Patriots Caught Cheating: Used Underinflated Footballs

Sorry, no cigar wrote:

You can sugar coat it all you want --"Illegal." It's Cheating. A high school kid racing barefoot is obvious to everyone else. You can see the lack of shoes. This was underhanded, hidden, and done in the hope that no one would discover it.

Brush it under the rug all you want. The Pats and Brady's reputations have taken a huge hit.

Have you actually read what you write? You are convicting an organization of cheating when you know absolutely nothing about the facts. Nothing.

The NFL has conducted 40 interviews (not including Brady) and has yet to reach a conclusion but some sleuth on letsrun has figured out that the Pats and Brady definitively "cheated"? How did you do it Encyclopedia Brown? Did you and Sally Kimble catch Buggs Meaney with a needle and a sack of balls on the sideline?

I won't argue that their has been some reputational hit here but, at least in the last 24 hours, I think the media has taken as big a hit for jumping to conclusions and pouring it on without any information.

Can't you wait a week or two until we know what happened?

logia2 wrote:

analogia wrote:

No, the better running analogy is that we are all told that we will be racing 400 meters. We are all told that we can wear cross country spikes but not sprint spikes. Despite this someone wears sprint spikes. They beat us all by such a wide margin that we are all pretty sure they would have won no matter what spikes they wore.

So, next race is 800 meters, how many of us would wear sprint spikes now if there was no penalty imposed in the first race???

Agreed. With the caveat that they checked in with the xc spikes and switched to the sprint spikes before the race.

EXACTLY. It's not that they started out with underinflated footballs. The footballs were checked in as legal, THEN they were underinflated. That's the crux of this whole situation. Not that the balls were illegally soft, but because they became that way after being approved at legal pressure two hours prior. It's becoming obvious that this was done deliberately. It has nothing to do with how much of an advantage this gave Brady or whether it would have affected the outcome of the game. It's the underhanded nature of it that has everyone up in arms.

Nope. I don't need to wait a week, Sherlock. There are plenty of facts that are being reported by independent sources. I'd like to point out that image and reputation matter a lot. I live in New England. Tom Brady is all over our regional advertisements, but how many national endorsements and commercials has he been in? I think there was one for Uggs shoes. Compare that with Manning, M. Jordan, Shaq, Rodgers....with Brady's looks and talent, he should be all over the magazines and TV. Athletes pull in huge dollars from this. Brady's Q score is in the dumps. Where there's smoke, there's fire.

Hosemaster wrote:

logia2 wrote:

Agreed. With the caveat that they checked in with the xc spikes and switched to the sprint spikes before the race.

EXACTLY. It's not that they started out with underinflated footballs. The footballs were checked in as legal, THEN they were underinflated. That's the crux of this whole situation. Not that the balls were illegally soft, but because they became that way after being approved at legal pressure two hours prior. It's becoming obvious that this was done deliberately. It has nothing to do with how much of an advantage this gave Brady or whether it would have affected the outcome of the game. It's the underhanded nature of it that has everyone up in arms.

The rule that I've seen posted only specifies the pressure to which balls must be inflated. It does not say that the balls must be maintained at the specified pressure after they have been inflated.

The Patriots did inflate the balls to 12.5-13.5lbs. We know this, as the balls were checked before kickoff. The rule doesn't say that they can't deflate the balls after inflating them.

Sorry, no cigar wrote:

Nope. I don't need to wait a week, Sherlock. There are plenty of facts that are being reported by independent sources.

Show me one fact that has been reported by an independent source?

And, by the way, what the hell does Brady's lack of commercialism have to do with all of this? He has eschewed mainstream advertising for his entire career. That--in many people's opinions--makes him more likable.

Sorry, no cigar wrote:

Grintz wrote:

2. What's different about this? Seriously? The Pats didn't cut the course. They played the whole game. A better analogy might be a high school kid racing barefoot. It's illegal, but doesn't significantly change the outcome of the race.

You can sugar coat it all you want --"Illegal." It's Cheating. A high school kid racing barefoot is obvious to everyone else. You can see the lack of shoes. This was underhanded, hidden, and done in the hope that no one would discover it.

Brush it under the rug all you want. The Pats and Brady's reputations have taken a huge hit.

How am I sugar coating or brushing anything under a rug? The guy I responded to asked how deflating footballs was different from cutting a race course. I answered his question and gave him a better cheating analogy.

Next time, try reading all applicable posts before posting. Maybe then you won't seem so ignorant.

