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New England Patriots caught deflating game balls


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ProFootballTalk @ProFootballTalk 23m23 minutes ago

Troy Aikman: Patriots punishment should exceed Saints bounty punishment http://wp.me/p14QSB-9GZP

 

"This whole comment by Roger Goodell based on the Saints when Sean Payton got suspended for the year, and he says ‘ignorance is no excuse,’ that’s going to come back to haunt him again,” Aikman said, via the Dallas Morning News. “That haunted him during the whole Ray Rice situation with he, himself, and now it’s going to haunt Roger Goodell in terms of what the punishment is for the New England Patriots and Bill Belichick. If ignorance is no excuse, and it wasn’t for Sean Payton. …[The Saints] did not give themselves a competitive advantage. Now twice, under Bill Belichick and possibly a third time, they’ve cheated and given themselves an advantage. To me, the punishment for the Patriots and/or Bill Belichick has to be more severe than what the punishment was for the New Orleans Saints.”

That is horses**t -- utter, unadulterated, horses**t. Paying bounties helped cripple Bret Favre, which directly led to the Saints defeating the Vikings and going to the SB. Aikman is not a bright guy.

 

The bounty scandal is the worst thing that has ever happened in league history, in my opinion -- it combined cheating, bribery, salary cap evasion, and--worst--criminal assault.

Edited by dave mcbride
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A friend of mine from Boston lives down south now with his family. He relayed to me that his 10 yr old daughter came down wearing her Patriots jersey to school today. He said its the first time ever he made her take it off. He's a huge Pats fan and even he is disgusted at the team for these allegations. Says even if the Pats win the SB no one will take them seriously anyway so there's no point.... I *almost* felt bad for him.

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That is horses**t -- utter, unadulterated, horses**t. Paying bounties helped cripple Bret Favre, which directly led to the Saints defeating the Vikings and going to the SB. Aikman is not a bright guy.

 

The bounty scandal is the worst thing that has ever happened in league history, in my opinion -- it combined cheating, bribery, salary cap evasion, and--worst--criminal assault.

 

I actually disagree with Aikman on that point; hurting the opposing teams QB/orotherbestplayer has honestly been part of the game along time. Knock them out of the game, you have a better chance of winning; it definitely gives everyone an advantage who has ever done that...

 

The rest of it though; he has all good points on.

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Here is an interesting quote from Goodell from article on SI.com today (speaking in 2008): “Too often competitive violations have gone unpunished because conclusive proof of the violation was lacking,” Goodell wrote. “I believe we should reconsider the standard of proof to be applied in such cases, and make it easier for a competitive violation to be established.”

 

kj

 

Just bringing this back around from earlier this afternoon. Goodell said at one point he didn't need to clear a particularly high bar in terms of evidence. Let's hope there is an effort to hold him to this. (I also said earlier that the league shouldn't focus on establishing the guilt of/punishing an individual, but should hold the organization accountable. Who cares if they can't pin it directly on Belicheck?)

 

kj

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Really interesting tweet on Jeremy White's timeline. New Englands ball security since 2010 is nearly off the charts as compared to the rest of the league.

 

https://twitter.com/JeremyWGR/status/558360264228474880

 

That's not a very good chart. Not horrible, just...imperfect. Axes chosen to make the magnitude of the discrepancy look worse than it is, the measurement (plays per fumble) chosen resembles an exponential curve in nature while the raw data (fumbles) looks linear.

 

A better measure would be to do that analysis on a year-by-year basis, for each and all teams. 95% of the teams should fall within 2 standard deviations of the average value. If the Patriots are consistently outside of two standard deviations, that's compelling evidence they're cheating.

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I actually disagree with Aikman on that point; hurting the opposing teams QB/orotherbestplayer has honestly been part of the game along time. Knock them out of the game, you have a better chance of winning; it definitely gives everyone an advantage who has ever done that...

 

The rest of it though; he has all good points on.

I don't mean to be disagreeable, but this is utter crap. They paid players off the books to INJURE other players and force them out of the game. They paid Anthony Hargrove a bounty to knock Favre out of the game, and while he couldn't quite do it because Favre was legendarily tough with regard to injuries, he basically made Favre a cripple for the rest of the game. It is the only reason they beat Minnesota. It is in my opinion the worst scandal in modern sports history. Again, they were trying to INJURE players -- i.e., screw up their livelihoods.

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Really interesting tweet on Jeremy White's timeline. New Englands ball security since 2010 is nearly off the charts as compared to the rest of the league.

 

https://twitter.com/JeremyWGR/status/558360264228474880

 

 

BenJarvis Green-Ellis fumble stats:

 

2008 NE: 0

2009 NE: 0

2010 NE: 0

2011 NE: 0

2012 CIN: 3

2013 CIN: 2

 

 

Weird.

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If it has taken

 

 

 

BenJarvis Green-Ellis fumble stats:

2008 NE: 0
2009 NE: 0
2010 NE: 0
2011 NE: 0
2012 CIN: 3
2013 CIN: 2


Weird.

 

If it has taken the officials that long to determine that the balls were deflated EVERY game for 6 years, then the entire officiating department should be fired.

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I don't mean to be disagreeable, but this is utter crap. They paid players off the books to INJURE other players and force them out of the game. They paid Anthony Hargrove a bounty to knock Favre out of the game, and while he couldn't quite do it because Favre was legendarily tough with regard to injuries, he basically made Favre a cripple for the rest of the game. It is the only reason they beat Minnesota. It is in my opinion the worst scandal in modern sports history. Again, they were trying to INJURE players -- i.e., screw up their livelihoods.

What if the Saints someone stole the other teams play, then blitzed when they KNEW they would get to the QB, and that hit injured the QB?

 

Because thats what the Pats have been doing since Belicheater took over the team.

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I think this is one player (Brady) breaking the rules, just like when a player takes PED's. It's his first offense, and he should be given the same kind of suspension.

 

There is no reason to believe that Belichick had anything to do with the balls.

 

The fact that Brady MAY have done this in past games is as irrelevant as if you might have driven drunk in the past, but have only now been caught.

 

No one wants to hear this narrative though, because it's much more gratifying to bitter fans to assume that the entire team conspired to cheat. Where are the bitter EX-Patriots, ready to throw Belichick under the bus. Surely there is a former disgruntled employee, now out of the game, that would know about this, right?

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What if the Saints someone stole the other teams play, then blitzed when they KNEW they would get to the QB, and that hit injured the QB?

 

Because thats what the Pats have been doing since Belicheater took over the team.

I'm not justifying what the Pats did. What I'm saying that there has never been anything worse than the criminal enterprise that Gregg Williams oversaw in modern sports history.

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