Breaking News in Pats Investigation

I don’t what’s going to happen, but this is pretty good theater. You can feel the noose tightening around Belicheat’s neck.

I like Richard Sherman’s comment about the man-love and conflict of interest between Kraft and Goodell.

snowman wrote:

I like Richard Sherman’s comment about the man-love and conflict of interest between Kraft and Goodell.

yes, Sherman nailed it.

Dak wrote:

Well, if the Patriots win, I could see the NFL skating the issue, because they certainly don’t want a tainted Super Bowl winner.

OR, regardless of the outcome (and much more likely if the Pats lose), the NFL could really come down hard on the Patriots because they’ve already tainted the playoffs … and what better way to deter tampering in the future than to smack the Pats. I would propose a year-long suspension to Belicheat, a loss of 1st-round picks for the next 3 years, and a $10 million fine to the organization. And, that’s with no direct evidence. Remember, the NFL already set a precedent of coming down hard on a head coach without any direct evidence that he participated in a violation when they suspended Sean Payton for a year. With direct evidence, pretty much double the suspension and triple the fine.

Well….what if Belichick didnt know? …don’t shoot
the questioner.

w
v

wv wrote:

Well….what if Belichick didnt know? …don’t shoot
the questioner.

w
v

To have any credibility the NFL would need to get this done before the Super Bowl and if NE cheated strip them of their AFC championship anything else is just lip service. I think most people would give up a few draft picks and hefty fine to go to the SB.I can’t see BB not knowing anything about his team ,I mean he controls them down to the minutest detail ,what they say where they go and how they act when they get there “the Patriot way” and all.

Mackeyser wrote:

Per Roger Goodell, ignorance is not an excuse. Just ask Sean Payton…

Good, because I highly doubt Belichick was completely oblivious to the deflated football situation (just as I don’t believe Payton knew nothing about his team participating in bounties). Seems to me there’s little that would escape his notice, or rules broken without his approval even if it was unspoken.

nittany ram wrote:

Mackeyser wrote:
Per Roger Goodell, ignorance is not an excuse. Just ask Sean Payton…

Good, because I highly doubt Belichick was completely oblivious to the deflated football situation (just as I don’t believe Payton knew nothing about his team participating in bounties). Seems to me there’s little that would escape his notice, or rules broken without his approval even if it was unspoken.

I can’t imagine a rogue employee deflating the ball with no instructions, on just about any team, but especially Bill Belichick’s Patriots.

I’d like to see a journalist do a real good piece
on cheating in football. I looked around and there is very
little written on it. There’s little hints here and there
that its been going on for a long time in various ways,
but apparently nobody has done a big in-depth article on it.
I’m sure the NFL doesnt want to see one, either.

I’d just like to see the deflate thing and the spying thing
put in context

DV mentions a ‘spy’ who dressed up as a painter
http://www.rams-news.com/could-the-greatest-show-on-turf-beat-the-current-seahawks-defense-vermeil-audio/
and reported to a Dallas coach. And ive posted
about George Allen hiring a spy to spy on Dallas.

I just wish i had a better idea of the big-picture.
The context.

w
v
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http://forums.denverbroncos.com/showthread.php?177825-NFL-investigating-Broncos
McD = Belichick ??? (Merged)

I was afraid of this………..

TAPING PRACTICES IS NOTHING NEW

Regardless of whether the Patriots did or didn’t videotape the Rams’ walk-through practice prior to Super Bowl XXXVI, it’s not the first time that such allegations have been raised.

As Jason Cole of Yahoo! Sports wrote in the days following the discovery that the Pats were taping defensive coaching signals during a Week One game against the Jets, the Broncos were suspected at one time of secretly videotaping Chargers practices.

Wrote Cole: “The San Diego Chargers increased their security several years ago at a hill overlooking the practice field at the team facility during weeks when they played the Denver Broncos. Why? It turns out Broncos coach Mike Shanahan had been hiring spies to videotape the Chargers practices. The NFL had been aware of it for several years (at least one NFL official had seen one of the tapes), but didn’t step in because it was considered a team issue.”

Such stories tend to support the rumor that Patriots coach Bill Belichick included with the materials surrendered to the league extensive evidence of cheating by other teams.

Further bolstering the belief that the Pats weren’t the only team doing what they were caught doing are the comments of former Cowboys and Dolphins coach Jimmy Johnson. The Boston Herald has posted the transcript of a WFAN interview that we first mentioned on September 29, during which Johnson said that the videotaping of defensive coaching signals was a widespread practice.

“I did it with video and so did a lot of other teams in the league,” Johnson said on September 28. “Just to make sure that you could study it and take your time, because you’re going to play the other team the second time around. But a lot of coaches did it, this was commonplace.”

And this kind stuff is nothing new. Way back in 1967, Lee Grosscup wrote an item for Sport magazine that delved into the issue of spying in football.

The bigger issue with what the Patriots did against the Jets is that the Pats continued to do something that the league had specifically told teams not to do, and that the Jets decided to make a sufficiently big deal about it that it set off a media firestorm.

The staggering penalty applied to the Patriots ($250,000 fine and loss of a first-round pick) and coach Bill Belichick ($500,000 fine) created the impression that this really was a big deal, regardless of the fact that it had been going on for an extended period of time.

And by hitting the Pats so hard, the league backed itself into a corner. If the videotaping of defensive coaching signals compels such a harsh sanction, evidence that such things have been occurring on a widespread basis would potentially shake public confidence in the sport.

But at a time when folks are chasing (as we think they should) the question of whether the Patriots cheated in connection with Super Bowl XXXVI or any other postseason game since 2001, we think that resources and effort also should be devoted to exploring whether and to what extent there has been cheating by other teams.

Maybe that’s why teams like the Steelers and Eagles aren’t willing to blame spying on losses to the Pats in the 2004 AFC title game and Super Bowl XXXIX, respectively. Maybe the problem in both cases isn’t that either of the teams within Senator Arlen Specter’s territory were the victims of skullduggery. Maybe the problem is that they didn’t take enough steps to prevent themselves from being victimized by practices that were an open secret prior to Week One of the 2007 regular season.

Maybe that’s why teams like the Steelers and Eagles aren’t willing to blame spying on losses to the Pats in the 2004 AFC title game and Super Bowl XXXIX, respectively. Maybe the problem in both cases isn’t that either of the teams within Senator Arlen Specter’s territory were the victims of skullduggery. Maybe the problem is that they didn’t take enough steps to prevent themselves from being victimized by practices that were an open secret prior to Week One of the 2007 regular season.

This is why stealing signals is in itself not a rules violation. Meaning, just simply, there’s no rule against it. Why not? The league says that kind of security issue is on the team not the league, mostly because it would be impossible to enforce it.

Taping signals is illegal. Stealing them isn’t.