Hosemaster wrote:

logia2 wrote:

Agreed. With the caveat that they checked in with the xc spikes and switched to the sprint spikes before the race.

EXACTLY. It's not that they started out with underinflated footballs. The footballs were checked in as legal, THEN they were underinflated. That's the crux of this whole situation. Not that the balls were illegally soft, but because they became that way after being approved at legal pressure two hours prior. It's becoming obvious that this was done deliberately. It has nothing to do with how much of an advantage this gave Brady or whether it would have affected the outcome of the game. It's the underhanded nature of it that has everyone up in arms.

You are just as dumb as your partner down there. We do not know that the balls started out as legal. We know the officials checked them. In a lot of cases(as was reported by a former ball boy) they squeeze them, look for faults, and examine the laces. They don't check the psi on 24 footballs all the time, it is possible they didn't do it at all in this case.

Why wouldn't you wait until the facts of the investigation come out after the super bowl? Instead you run around like a chicken with your head cut off making accusations as if you know something that the NFL investigators don't just because it is convenient for you to be able to hate on something. Grow up peter pan

analogia wrote:

Grintz wrote:

1. You are excused. The poll cited was mentioned on Sportscenter this evening.

2. What's different about this? Seriously? The Pats didn't cut the course. They played the whole game. A better analogy might be a high school kid racing barefoot. It's illegal, but doesn't significantly change the outcome of the race.

No, the better running analogy is that we are all told that we will be racing 400 meters. We are all told that we can wear cross country spikes but not sprint spikes. Despite this someone wears sprint spikes. They beat us all by such a wide margin that we are all pretty sure they would have won no matter what spikes they wore.

So, next race is 800 meters, how many of us would wear sprint spikes now if there was no penalty imposed in the first race???

I think by now it has been confirmed that none of the so called deflated balls were used in the second half.

1st half score: 17-7

2nd half score: 45-7

supposedly cheating we have a 10 point lead, not cheating 28 zip.

Cheating is to break the rules to gain an unfair advantage, does it look like an unfair advantage to anyone here?

The better analogy here is this is:

this is a 400m run in 2 heats with cumulative times.

1st heat someone wears sprints spikes and wins by 3 secs. 2nd heat that same runner runs with cross country spikes (like everyone else) and wins again this time by 10 secs.

next race is 800m how many of us wants him to wear sprint spikes?

Even better, how many of us even want to try sprint spikes?

That's a lousy analogy. Why would anyone wear XC spikes for a 400m race?

No innocent man would have behaved the way Brady behaved then. If the equipment guys were innocent, they would have fully cooperated. If Brady were innocent, he would have held press conferences and gone on ESPN and news shows proclaiming his innocence. Obviously there is evidence that Yahoo News has not seen. Someone at N.F.L. whispered in Brady's ear that they had dirt on Brady. To keep it all quiet, Brady rolled over and took four game suspension. You are acting as if Brady were a low IQ teenager framed for a felony by dishonest detectives. You wish it happened that way. No innocent man would have behaved in the manner in which Brady behaved. There is a 1% chance that Brady was 100% innocent of inflated footballs but N.F.L. had dirt on Brady for something else so Brady took the punishment. Brady may have failed a drug test. Think!

right...1%

Are we really doing deflategate again?

Stupidest controversy ever. I can't stand the Patriots. I'd like Brady to disappear. I wish nothing but evil upon them. But good grief, football air pressure, really?

I don't know why they even have a standard. As long as it's a regulation football, let them have whatever pressure they want. Who cares? Does it have air in it? Yes? Okay, play ball.

Sheesh.

It is 17 or 18 degrees and snowing in greater Green Bay, WI area as I type. Bucs are in their hotel rooms saying, "WTF!" I know Rodgers is 1-3 in N.F.C. games but the entire Bucs team has gotten soft down there in southern FL. Packers win. Note: I am not a Packer fan.

no innocent man ... wrote:

It is 17 or 18 degrees and snowing in greater Green Bay, WI area as I type. Bucs are in their hotel rooms saying, "WTF!" I know Rodgers is 1-3 in N.F.C. games but the entire Bucs team has gotten soft down there in southern FL. Packers win. Note: I am not a Packer fan.

I am a Packers fan and I hope you're right, but I always wonder if the south team playing in the north is a big deal. Players for both teams are 23 year olds from the south, not sure being in the north for a little while gives the Packers players an advantage.