Patriots being investigated after Colts game (3 Viewers)

[moleculo]

Can't find the original, but it has spread to a couple outlets.

Was posted on reddit a few days ago.

"The problem that they address in many places in this report is how to approximate conditions on the field, conditions in the locker room, and so forth all the various things that you don't know exactly," Syphers said. "(With) humidity of the rooms, they took a variation of parameters and temperature in a humidity-controlled environment and looked at that, and that was great. It's exactly what they should have done. The one place where they didn't do that was a wet football. They just used one technique."

If he were grading the Wells report like one of his students' papers, however, Syphers says it would have to be an incomplete.

"I would grade everything else they did there are little pieces they did of the sciences, and most of them I would give an A," Syphers said. "(The way they tested the wet footballs) I would give a D to, and because it's such a lynchpin for the final conclusion, rather than grade the whole thing, I would send them back and say, 'No, you've got to do this right. This is wrong.'

"If this were a professional paper being submitted to a journal, as a reviewer, I would tell them, 'You did not do this part correctly and it cannot be published until you address these concerns and do that right.'"

Now we patiently wait for the people to point out that hes a Pats fan and dismiss actual science.

So, Syphers test was rolling a football in a pan of water, with no effort to towel it off.

Exponent, on the other hand, sprayed the balls with water and then toweled them off.

I don't know about you guys, but I've seen ball-boys toweling off footballs when it's raining. I also didn't see any puddles in Foxborough.

Further, from the Exponent report (pg 48),

Ball condition (wet and dry): according to information by Paul, Weiss, the ballboys

from each team left several balls (up to four) in their respective ball bags during the first

half. Ostensibly, these footballs remained dry. Although rain was observed in the first half,

information provided by Paul, Weiss indicates that the ballboys kept the balls relatively dry.

Clete Blakeman recalled that though some, but not all, of the balls were moist at halftime;

none were waterlogged.

Which do you think more accurately depicts pouring rain in cold weather, spritzing a ball every fifteen minutes or rolling it in a pan of water?

Obviously neither are perfect.

well, the balls aren't left out in the pouring rain, are they? They are exposed to the conditions for a few plays, are swapped out, and toweled off.

I don't see a problem with spritzing, personally. If I were running an experiment to simulate game conditions, that's what I would do.

 

[12punch]

Also, Florio pointed out that the ref said the Logo gauge was used to check pre-game?

btw, not that this is the place for it, but I saw a reference to a particular passage that was pretty entertaining, in case any of you pats fans missed it.

the latest gem:

Although Anderson's best recollection is that he used the Logo Gauge,
he said that it is certainly possible that he used the Non Logo Gauge
.....
We credit Anderson‟s recollection of the pre-game measurements taken on the dayof the AFC Championship Game based on both the level of confidence Anderson expressed in his recollection and the consistency of his recollection with information
provided by each of the Patriot s and Colts regarding their target inflation levels
......
As noted above, we also believe that Walt Anderson most likely used the Non Logo Gauge prior to the game

 

[Stealthycat]

just thank goodness it was caught, so Tom could throw properly inflated balls in the second half and the Super Bowl - where he preformed BETTER than with slightly under pressure balls (first half of the AFC game)

right ?

Tom cheated and he performed WORSE for doing it ... makes a lot of sense boys and girls

 

[12punch]

Hmmm, if ball bag was mesh, then the balls would start warming up pretty soon after they were brought into the building. But if the ball bag was a regular bag, wouldn't there be some air buffer to slow down the warming while it was being lugged to the locker room?

Also, Florio pointed out that the ref said the Logo gauge was used to check pre-game?

Here's the skinny on the gauges:

they both appear to be repeatable and accurate, with the caveat that the logo gauge consistently measured 0.3-0.4 psi higher. When compared to a calibrated master gauge, the no-logo gauge was almost exactly accurate while the logo gauge was high.

The Patriots staff said they aim for balls at 12.5 psi, and the colts said they submit at 13.0. As that's the pressures measured by the officials, one can surmise that the official used the more accurate gauge - that is, the no-logo gauge.

finally some useful information after 170 pages

that would make me wonder why he'd be using that logo gauge at all

second bolded is

you had your moment in the sun, though

 

[Tango]

just thank goodness it was caught, so Tom could throw properly inflated balls in the second half and the Super Bowl - where he preformed BETTER than with slightly under pressure balls (first half of the AFC game)

right ?

Tom cheated and he performed WORSE for doing it ... makes a lot of sense boys and girls

This argument expired in January.Brady chose the wrong path. He denied and fought instead of giving a cleverly worded half-apology that would have stunted the entire issue. He dug in, committed additional silly violations along the way. What an idiotic thing to do...but that's what he did.

Suspension plus massive fine: at least the 7 figure cost of this stupid, unnecessary Investigstion that Brady should have prevented.

 

[PatsWillWin]

Hmmm, if ball bag was mesh, then the balls would start warming up pretty soon after they were brought into the building. But if the ball bag was a regular bag, wouldn't there be some air buffer to slow down the warming while it was being lugged to the locker room?

Also, Florio pointed out that the ref said the Logo gauge was used to check pre-game?

Here's the skinny on the gauges:

they both appear to be repeatable and accurate, with the caveat that the logo gauge consistently measured 0.3-0.4 psi higher. When compared to a calibrated master gauge, the no-logo gauge was almost exactly accurate while the logo gauge was high.

The Patriots staff said they aim for balls at 12.5 psi, and the colts said they submit at 13.0. As that's the pressures measured by the officials, one can surmise that the official used the more accurate gauge - that is, the no-logo gauge.

I lost you on this part. Since we're delving into the minutiae here, can you unpack?

 

[12punch]

Suspension plus massive fine: at least the 7 figure cost of this stupid, unnecessary Investigstion that Brady should have prevented.

yeah, this stupid, unnecessary waste of money is all brady's fault

 

[12punch]

Hmmm, if ball bag was mesh, then the balls would start warming up pretty soon after they were brought into the building. But if the ball bag was a regular bag, wouldn't there be some air buffer to slow down the warming while it was being lugged to the locker room?

Also, Florio pointed out that the ref said the Logo gauge was used to check pre-game?

Here's the skinny on the gauges:

they both appear to be repeatable and accurate, with the caveat that the logo gauge consistently measured 0.3-0.4 psi higher. When compared to a calibrated master gauge, the no-logo gauge was almost exactly accurate while the logo gauge was high.

The Patriots staff said they aim for balls at 12.5 psi, and the colts said they submit at 13.0. As that's the pressures measured by the officials, one can surmise that the official used the more accurate gauge - that is, the no-logo gauge.

I lost you on this part. Since we're delving into the minutiae here, can you unpack?

we assume the non-logo gauge because that makes the numbers look just a tiny smidge worse and we need every bit we can scrounge to push this in a certain direction.

if we assume the logo gauge, as anderson said he used, there's virtually nothing to even investigate, not that an extra half pound meant much, anyway.

 

[12punch]

Scott Fujita ‏@sfujita55 2h2 hours ago

Finally read Wells Report. Yawn. Barring any new developments, I've yet to see anything that warrants discipline. Chill w/ the hyperbole.

 

[moleculo]

Hmmm, if ball bag was mesh, then the balls would start warming up pretty soon after they were brought into the building. But if the ball bag was a regular bag, wouldn't there be some air buffer to slow down the warming while it was being lugged to the locker room?

