealing of the transcript hints at a larger conspiracy and cover-up.

Please address these issues with something other than "Take your medicine, crybabies!"

 

They were caught filming opposing coaches a few feet from where they could have legally done the exact same thing.
Now, they have been "caught" intentionally deflating footballs despite the fact that a multi-million dollar investigation found no evidence greater than a final conclusion that Brady "must have known" it was going on.
Yep. Real hardcore cheaters there guys.

 

Also, I know this is going to come off as blatant homerism (and it partially is) but can you blame Patriots fans for taking up the prosecuted position?
Name one other team that continues to get dogged in the media for something that NEVER HAPPENED (Taping the Rams walkthrough.)
Name one other team that would have been accused in the media by league sources of deflating 11 of 12 footballs and, when that's proven false, name one other team where the league wouldn't have immediately corrected that report or, at the least, corrected it within six months.
Name one other team that would have had to BEG the NFL to correct that report. Name one other team that would still not get that report corrected AFTER begging.
Name one other team that, when under investigation, would have the commissioner of the NFL blatantly lie about the testimony offered by its star quarterback.
Name one other team whose quarterback would have been suspended for a quarter of a season, on a first offense, after committing a crime there is no evidence he committed.

I'll stop there because I'm making myself sound like a homer stooge but simply dismissing Patriots fans as paranoid idiots casually ignores the facts that sometimes when you're paranoid, people actually are out to get you.

 

The penalties were so out of proportion to the crime because the league fears, quite probably correctly, that every other franchise would react to charges of bending/breaking competition rules with the full Patriots stonewall. And if Berman rules for Brady and the NFLPA, that's exactly what will happen.
Schiez, give it up. The Pats brought much of this on themselves with their credulity defying reaction. If this was such a nothingburger, why'd they treat it like being accused of throwing a game except for their own institutional arrogance, which is surely a match for Goodell's and the league's.

 

There is no reason to think that never happened. One day Goodell said he wanted to talk to Matt Walsh. Two months later he said they didn't talk, he can't find any other evidence (from the pile of evidence that he destroyed, I guess), and now Walsh is in Hawaii in a DB Cooper-like state.

The greater likelihood is it did happen and Goodell didn't want Spygate II because he was already done with Spygate.

 

They spent an entire week leading up to the biggest game of their season answering questions from national media experts about a supposed scandal that, depending on whom you believe, could be answered by a scientific phenomenon known to most third graders.
To make matters worse, leading into the biggest game of the year, when the team should have been praised for making it to their sixth Super Bowl under Brady/Belichick, you had experts on just about every channel, in every newspaper and on every talk show degrading their reputation and accomplishments.
Now, if the Patriots were intentionally deflating footballs, OK, maybe it's what they deserved. But if they weren't? If they didn't? According to you they should have what? Shrugged their shoulders while their name was dragged through the mud?
HA.
Name one franchise that would have been OK with being accused of a scandal they didn't do.

 

So the absence of evidence is proof something happened?
OK. Now I get this entire deflategate scandal and why brady's punishment is appropriate.

 

And those defending the Patriots here are delusional?

What, pray tell, do you think is on these DESTROYED TAPES? Video evidence of JFK's actual killer? Proof the moon landing was a hoax?

Everyone has bought into the (exaggerated) signal-stealing story. What else can you do with a camera from the sidelines?

 

That's my point. They didn't act like they didn't do it. Cooperation from the start accompanied by firm declarations that the team had nothing to hide because it did nothing wrong would have been convincing. The stonewall was convincing in the other direction.