admission by Grigson:
Florio: "....
in light of G.M. Ryan Grigsons admission that the Colts alerted the NFL to concerns about deflation in the days before the AFC title game. "
http://profootballtalk.nbcsports.com/2015/02/22/league-not-saying-whether-investigation-includes-whether-colts-deflated-ball/
That's old news. Grigson admitted that a week or so ago.
The importance of this admission is that we now know the NFL leadership was alerted to a potential problem affecting the competitive balance of play in an AFC Champiosnhip Game, and here's the way they handled it:
1. They didn't solve the problem by simply alerting the Patriots that the balls were going to monitored closely throughout the game.
2. Apparently the balls were not measured adequately before the game. There is some question if they were all measured using a gauge. If they were, the measurement results were not documented.
3. They allowed an NFL official who had a "pattern of behavior" of stealing game balls to be on the Patriots sideline.
4. The NFL Official proceeds to do exactly what the NFL was wary of, and steals a game ball during the game from the Patriots. When the Official knows he's in trouble, he tries to get Patriots Equipment Manager John McNally to introduce a non-approved K-ball into the game. The referee sees this as the Pats trying to play games and calls Mike Kensil from the NFL, who has been lying in wait for such an act by the Pats based on Grigson's warning.
5. Kensil himself apparently measures all the game balls at halftime. This is a direct violation of the Rulebook that says only game officials are allowed to handle balls from an approval and measurement standpoint.
6. Kensil apparently doesn't document the results of the halftime measurements.
7. After the game the leaks start coming out and the Patriots are put at a MAJOR disadvantage in the weeks leading up the Super Bowl. The initial leak to Chris Mortensen is that 11 of the 12 Patriot balls were significantly under inflated. This report goes unchallenged for a whole week, leading to the public perception that the Pats certainly deflated the balls.
8. A full week later it is reported that Mort's report was incorrect - that only one ball was significantly under inflated and that was the ball intercepted and handled by the Colts. Every other Pats ball was either at 12.5 of just a few ticks below it - which would not only be explainable by science, but predicted by it.
9. Almost a full 4 weeks into the story, when the tide of public opinion beings turning in the Patriots' favor, Kelly Naqi from ESPN's Outside the Lines reports that Pats Equipment Manager John McNally tried to introduce an unapproved k-ball into the game. In another nice touch of classy reporting, Kelly tries to interview McNally at his home in New Hampshire. He politely tells her her can't comment on the NFL investigation (as mandated not by the Patriots, but by the ####### Wells Commission running the investigation) and Kelly reports this in her story with slanted wording implying that McNally was being uncooperative and dodgy.
10. Kelly is thoroughly embarrassed on the OTL TV segment where she and Bob Lee are discussing her investigative reporting when Schefter comes on and drops the bomb that the only reason McNally was introducing the unapproved k-ball was at the request of an NFL league official who was stealing game balls on the Patriots sidelines! She did 4 weeks of reporting, with a clear agenda and bias, and her story was completely blown up literally hours after it was released by a fellow ESPN employee!! You can't make this #### up.
11. Back to Kelly and the sources for her bogus story that did nothing but once again obfuscate the truth and cast a negative, guilt-assuming light on the Patriots. A Patriot's fan does some internet sleuthing of his own and finds out that Naqi's husband used to work with, and is apparently still friendly with, get this - Mike Kensil. So it's pretty clear where the McNally story came from. For Kensil to leak that abridged version of the McNally story is unconscionable, and in my opinion not only enough for him to be fired over, but also potentially sued over. Kensil knew full well only a few days after the investigation that McNally was innocent. How do we know this? Because that's when the crooked official stealing footballs was fired by him!
CONCLUSION - the NFL set up a sting operation based on some unsubstantiated complaints it received from the Colts. The Colts concerns were probably brought to life by the Ravens and Harbaugh the prior week when they apparently were concerned about k balls feeling a little soft. The NFL assumed the Pats were guilty from the start, and laid in wait with a trap designed to catch them in the act. They did this knowing that in order to catch the Pats they would have to allow the fairness of an AFC Championship game to be compromised. Bottom line, Kensil had such a hard-on to nail the Pats that he gladly risked blowing up the legitimacy of the two most important games of the NFL season. Fireable offense #1. The sting itself was poorly executed with no measurements documented. Fireable offense #2. Kensil circumvented the NFL Rulebook and measured the balls himself at half time. Fireable offense #3. Lastly, and the worst offense in my opinion, is that Kensil provided directly, or allowed to occur, a series of leaks that were in many cases not true - all of which contained damning information against the Patriots. Fireable offense #4.
One caveat here - this is all based on reporting that we all know sucks beyond belief. Some of the above could be disproven when the report comes out. We'll have to wait and see. I have had an open mind on this issue from the beginning, and I still do. It is possible that that the Pats deflated some footballs. But based on my following of the story the last few weeks, I thinki it's much more likely that the Pats didn't deflate balls at all, and that they were totally screwed in this process. We shall see. Once thing's for sure, if the report is damning to the Pats it will be released during prime media time. If the report is supportive of the Pats, it will be released on a Friday afternoon or weekend when media attention is at its low point.
s
). This retired ref was adamant that the pats were acting nefariously.
, I read his comments when they were made, and I didn't think he said "innocent." So, I checked, and while he basically (in his opinion) excused the Pats from any guilt, he didn't use that word.