Also, Florio pointed out that the ref said the Logo gauge was used to check pre-game?

Here's the skinny on the gauges:

they both appear to be repeatable and accurate, with the caveat that the logo gauge consistently measured 0.3-0.4 psi higher. When compared to a calibrated master gauge, the no-logo gauge was almost exactly accurate while the logo gauge was high.

The Patriots staff said they aim for balls at 12.5 psi, and the colts said they submit at 13.0. As that's the pressures measured by the officials, one can surmise that the official used the more accurate gauge - that is, the no-logo gauge.

I lost you on this part. Since we're delving into the minutiae here, can you unpack?

sure.

if the Patriots say they inflate the balls to 12.5, and using my gauge I measure the balls to be 12.5 and not 12.9, I can say the Patriots and my gauge are in agreement.

If the Colts say they inflate the balls to 13.0, and using my gauge I measure the balls to be 13.0 and not 13.4, I can say the Colts and my gauge are in agreement.

So, we can say the gauge used to measure the balls was in agreement with both the Colts and the Patriots team gauges.

Now - if the ref used the no-logo gauge, everything makes sense - everyones gauges are good and accurate.

If the ref used the logo gauge, that means that New England and Indy's gauges were both off by almost exactly 0.4 psi. This seems unlikely.

Again - I don't necessarily sign off on this reasoning. This is the arguement in the Wells report, and there's a few too many "ifs" here for my liking. According to the Exponent report however, it doesn't really matter anyways:

although the relative “explainability” of the results from Game Day are dependent on which gauge was used by Walt Anderson prior to the game, given the most likely timing of events during halftime, the Patriots halftime measurements do not appear to be explained by the environmental factors tested, regardless of the gauge used.

 

[The Duff Man]

This dude was blessed at birth or something.

His skills start to fade so he cheats....a culture inspired by his coach.

His probable punishment? Time at home with his super model wife so he is refreshed for the playoffs.

Unreal...

 

[GregR]

Can't find the original, but it has spread to a couple outlets.

Was posted on reddit a few days ago.

"The problem that they address in many places in this report is how to approximate conditions on the field, conditions in the locker room, and so forth all the various things that you don't know exactly," Syphers said. "(With) humidity of the rooms, they took a variation of parameters and temperature in a humidity-controlled environment and looked at that, and that was great. It's exactly what they should have done. The one place where they didn't do that was a wet football. They just used one technique."

If he were grading the Wells report like one of his students' papers, however, Syphers says it would have to be an incomplete.

"I would grade everything else they did there are little pieces they did of the sciences, and most of them I would give an A," Syphers said. "(The way they tested the wet footballs) I would give a D to, and because it's such a lynchpin for the final conclusion, rather than grade the whole thing, I would send them back and say, 'No, you've got to do this right. This is wrong.'

"If this were a professional paper being submitted to a journal, as a reviewer, I would tell them, 'You did not do this part correctly and it cannot be published until you address these concerns and do that right.'"

Now we patiently wait for the people to point out that hes a Pats fan and dismiss actual science.

So, Syphers test was rolling a football in a pan of water, with no effort to towel it off.

Exponent, on the other hand, sprayed the balls with water and then toweled them off.

I don't know about you guys, but I've seen ball-boys toweling off footballs when it's raining. I also didn't see any puddles in Foxborough.

Further, from the Exponent report (pg 48),

Ball condition (wet and dry): according to information by Paul, Weiss, the ballboys

from each team left several balls (up to four) in their respective ball bags during the first

half. Ostensibly, these footballs remained dry. Although rain was observed in the first half,

information provided by Paul, Weiss indicates that the ballboys kept the balls relatively dry.

Clete Blakeman recalled that though some, but not all, of the balls were moist at halftime;

none were waterlogged.

Which do you think more accurately depicts pouring rain in cold weather, spritzing a ball every fifteen minutes or rolling it in a pan of water?

Obviously neither are perfect.

You got me curious so I just pulled up the NFL Game Rewind of the game. At the start of the 1st half whenever they show an angle with the black outside of the stadium or in the night sky, it's easy to see the rain.

End of the 2nd half I can't see any rain in those shots. Definitely not "pouring rain". People without hats like Pagano have hair that looks completely dry. Gostkowski kicks a FG right near the end of the half resulting in the kind of shot the rain was easily visible earlier, and I can't see any rain at all.

So I'd say a spritz is probably appropriate. Probably made the balls more wet than actually would have been the case at the game.

 

[H8fulHuck]

WWBD?

Tom: Would you care if another NFL team cheated and it may have cost the Patriots a chance to win the Super Bowl?

In your mind, what would be fair punishment to an NFL player who intentionally cheated, bribed others to break the rules, and was not remorseful when caught?

 

[BustedKnuckles]

Hmmm, if ball bag was mesh, then the balls would start warming up pretty soon after they were brought into the building. But if the ball bag was a regular bag, wouldn't there be some air buffer to slow down the warming while it was being lugged to the locker room?

Also, Florio pointed out that the ref said the Logo gauge was used to check pre-game?

Here's the skinny on the gauges:

they both appear to be repeatable and accurate, with the caveat that the logo gauge consistently measured 0.3-0.4 psi higher. When compared to a calibrated master gauge, the no-logo gauge was almost exactly accurate while the logo gauge was high.

The Patriots staff said they aim for balls at 12.5 psi, and the colts said they submit at 13.0. As that's the pressures measured by the officials, one can surmise that the official used the more accurate gauge - that is, the no-logo gauge.

I lost you on this part. Since we're delving into the minutiae here, can you unpack?

sure.

if the Patriots say they inflate the balls to 12.5, and using my gauge I measure the balls to be 12.5 and not 12.9, I can say the Patriots and my gauge are in agreement.

If the Colts say they inflate the balls to 13.0, and using my gauge I measure the balls to be 13.0 and not 13.4, I can say the Colts and my gauge are in agreement.

So, we can say the gauge used to measure the balls was in agreement with both the Colts and the Patriots team gauges.

Now - if the ref used the no-logo gauge, everything makes sense - everyones gauges are good and accurate.

If the ref used the logo gauge, that means that New England and Indy's gauges were both off by almost exactly 0.4 psi. This seems unlikely.

Again - I don't necessarily sign off on this reasoning. This is the arguement in the Wells report, and there's a few too many "ifs" here for my liking. According to the Exponent report however, it doesn't really matter anyways:

although the relative “explainability” of the results from Game Day are dependent on which gauge was used by Walt Anderson prior to the game, given the most likely timing of events during halftime, the Patriots halftime measurements do not appear to be explained by the environmental factors tested, regardless of the gauge used.

Wells Report: More Probable Than Not Colts Played With Under-Inflated FootballsCold, Hard Football Facts


inShare3




We agree with the Wells Report on DeflateGate commissioned by the NFL after the AFC title game between the Colts and Patriots: it's "more probable than not" that Tom Brady was aware of inappropriate handling of Patriots footballs. If guilty, he should be punished.

Regardless, here's the story you don't hear: officials found both at halftime and after the AFC title clash that, to steal a weak phrase, "it's more more probable than not" that the Colts played the entire game with under-inflated footballs.

That's not OUR interpretation. Those findings of likely under-inflation are straight from the report.

 

[12punch]

Brady TD passes since 2006:

Home: 131 in 65 games.

Road: 138 in 64 games.

salty trolls be trollin'

 

[cstu]

Brady TD passes since 2006:

Home: 131 in 65 games.

Road: 138 in 64 games.

salty trolls be trollin'

Air pressure in Brady's balls since 2006:

Home: 10.6 in 65 games.

Road: 10.5 in 64 games.

 

[Stealthycat]

Suspension plus massive fine: at least the 7 figure cost of this stupid, unnecessary Investigstion that Brady should have prevented

less than 1# of ball pressure warrants the above? seriously?

nobody in their right mind could come to that conclusion

now, the text messages are confusing ... they talk about blowing balls up in pressure to piss Tom off .... indicating Tom like a lower pressured ball, but then Aaron Rodgers has come out saying he like higher inflated balls, so that's a non-argument

 

[AB in DC]

Florio nails it. Probably the best, most even-handed summary of the investigation that I've ever seen.

http://profootballtalk.nbcsports.com/2015/05/10/is-football-inflation-a-big-deal-its-too-late-for-the-nfl-to-say-it-isnt/

Inflation of the football within the proper range is a big deal because the NFL made it a big deal, from the moment two grossly conflicting pressure gauges were inserted into 11 Patriots footballs at halftime of the playoff game against the Colts. The problem is that it wasn’t a big deal before that very moment — even though the NFL knew before the game started that the Colts suspected that the Patriots were deflating footballs.Check out the video at the top of this item from Peter King of TheMMQB.com regarding the manner in which the officials check football pressure. It’s clear that, as of 2013, the precise amount of air inside a football was anything but a big deal.

“12.5, that’s close enough,” one official says after cramming the gauge into the ball, pulling it out, and tossing it to another official. In another portion of that same video, an official is alarmed by the amount of air hissing out of the ball before adjusting the valve on the gauge, popping it in again, and then flipping it to someone else, presumably because it was “close enough.”

The rigorous (and flawed) scientific analysis of the measurements taken of the AFC title game footballs at halftime presumes a degree of care and certainty that didn’t previously exist. Sure, Rule 2 requires the football to contain a urethane bladder inflated to 12.5 to 13.5 pounds per square inch. But the rule never has been interpreted as imposing a duty on the referee to periodically ensure that the football remains within that range. However, as the Ideal Gas Law demonstrates (based on the Wells report), a wet, 48-degree day in January results in the footballs being anywhere from 0.98 to 1.18 PSI below the minimum at halftime.

How low would the pressure have been in the fourth quarter? In overtime? In double overtime?

How much air pressure remained in the football when Bart Starr scored from the one in the final minute of the Ice Bowl?

Then there’s the chain of custody, or lack thereof, that applies to the handling of the footballs. In the AFC title game, referee Walt Anderson lost the footballs for the first time in his 19 years as an official, but he neither took the balls back inside for re-inflation (if needed) nor used the alternate footballs, which hadn’t been lost.

“[T]he balls shall remain under the supervision of the Referee until they are delivered to the ball attendant just prior to the start of the game,” Rule 2 also states. That didn’t happen prior to the AFC title game, and that wasn’t a big deal. None of it was a big deal until Colts linebacker D’Qwell Jackson’s interception of a Tom Brady pass set in motion a chain of events that resulted in the footballs being checked and re-inflated at halftime — and that sparked an all-out investigation even though the numbers generated by one of the two pressure gauges ultimately didn’t suggest that anything was amiss.

The league officials presumably believed measurements reflecting numbers less than 12.5 PSI indicated a problem because, possibly, no one at the league office realized before this specific investigation began to unfold that air pressure drops significantly during the course of a game.

Early on, it should have become apparent that the numbers measured by the two grossly out-of-sync pressure gauges didn’t clearly demonstrate that something was amiss. (Instead, someone leaked to ESPN that something was amiss, with 10 of the 12 footballs reportedly a full 2.0 pounds under the minimum.) At that point, someone in the league office should have said that it’s impossible to suddenly make this a big deal when the existing culture of the league — for decades — entailed a high degree of nonchalance regarding the procedures and a low degree of understanding regarding the science. Maybe the Patriots were cheating, but the circumstantial evidence of it becomes far less persuasive when the overall circumstances can’t be clearly discerned.

The NFL, via Ted Wells, has nevertheless attempted to apply laboratory-level analysis to a kitchen-sink sausage-making process. It’s impossible to do that, as evidenced by the obvious flaws regarding the two gauges that were used to ensure that the footballs were at 12.5 PSI before kickoff.

Absent the text messages suggesting some sort of concerted effort to make footballs deemed perfect by Tom Brady even more perfect, there’s no way this investigation could have resulted in a finding of wrongdoing. Even with those text messages, the scientific evidence supports a possibility, not a probability, that tampering occurred on that specific day.

 

[Tango]

Suspension plus massive fine: at least the 7 figure cost of this stupid, unnecessary Investigstion that Brady should have prevented

less than 1# of ball pressure warrants the above? seriously?

nobody in their right mind could come to that conclusion

now, the text messages are confusing ... they talk about blowing balls up in pressure to piss Tom off .... indicating Tom like a lower pressured ball, but then Aaron Rodgers has come out saying he like higher inflated balls, so that's a non-argument

Suspension.

and.

fine.

coming.

 

[Tango]

Suspension plus massive fine: at least the 7 figure cost of this stupid, unnecessary Investigstion that Brady should have prevented.

yeah, this stupid, unnecessary waste of money is all brady's fault

"But what if Brady had said something like this, at the very beginning of something that was never supposed to be treated like the crime of the century:

“Listen, I put an awful lot of pressure on our equipment guys about how much, or little, air I like in our game balls. And if I’ve put so much pressure on them that they somehow took them down below the legal limit, whether I came right out and told them to or not, that’s on me, and I’ve got to wear it. They probably just got a little over-zealous about what they thought I wanted them to do. So that’s on me as much as it’s on them.”

At that point, the air — literally and figuratively — comes out of the whole thing. There is no Ted Wells investigation, there is no Ted Wells report."

 

[Tango]

Florio nails it. Probably the best, most even-handed summary of the investigation that I've ever seen.

http://profootballtalk.nbcsports.com/2015/05/10/is-football-inflation-a-big-deal-its-too-late-for-the-nfl-to-say-it-isnt/

Inflation of the football within the proper range is a big deal because the NFL made it a big deal, from the moment two grossly conflicting pressure gauges were inserted into 11 Patriots footballs at halftime of the playoff game against the Colts. The problem is that it wasn’t a big deal before that very moment — even though the NFL knew before the game started that the Colts suspected that the Patriots were deflating footballs.Check out the video at the top of this item from Peter King of TheMMQB.com regarding the manner in which the officials check football pressure. It’s clear that, as of 2013, the precise amount of air inside a football was anything but a big deal.

“12.5, that’s close enough,” one official says after cramming the gauge into the ball, pulling it out, and tossing it to another official. In another portion of that same video, an official is alarmed by the amount of air hissing out of the ball before adjusting the valve on the gauge, popping it in again, and then flipping it to someone else, presumably because it was “close enough.”

The rigorous (and flawed) scientific analysis of the measurements taken of the AFC title game footballs at halftime presumes a degree of care and certainty that didn’t previously exist. Sure, Rule 2 requires the football to contain a urethane bladder inflated to 12.5 to 13.5 pounds per square inch. But the rule never has been interpreted as imposing a duty on the referee to periodically ensure that the football remains within that range. However, as the Ideal Gas Law demonstrates (based on the Wells report), a wet, 48-degree day in January results in the footballs being anywhere from 0.98 to 1.18 PSI below the minimum at halftime.

How low would the pressure have been in the fourth quarter? In overtime? In double overtime?

How much air pressure remained in the football when Bart Starr scored from the one in the final minute of the Ice Bowl?

Then there’s the chain of custody, or lack thereof, that applies to the handling of the footballs. In the AFC title game, referee Walt Anderson lost the footballs for the first time in his 19 years as an official, but he neither took the balls back inside for re-inflation (if needed) nor used the alternate footballs, which hadn’t been lost.

“[T]he balls shall remain under the supervision of the Referee until they are delivered to the ball attendant just prior to the start of the game,” Rule 2 also states. That didn’t happen prior to the AFC title game, and that wasn’t a big deal. None of it was a big deal until Colts linebacker D’Qwell Jackson’s interception of a Tom Brady pass set in motion a chain of events that resulted in the footballs being checked and re-inflated at halftime — and that sparked an all-out investigation even though the numbers generated by one of the two pressure gauges ultimately didn’t suggest that anything was amiss.

The league officials presumably believed measurements reflecting numbers less than 12.5 PSI indicated a problem because, possibly, no one at the league office realized before this specific investigation began to unfold that air pressure drops significantly during the course of a game.

Early on, it should have become apparent that the numbers measured by the two grossly out-of-sync pressure gauges didn’t clearly demonstrate that something was amiss. (Instead, someone leaked to ESPN that something was amiss, with 10 of the 12 footballs reportedly a full 2.0 pounds under the minimum.) At that point, someone in the league office should have said that it’s impossible to suddenly make this a big deal when the existing culture of the league — for decades — entailed a high degree of nonchalance regarding the procedures and a low degree of understanding regarding the science. Maybe the Patriots were cheating, but the circumstantial evidence of it becomes far less persuasive when the overall circumstances can’t be clearly discerned.

The NFL, via Ted Wells, has nevertheless attempted to apply laboratory-level analysis to a kitchen-sink sausage-making process. It’s impossible to do that, as evidenced by the obvious flaws regarding the two gauges that were used to ensure that the footballs were at 12.5 PSI before kickoff.

Absent the text messages suggesting some sort of concerted effort to make footballs deemed perfect by Tom Brady even more perfect, there’s no way this investigation could have resulted in a finding of wrongdoing. Even with those text messages, the scientific evidence supports a possibility, not a probability, that tampering occurred on that specific day.

You forgot the last paragraph:

Tampering may have occurred on other days. And Tom Brady may be hiding evidence of tampering occurring on multiple occasions by refusing to turn over his text messages and emails. But it’s hard to conclude that tampering happened on January 18, 2015, in large part because the subject matter that became such a big deal the next day had never been one before the moment the needles on those two conflicting gauges were crammed into the 10 footballs.

 

[Tango]

Florio's articles have been top-notch, agree.

Those that want to put hands on eyes and ears and just ride the wave that the Brady story is a iron-clad case are put in their place by Florio repeatedly.

In summary, from Florio we have learned that:

(1) Too many weird things happened to think Brady is innocent, but hey...there's holes all over this report and no one should be running around saying the NFL nailed Brady.

(2) Brady will definitely be disciplined for lack of cooperation. No if, ands and buts. DONE DEAL. Brady will be disciplined for this b/c he clearly violated NFL rules

(3) Gostkowski will definitely be disciplined for lack of cooperation.

 

[Run It Up]

Florio is typically that local writer that actually hates his team, but his articles have been mostly positive towards NE post-wells report.

 

[Anarchy99]

Florio is typically that local writer that actually hates his team, but his articles have been mostly positive towards NE post-wells report.

He is on WEEI right now sounding like this is a serious infraction and sounded like suspension should be four games for the infraction and a case could be made for a lot more for not cooperating with the investigation.

 

[Jercules]

Florio nails it. Probably the best, most even-handed summary of the investigation that I've ever seen.

http://profootballtalk.nbcsports.com/2015/05/10/is-football-inflation-a-big-deal-its-too-late-for-the-nfl-to-say-it-isnt/

Inflation of the football within the proper range is a big deal because the NFL made it a big deal, from the moment two grossly conflicting pressure gauges were inserted into 11 Patriots footballs at halftime of the playoff game against the Colts. The problem is that it wasn’t a big deal before that very moment — even though the NFL knew before the game started that the Colts suspected that the Patriots were deflating footballs.Check out the video at the top of this item from Peter King of TheMMQB.com regarding the manner in which the officials check football pressure. It’s clear that, as of 2013, the precise amount of air inside a football was anything but a big deal.

“12.5, that’s close enough,” one official says after cramming the gauge into the ball, pulling it out, and tossing it to another official. In another portion of that same video, an official is alarmed by the amount of air hissing out of the ball before adjusting the valve on the gauge, popping it in again, and then flipping it to someone else, presumably because it was “close enough.”

The rigorous (and flawed) scientific analysis of the measurements taken of the AFC title game footballs at halftime presumes a degree of care and certainty that didn’t previously exist. Sure, Rule 2 requires the football to contain a urethane bladder inflated to 12.5 to 13.5 pounds per square inch. But the rule never has been interpreted as imposing a duty on the referee to periodically ensure that the football remains within that range. However, as the Ideal Gas Law demonstrates (based on the Wells report), a wet, 48-degree day in January results in the footballs being anywhere from 0.98 to 1.18 PSI below the minimum at halftime.

How low would the pressure have been in the fourth quarter? In overtime? In double overtime?

How much air pressure remained in the football when Bart Starr scored from the one in the final minute of the Ice Bowl?

Then there’s the chain of custody, or lack thereof, that applies to the handling of the footballs. In the AFC title game, referee Walt Anderson lost the footballs for the first time in his 19 years as an official, but he neither took the balls back inside for re-inflation (if needed) nor used the alternate footballs, which hadn’t been lost.

“[T]he balls shall remain under the supervision of the Referee until they are delivered to the ball attendant just prior to the start of the game,” Rule 2 also states. That didn’t happen prior to the AFC title game, and that wasn’t a big deal. None of it was a big deal until Colts linebacker D’Qwell Jackson’s interception of a Tom Brady pass set in motion a chain of events that resulted in the footballs being checked and re-inflated at halftime — and that sparked an all-out investigation even though the numbers generated by one of the two pressure gauges ultimately didn’t suggest that anything was amiss.

The league officials presumably believed measurements reflecting numbers less than 12.5 PSI indicated a problem because, possibly, no one at the league office realized before this specific investigation began to unfold that air pressure drops significantly during the course of a game.

Early on, it should have become apparent that the numbers measured by the two grossly out-of-sync pressure gauges didn’t clearly demonstrate that something was amiss. (Instead, someone leaked to ESPN that something was amiss, with 10 of the 12 footballs reportedly a full 2.0 pounds under the minimum.) At that point, someone in the league office should have said that it’s impossible to suddenly make this a big deal when the existing culture of the league — for decades — entailed a high degree of nonchalance regarding the procedures and a low degree of understanding regarding the science. Maybe the Patriots were cheating, but the circumstantial evidence of it becomes far less persuasive when the overall circumstances can’t be clearly discerned.

The NFL, via Ted Wells, has nevertheless attempted to apply laboratory-level analysis to a kitchen-sink sausage-making process. It’s impossible to do that, as evidenced by the obvious flaws regarding the two gauges that were used to ensure that the footballs were at 12.5 PSI before kickoff.

Absent the text messages suggesting some sort of concerted effort to make footballs deemed perfect by Tom Brady even more perfect, there’s no way this investigation could have resulted in a finding of wrongdoing. Even with those text messages, the scientific evidence supports a possibility, not a probability, that tampering occurred on that specific day.

Two big points to put this all in context.

One is that 'cheating' is fairly commonplace in the NFL, and the Patriots aren't necessarily even the worst offenders (yourteamcheats.com ... for those of you desperate to put asterisks on Super Bowls, I'd turn you to the early-90's 49ers and late-90's Broncos).

Two is what Florio describes here. The officials did not take the testing and preservation of balls seriously.

Different gauges with different readings, some provided by the team, some personal; some refs do it themselves, others delegate, nobody records any readings.

The locker room attendant is never supposed to take the game balls himself to the field... only he does, fairly often, according to the testimony of the security people (Wells mentions this, then forgets it in his conclusion).

Of course, who even cares about that, since, as various officials testify, if any team employees are going to tamper with balls they'd do it in the 15-20 minute period when the officials take the field for their pregame, and leave the balls unattended in their effectively public locker room!

And then the October Jets game, when Brady complained about 'brick' footballs and was right: The officials, in the pregame, had inflated at least one of them to 16 psi!

We're not exactly talking about the crown jewels here.

None of that is to say Brady wasn't cheating, didn't try to cover it up, and doesn't deserve his inevitable suspension. It is to say that this is all past ridiculous, even a little loony, and any fears/hopes that fans/haters have about this 'tarnishing the New England legacy' are totally unwarranted.

 

[Baloney Sandwich]

From Peter King this morning:

6. Officials used two gauges at halftime of the AFC Championship Game to measure the air pressure in 11 New England footballs and four Indianapolis footballs. On page 113 of the Wells report, after a description of the scientific Ideal Gas Law (eyes glaze over), Wells says the Patriots footballs should have measured between 11.32 psi and 11.52 psi. The average of one gauge for the 11 balls was 11.49 psi, on the upper range of what the balls should measure. The average of the other gauge was 11.11 psi, clearly lower than what the balls should have measured. Average all 22 readings, and you get 11.30 … two-one-hundredths lower what the Ideal Gas Law would have allowed for balls that started the day at 12.5 psi.

I think we should probably dismiss the arguments from both extremes, the Pats backers claiming Brady is innocent and those on this board claiming that there was a competitve advantage to have a lower psi (unless you want to argue that .002 psi makes a difference). The NFL certainly didn't think it was a competitive advantage because if they did they would have switched out the balls after they went missing since they had been warned ahead of time to the Pats manipulating the balls. In fact, they brought out the back up balls to the field but didn't use them once they found out the balls were with the Deflator. As a Pats fan, I'm fine with the NFL coming down on Brady and the Pats for breaking an equipment rule and not fully cooperating with the league investigation but lets admit the actual infraction is more of a misdemeanor than a felony. Regardless, still breaking the rules and they will be held accountable.

 

[Bayhawks]

Florio nails it. Probably the best, most even-handed summary of the investigation that I've ever seen.

http://profootballtalk.nbcsports.com/2015/05/10/is-football-inflation-a-big-deal-its-too-late-for-the-nfl-to-say-it-isnt/

Inflation of the football within the proper range is a big deal because the NFL made it a big deal, from the moment two grossly conflicting pressure gauges were inserted into 11 Patriots footballs at halftime of the playoff game against the Colts. The problem is that it wasn’t a big deal before that very moment — even though the NFL knew before the game started that the Colts suspected that the Patriots were deflating footballs.Check out the video at the top of this item from Peter King of TheMMQB.com regarding the manner in which the officials check football pressure. It’s clear that, as of 2013, the precise amount of air inside a football was anything but a big deal.

“12.5, that’s close enough,” one official says after cramming the gauge into the ball, pulling it out, and tossing it to another official. In another portion of that same video, an official is alarmed by the amount of air hissing out of the ball before adjusting the valve on the gauge, popping it in again, and then flipping it to someone else, presumably because it was “close enough.”

The rigorous (and flawed) scientific analysis of the measurements taken of the AFC title game footballs at halftime presumes a degree of care and certainty that didn’t previously exist. Sure, Rule 2 requires the football to contain a urethane bladder inflated to 12.5 to 13.5 pounds per square inch. But the rule never has been interpreted as imposing a duty on the referee to periodically ensure that the football remains within that range. However, as the Ideal Gas Law demonstrates (based on the Wells report), a wet, 48-degree day in January results in the footballs being anywhere from 0.98 to 1.18 PSI below the minimum at halftime.

How low would the pressure have been in the fourth quarter? In overtime? In double overtime?

How much air pressure remained in the football when Bart Starr scored from the one in the final minute of the Ice Bowl?

Then there’s the chain of custody, or lack thereof, that applies to the handling of the footballs. In the AFC title game, referee Walt Anderson lost the footballs for the first time in his 19 years as an official, but he neither took the balls back inside for re-inflation (if needed) nor used the alternate footballs, which hadn’t been lost.

“[T]he balls shall remain under the supervision of the Referee until they are delivered to the ball attendant just prior to the start of the game,” Rule 2 also states. That didn’t happen prior to the AFC title game, and that wasn’t a big deal. None of it was a big deal until Colts linebacker D’Qwell Jackson’s interception of a Tom Brady pass set in motion a chain of events that resulted in the footballs being checked and re-inflated at halftime — and that sparked an all-out investigation even though the numbers generated by one of the two pressure gauges ultimately didn’t suggest that anything was amiss.

The league officials presumably believed measurements reflecting numbers less than 12.5 PSI indicated a problem because, possibly, no one at the league office realized before this specific investigation began to unfold that air pressure drops significantly during the course of a game.

Early on, it should have become apparent that the numbers measured by the two grossly out-of-sync pressure gauges didn’t clearly demonstrate that something was amiss. (Instead, someone leaked to ESPN that something was amiss, with 10 of the 12 footballs reportedly a full 2.0 pounds under the minimum.) At that point, someone in the league office should have said that it’s impossible to suddenly make this a big deal when the existing culture of the league — for decades — entailed a high degree of nonchalance regarding the procedures and a low degree of understanding regarding the science. Maybe the Patriots were cheating, but the circumstantial evidence of it becomes far less persuasive when the overall circumstances can’t be clearly discerned.

The NFL, via Ted Wells, has nevertheless attempted to apply laboratory-level analysis to a kitchen-sink sausage-making process. It’s impossible to do that, as evidenced by the obvious flaws regarding the two gauges that were used to ensure that the footballs were at 12.5 PSI before kickoff.

Absent the text messages suggesting some sort of concerted effort to make footballs deemed perfect by Tom Brady even more perfect, there’s no way this investigation could have resulted in a finding of wrongdoing. Even with those text messages, the scientific evidence supports a possibility, not a probability, that tampering occurred on that specific day.

You forgot the last paragraph:

Tampering may have occurred on other days. And Tom Brady may be hiding evidence of tampering occurring on multiple occasions by refusing to turn over his text messages and emails. But it’s hard to conclude that tampering happened on January 18, 2015, in large part because the subject matter that became such a big deal the next day had never been one before the moment the needles on those two conflicting gauges were crammed into the 10 footballs.

Yes, he "forgot." There's no way he would have left that paragraph out on purpose.

 

[tommyGunZ]

Ted Bruschi's credibilty is now completely gone: http://awfulannouncing.com/2015/ex-patriots-damien-woody-and-tedy-bruschi-argue-over-deflategate.html

 

[moleculo]

From Peter King this morning:

6. Officials used two gauges at halftime of the AFC Championship Game to measure the air pressure in 11 New England footballs and four Indianapolis footballs. On page 113 of the Wells report, after a description of the scientific Ideal Gas Law (eyes glaze over), Wells says the Patriots footballs should have measured between 11.32 psi and 11.52 psi. The average of one gauge for the 11 balls was 11.49 psi, on the upper range of what the balls should measure. The average of the other gauge was 11.11 psi, clearly lower than what the balls should have measured. Average all 22 readings, and you get 11.30 … two-one-hundredths lower what the Ideal Gas Law would have allowed for balls that started the day at 12.5 psi.

I think we should probably dismiss the arguments from both extremes, the Pats backers claiming Brady is innocent and those on this board claiming that there was a competitve advantage to have a lower psi (unless you want to argue that .002 psi makes a difference). The NFL certainly didn't think it was a competitive advantage because if they did they would have switched out the balls after they went missing since they had been warned ahead of time to the Pats manipulating the balls. In fact, they brought out the back up balls to the field but didn't use them once they found out the balls were with the Deflator. As a Pats fan, I'm fine with the NFL coming down on Brady and the Pats for breaking an equipment rule and not fully cooperating with the league investigation but lets admit the actual infraction is more of a misdemeanor than a felony. Regardless, still breaking the rules and they will be held accountable.

all application of ideal gas law is assuming that the temperature of the balls is the temperature of the field, and that's not so. The instant you bring them inside, they begin warming up.

I applaud sports journalists for learning about basic physics (even if their eyes gloss over), but they are all missing the key points here.

 

[Baloney Sandwich]

From Peter King this morning:

6. Officials used two gauges at halftime of the AFC Championship Game to measure the air pressure in 11 New England footballs and four Indianapolis footballs. On page 113 of the Wells report, after a description of the scientific Ideal Gas Law (eyes glaze over), Wells says the Patriots footballs should have measured between 11.32 psi and 11.52 psi. The average of one gauge for the 11 balls was 11.49 psi, on the upper range of what the balls should measure. The average of the other gauge was 11.11 psi, clearly lower than what the balls should have measured. Average all 22 readings, and you get 11.30 … two-one-hundredths lower what the Ideal Gas Law would have allowed for balls that started the day at 12.5 psi.

I think we should probably dismiss the arguments from both extremes, the Pats backers claiming Brady is innocent and those on this board claiming that there was a competitve advantage to have a lower psi (unless you want to argue that .002 psi makes a difference). The NFL certainly didn't think it was a competitive advantage because if they did they would have switched out the balls after they went missing since they had been warned ahead of time to the Pats manipulating the balls. In fact, they brought out the back up balls to the field but didn't use them once they found out the balls were with the Deflator. As a Pats fan, I'm fine with the NFL coming down on Brady and the Pats for breaking an equipment rule and not fully cooperating with the league investigation but lets admit the actual infraction is more of a misdemeanor than a felony. Regardless, still breaking the rules and they will be held accountable.

all application of ideal gas law is assuming that the temperature of the balls is the temperature of the field, and that's not so. The instant you bring them inside, they begin warming up.

I applaud sports journalists for learning about basic physics (even if their eyes gloss over), but they are all missing the key points here.

So did the Wells investigation miss it as well? They were the ones that said the balls should have measured between 11.32 and 11.52

 

[BigSteelThrill]

Ted Bruschi's credibilty is now completely gone: http://awfulannouncing.com/2015/ex-patriots-damien-woody-and-tedy-bruschi-argue-over-deflategate.html

Tedy wont be overly critical of the Patriots at all. I don't think he needs to either.

That's on ESPN, they should expect him to get fluff pieces regarding the Pats and little else.

He simply isnt going down the "journalism" road anytime soon. He is a talking head that still has lots of love for his team and that's fine.

 

[BroadwayG]

From Peter King this morning:

6. Officials used two gauges at halftime of the AFC Championship Game to measure the air pressure in 11 New England footballs and four Indianapolis footballs. On page 113 of the Wells report, after a description of the scientific Ideal Gas Law (eyes glaze over), Wells says the Patriots footballs should have measured between 11.32 psi and 11.52 psi. The average of one gauge for the 11 balls was 11.49 psi, on the upper range of what the balls should measure. The average of the other gauge was 11.11 psi, clearly lower than what the balls should have measured. Average all 22 readings, and you get 11.30 … two-one-hundredths lower what the Ideal Gas Law would have allowed for balls that started the day at 12.5 psi.

I think we should probably dismiss the arguments from both extremes, the Pats backers claiming Brady is innocent and those on this board claiming that there was a competitve advantage to have a lower psi (unless you want to argue that .002 psi makes a difference). The NFL certainly didn't think it was a competitive advantage because if they did they would have switched out the balls after they went missing since they had been warned ahead of time to the Pats manipulating the balls. In fact, they brought out the back up balls to the field but didn't use them once they found out the balls were with the Deflator. As a Pats fan, I'm fine with the NFL coming down on Brady and the Pats for breaking an equipment rule and not fully cooperating with the league investigation but lets admit the actual infraction is more of a misdemeanor than a felony. Regardless, still breaking the rules and they will be held accountable.

all application of ideal gas law is assuming that the temperature of the balls is the temperature of the field, and that's not so. The instant you bring them inside, they begin warming up.

I applaud sports journalists for learning about basic physics (even if their eyes gloss over), but they are all missing the key points here.

And this is why the Colts balls seemed to not drop too much, they were inside warming up much longer before they were tested.

 

[moleculo]

If I were Robert Kraft, I would immediately contact a local test lab and ask the following:

1. Repeat the Exponent experiments, using procedures from the report as exactly as possible.

2. perform new experiments, manipulating the parameters as much as could be expected, to demonstrate that the pressures measured at halftime are physically possible.

3. document and verify all data, compile comprehensive report.

The low pressure in the Patriots balls isn't that far off from what could be expected - 0.75 psi would do the trick. I wonder if that could be accounted for by dropping the cold temp a degree or two (question accuracy of external air temperature), making sure the balls were thoroughly wet, storing them in the bag as long as possible before testing, accuracy of the gauge, etc.

I think it's may be possible that if you manipulate some of the variables to the very edge of what is realistic, it may be possible to demonstrate the observed pressures could be explained.

 

[Baloney Sandwich]

From Peter King this morning:

6. Officials used two gauges at halftime of the AFC Championship Game to measure the air pressure in 11 New England footballs and four Indianapolis footballs. On page 113 of the Wells report, after a description of the scientific Ideal Gas Law (eyes glaze over), Wells says the Patriots footballs should have measured between 11.32 psi and 11.52 psi. The average of one gauge for the 11 balls was 11.49 psi, on the upper range of what the balls should measure. The average of the other gauge was 11.11 psi, clearly lower than what the balls should have measured. Average all 22 readings, and you get 11.30 … two-one-hundredths lower what the Ideal Gas Law would have allowed for balls that started the day at 12.5 psi.

I think we should probably dismiss the arguments from both extremes, the Pats backers claiming Brady is innocent and those on this board claiming that there was a competitve advantage to have a lower psi (unless you want to argue that .002 psi makes a difference). The NFL certainly didn't think it was a competitive advantage because if they did they would have switched out the balls after they went missing since they had been warned ahead of time to the Pats manipulating the balls. In fact, they brought out the back up balls to the field but didn't use them once they found out the balls were with the Deflator. As a Pats fan, I'm fine with the NFL coming down on Brady and the Pats for breaking an equipment rule and not fully cooperating with the league investigation but lets admit the actual infraction is more of a misdemeanor than a felony. Regardless, still breaking the rules and they will be held accountable.

all application of ideal gas law is assuming that the temperature of the balls is the temperature of the field, and that's not so. The instant you bring them inside, they begin warming up.

I applaud sports journalists for learning about basic physics (even if their eyes gloss over), but they are all missing the key points here.

So did the Wells investigation miss it as well? They were the ones that said the balls should have measured between 11.32 and 11.52

Where in the Wells report does it say that?

Page 113

 

[moleculo]

From Peter King this morning:

6. Officials used two gauges at halftime of the AFC Championship Game to measure the air pressure in 11 New England footballs and four Indianapolis footballs. On page 113 of the Wells report, after a description of the scientific Ideal Gas Law (eyes glaze over), Wells says the Patriots footballs should have measured between 11.32 psi and 11.52 psi. The average of one gauge for the 11 balls was 11.49 psi, on the upper range of what the balls should measure. The average of the other gauge was 11.11 psi, clearly lower than what the balls should have measured. Average all 22 readings, and you get 11.30 … two-one-hundredths lower what the Ideal Gas Law would have allowed for balls that started the day at 12.5 psi.

I think we should probably dismiss the arguments from both extremes, the Pats backers claiming Brady is innocent and those on this board claiming that there was a competitve advantage to have a lower psi (unless you want to argue that .002 psi makes a difference). The NFL certainly didn't think it was a competitive advantage because if they did they would have switched out the balls after they went missing since they had been warned ahead of time to the Pats manipulating the balls. In fact, they brought out the back up balls to the field but didn't use them once they found out the balls were with the Deflator. As a Pats fan, I'm fine with the NFL coming down on Brady and the Pats for breaking an equipment rule and not fully cooperating with the league investigation but lets admit the actual infraction is more of a misdemeanor than a felony. Regardless, still breaking the rules and they will be held accountable.

all application of ideal gas law is assuming that the temperature of the balls is the temperature of the field, and that's not so. The instant you bring them inside, they begin warming up.

I applaud sports journalists for learning about basic physics (even if their eyes gloss over), but they are all missing the key points here.

So did the Wells investigation miss it as well? They were the ones that said the balls should have measured between 11.32 and 11.52

Where in the Wells report does it say that?

Page 113

yup, found it. Wells doesn't do a very good job of explaining the science here. 11.32 and 11.52 is from the Exponent report and deals with what they term, "master gauge pressure", which tracks very closely with the "no-logo" gauge. if you look at the "no-logo" gauge, you see that just 3 of 11 Patriots balls fall into that range.

 

[12punch]

You forgot the last paragraph:

Tampering may have occurred on other days. And Tom Brady may be hiding evidence of tampering occurring on multiple occasions by refusing to turn over his text messages and emails. But it’s hard to conclude that tampering happened on January 18, 2015, in large part because the subject matter that became such a big deal the next day had never been one before the moment the needles on those two conflicting gauges were crammed into the 10 footballs.

lolz

 

[Tango]

You forgot the last paragraph:

Tampering may have occurred on other days. And Tom Brady may be hiding evidence of tampering occurring on multiple occasions by refusing to turn over his text messages and emails. But it’s hard to conclude that tampering happened on January 18, 2015, in large part because the subject matter that became such a big deal the next day had never been one before the moment the needles on those two conflicting gauges were crammed into the 10 footballs.

lolz

You dont seem to get it. We are glad you cite him. The fact that Florio makes points in support of the Patriots is a very good thing.

Now cite the fact that this same Florio believes Brady should and will get suspended on multiple-counts.

Oops, guess you forgot those Florio articles.

 

[The Duff Man]

Did I miss the news where the Deflator was taking the balls to the bathroom was discredited?

Not sure why the actual air pressure is even an issue? He was tampering with the balls after they were approved by the refs. Brady knew. The end....who cares what the actual pressure was?

Arguing the actual air pressure or whether there was any competitive advantage is like Josh Gordon arguing that he should be allowed to smoke pot.

It is irrelevant. You cant tamper with the balls!! Survellance of him bringing them to the bathroom and the texts seals the guilty verdict.

They tampered with the balls. They discussed it beforehand. Brady knew.

 

[BustedKnuckles]

Due to inconclusive and concrete evidence Tom Brady will be suspended at some point

 

[12punch]

The locker room attendant is never supposed to take the game balls himself to the field... only he does, fairly often, according to the testimony of the security people (Wells mentions this, then forgets it in his conclusion).

that might be in there, somewhere, but what I've seen is this

[T]he balls shall remain under the supervision of the Referee until they are delivered to the ball attendant just prior to the start of the game,” Rule 2 also states. That didn’t happen prior to the AFC title game, and that wasn’t a big deal.

that sounds exactly like what happened --- not sure where people are getting an issue from.

they were under supervision of the refs until the attendant took custody and brought them to the field.

also, this whole point is kind of hilarious, as the poo flingers will have us believe this chicanery has been going on for years, and yet at the very same time note this instance as some kind of incriminating evidence because it was such unusual behavior.

he didn't sneak them away to a bathroom unescorted in the balt game?

this kind of thing really just makes me sad for this country.

unfortunately, mike judge is probably a visionary.

 

[Mookie]

How is their chicanery even in doubt? The guy referred to himself as "The Deflator" before the season even started!

 

[12punch]

It is irrelevant. You cant tamper with the balls!! Survellance of him bringing them to the bathroom and the texts seals the guilty verdict.

They tampered with the balls. They discussed it beforehand. Brady knew.

wat

guy's in a bathroom for a minute to take a piss and he's guilty.

panthers and vikings tampering with balls on video = who cares

shark pool be sharkin'

 

[Bayhawks]

It is irrelevant. You cant tamper with the balls!! Survellance of him bringing them to the bathroom and the texts seals the guilty verdict.

They tampered with the balls. They discussed it beforehand. Brady knew.

wat

guy's in a bathroom for a minute to take a piss and he's guilty.

panthers and vikings tampering with balls on video = who cares

shark pool be sharkin'

Again, the Panthers and Vikings didn't lie about it, cover it up, and interfere with the NFL investigation. Brady/NE did. That's where any punishment is likely to be focused on. No stripping the SBs, no erasing the record books, no asterisks, just punishment for what Brady/NE did AFTER they broke the minor rule.

 

[The Duff Man]

It is irrelevant. You cant tamper with the balls!! Survellance of him bringing them to the bathroom and the texts seals the guilty verdict.

They tampered with the balls. They discussed it beforehand. Brady knew.

wat

guy's in a bathroom for a minute to take a piss and he's guilty.

panthers and vikings tampering with balls on video = who cares

shark pool be sharkin'

Head in the sand and deflect......

Head in the sand and deflect.....

 

[the moops]

yup, found it. Wells doesn't do a very good job of explaining the science here. 11.32 and 11.52 is from the Exponent report and deals with what they term, "master gauge pressure", which tracks very closely with the "no-logo" gauge. if you look at the "no-logo" gauge, you see that just 3 of 11 Patriots balls fall into that range.

Would be nice to know where the other 7 Colt balls fall in these ranges.

 

[moleculo]

I'm not convinced Brady is guilty of anything outside of not fully cooperating with the Wells investigation. He will be suspended for that, but I'm not entirely sure his involvement goes deeper.

My proposed narrative: Brady was irate at McNally after the Jets game in October, where some ref over-inflated the balls. After that incident, McNally wanted to make damn sure the refs didn't screw with proper inflation, so they began doctoring the balls post-ref inspection. In his mind, he was correcting the refs mistake - doing his best to make sure Mr Brady got to play with his balls just the way he liked them.

The doctoring got routine by January, and in the playoffs it's even more important for your star QB to have every advantage. As McNally saw Anderson over-inflate a couple of balls and then adjust the pressure, he took it upon himself to just make sure things were right.

This is tampering of official, certified game equipment by a member of the Patriots organization, and it likely wasn't the first time. The Patriots do deserve sanctions as a result, especially given they are repeat offenders, but I'm still not entirely convinced Brady is culpable.

 

[Jercules]

The locker room attendant is never supposed to take the game balls himself to the field... only he does, fairly often, according to the testimony of the security people (Wells mentions this, then forgets it in his conclusion).

that might be in there, somewhere, but what I've seen is this

[T]he balls shall remain under the supervision of the Referee until they are delivered to the ball attendant just prior to the start of the game,” Rule 2 also states. That didn’t happen prior to the AFC title game, and that wasn’t a big deal.

that sounds exactly like what happened --- not sure where people are getting an issue from.

they were under supervision of the refs until the attendant took custody and brought them to the field.

also, this whole point is kind of hilarious, as the poo flingers will have us believe this chicanery has been going on for years, and yet at the very same time note this instance as some kind of incriminating evidence because it was such unusual behavior.

he didn't sneak them away to a bathroom unescorted in the balt game?

this kind of thing really just makes me sad for this country.

unfortunately, mike judge is probably a visionary.

From what I understand, "delivering the balls just prior to the start of the game" is supposed to include taking them to the field (although that's yet another layer of ambiguity that clouds this whole thing up).

To read the report, you would think McNally committed some exceptional violation of protocol by taking the balls to the field himself. That's what the refs testify. But the security people all said they see it happen often enough: sometimes he takes them himself, sometimes he is escorted, and so on (and why not? As you point out, nothing says they can't 'deliver' the game balls before they reach the field).

Brady's agent made the point that this investigation was commissioned by the NFL, and is designed to not make the NFL look bad in any way. That would presumably include not highlighting how nonchalant the refs generally were with testing, inflating/deflating, and guarding the game balls.

 

[cstu]

My proposed narrative: Brady was irate at McNally after the Jets game in October, where some ref over-inflated the balls. After that incident, McNally wanted to make damn sure the refs didn't screw with proper inflation, so they began doctoring the balls post-ref inspection. In his mind, he was correcting the refs mistake - doing his best to make sure Mr Brady got to play with his balls just the way he liked them.

McNally Tom must really be working your balls hard this week

Jastremski Talked to him last night. He actually brought you up and said you must have a lot of stress trying to get them done...

 

[AB in DC]

OK, I said I was done, but one more thing. The idea that "Tom has been working your balls hard all week" is evidence that Brady violated any kind of rule is probably the dumbest thing I've heard on this entire thread.

 

[Anarchy99]

It is irrelevant. You cant tamper with the balls!! Survellance of him bringing them to the bathroom and the texts seals the guilty verdict.

They tampered with the balls. They discussed it beforehand. Brady knew.

wat

guy's in a bathroom for a minute to take a piss and he's guilty.

panthers and vikings tampering with balls on video = who cares

shark pool be sharkin'

Again, the Panthers and Vikings didn't lie about it, cover it up, and interfere with the NFL investigation. Brady/NE did. That's where any punishment is likely to be focused on. No stripping the SBs, no erasing the record books, no asterisks, just punishment for what Brady/NE did AFTER they broke the minor rule.

This is the biggest I have with this whole miss (which I posted about over the weekend). To the best of my knowledge, in the history of th e league, no player has been suspended for an equipment violation. Similarly, there have been no other full scale investigations into an equipment violation.

The way things have gone has always been as follows:

- League ignores a potentional violation entirely / looks the other way

- League hears an allegation and sends out a league wide memo telling the entire league to stop doing it

- A team gets caught doing something and is told to stop with no penalty enforced.

- A team gets caught doing something and the team is fined and told to stop.

To the best of my knowledge, no team has been docked a draft pick for an equipment violation.

Also, the "in thing" these days is to cite the integrity of the game, altering the competitive balance, gaining an unfair advantage, and intentional skirting the rules . . . all reasons for action against NE to be severe. However, all the other instances involving tampering with equipment all did the same thing. Did players tell the refs or the league that they were using stick um or vasolene on their jerseys? Nope. Did they do it to gain a competitive advantage. Yep. Did they knowingly break the rules. Yep. Where was the outcry for the integrity of the game then?

The only thing different in the current NE situation is that they did stuff after the equipment was inspected. But the intent was still just as bad as the other infractions involving equipment. But the fact still remains that at no other point was there ever an investigation for any of this stuff.

In years past, NE would have been told to knock it off and if they didn't they would get punished. And short of that, if they did get caught they would have been fined and that would have been that. Other teams have been caught and had nothing as penalties or minor fines.

As I cited over the weekend, even if we just say the Pats did the things they are accused of, it still should be considered a minor infraction. In baseball, scuffing or adding a foreign substance would get a starting picher a suspension for two missed starts (2 games out of 32 starts = 1/16 of the season). Batters using a corked bat would get an 8 or 10 game suspension (less than 1/16 of the season). Batters abusing pine tar rules would have their bat tossed or at worst would be ejected from the game.

From what I recollect, teams have let air out of the ball 40+ years ago in the NBA and no sanctions were taken. In hockey, use of a stick that is either too long or too curved will get the stick tossed and the player a two minute minor penalty. Race teams in NASCAR will get large fines and lose some accumulated driver points for circumventing the rules on engine performance.

Bottom line, the ntire Deflategate story has been handled way out of proportion for what the league has done in the past and what other sports do as well. Suspending Brady a game for the infraction and a game for the cover up would still be way more than anything the league has ever doled out for a penalty. And by extension, that should be used as a baseline for all future equipment infractions as well. The league should not be able to nab the Pats but then look the other way for other teams moving forward.