Sports: Deflate-Gate

[TAX GUY]

If it makes no difference, why the preference? The entire issue comes from a team "testing" rule, upon rule. It appears that too much "testing" caught up, and now the team will pay. Would the NFL have issued such severe penalties if the Patriots and Tom Brady had cooperated fully? The answer would be an emphatic No. This is a time when "Patriot pride" or swagger, have cost the team dearly. Will they learn or will history repeat?

I prefer my steaks cooked/grilled to a medium rare, and others prefer well done. Both temperatures are within a few degrees of each other and both are safe to eat. It's simply a preference by those eating it.

No one can say what would or wouldn't have happened if Brady and/or the team gave Wells EVERYTHING he wanted (they cooperated but not with EVERYTHING or EVERY request. I'm wiling to bet they were advised to do and not do certain things. None of us Monday Quarterbacks will know all the details involved, because we aren't there. We can only base our opinions from what is released to us, via the media.

 

[undertheradar]

So, being so honest and forthright, has Yee released the Brady notes? Looks like Wells is calling that bluff!

 

[TAX GUY]

its a CONSPIRACY!!! The league and its officials are only against the Patriots (I'm channeling my inner Disney Ron )

http://www.coldhardfootballfacts.co...s-played-with-under-inflated-footballs/33495/


(I know this changes nothing but I find it interesting...)

 

[TAX GUY]

So, being so honest and forthright, has Yee released the Brady notes? Looks like Wells is calling that bluff!

He will be, via his new legal team....

 

[ilovefh]

I concur. I just had a conversation about this. Did he want them at the 12.5 minimum? Absolutely. Did he want them under it? I don't think so. And was there or was there not a record of pre-game PSI? Someone posted it to me in this thread back a few pages, but I keep seeing people say they didn't record the pre-game PSI (which is what I thought till the other poster gave me a supposed record of it).

No record of the pregame PSI. The information is based on Anderson's recollection of what they were.

 

[pat fan]

No record of the pregame PSI. The information is based on Anderson's recollection of what they were.

Ok, then I retract all my previous statements on conceding there may be some sort of smoking gun somewhere. If there is NO evidence of what they were prior to the game there is no way on this green earth that you can say they were deflated below some invisible number.

Is the "deflator" "more likely than not" guilty of trying to get them to Tom's preferred 12.5? Probably, more likely than not. Was it their intention to go BELOW 12.5? Unlikely on Tom's end, who knows about the ball boys. Sounds like they didn't like him very much, but it's also best not to bite the hand that feeds you (Patriots). I call NFL BS/Sting/whatever all the way.

 

[TAX GUY]

I'm very curious to see what develops over the next two weeks (once Brady and his team appeal the suspension). Granted, I'm only reading/seeing opinions of those in favor of him and the Patriots, but none the less, some interesting takes on the Wells report.

For those interested: http://wellsreportcontext.com/

 

[Lucretia]

I'm very curious to see what develops over the next two weeks (once Brady and his team appeal the suspension). Granted, I'm only reading/seeing opinions of those in favor of him and the Patriots, but none the less, some interesting takes on the Wells report.

For those interested: http://wellsreportcontext.com/

Will be interesting

 

[undertheradar]

Now if they put on the big boy pants and just accepted being caught, imagine how quickly the media scrutiny would go away!

 

[TAX GUY]

Now if they put on the big boy pants and just accepted being caught, imagine how quickly the media scrutiny would go away!

 

[TAX GUY]

It's on...

http://www.msn.com/en-us/sports/nfl/brady-appeals-suspension-in-deflategate/ar-BBjNhil?ocid=UP75DHP

 

[kaytieeldr]

This was on my Facebook feed feed https://m.facebook.com/l.php?u=http...U6tZkQ2I5JHFIgm1qQ1OP2jiYFOJr0JOkRe3Xs-Ow&s=1 posted by a former neighbor, now living down south but still a Pats fan

 

[GrnMtnMan]

It's on...

Its off...

Roger Goodell to hear Tom Brady's appeal of Deflategate suspension

Anybody want to take bets on whether or not the penalties are increased?

I think the Pats made a big mistake with the rebuttal. My favorite analysis of it so far:

The Patriots released a 20,000-word tome in response to the Ted Wells report Thursday. It was actually funny. It wasn't meant to be funny. But it was hysterical.


The report was part Truther-ist (the only thing missing was a picture of Barack Obama's birth certificate), part serious, but mostly comical. Seriously, key parts of it were patently absurd, so absurd it led to a torrent of jokes on social media. The Patriots' response to the Deflategate report will give The Daily Show material for years to come.


The response's lack of weight belies its significance. It wasn't done just to rebut the NFL investigation's conclusions. It was a message. It was a hilarious, caps-locked message, a poor one, but a productive message nonetheless. It was a way for the team to continue to get party loyalists to believe it. The voluminousness of it gives the rebut a superficial density, and believers will grasp on to it, like a raft in a heavy seas.

 

[GrnMtnMan]

If there is NO evidence of what they were prior to the game there is no way on this green earth that you can say they were deflated below some invisible number.

There is evidence. Testimony is evidence. A statement made by an individual can be used in a court of law. Insert Miranda warning here.

The referee's statement about his recollection of the measuring of the balls prior to the game would be admitted in court as evidence. Under direct examination, the prosecuting lawyer would have the referee explain that it was not part of the procedure to write down every ball's PSI, but when one was outside of the rules, would direct that the ball be modified. That would be sufficient for the referees to believe all balls were within regulation.

The defense lawyer would then cross-examine the referee to try to discredit the testimony. And so on and so on.

Paragraph 3 is the evidence that would be compelling to an impartial judge or jury:

 

[pat fan]

There is evidence. Testimony is evidence. A statement made by an individual can be used in a court of law. Insert Miranda warning here.

The flaw here is that the report only wants to use what it wants to use. The ref ALSO said to the best of his knowledge he used the high reading gauge for the beginning and the low reading one at halftime, but Wells refused to use THAT recollection, saying it didn't matter. But it does. If you go with the correct ones, there's hardly any difference. It's pretty much all a witch hunt/farce if your going to use "best recollections" , un-calibrated gauges and the like.

 

[undertheradar]

The flaw here is that the report only wants to use what it wants to use. The ref ALSO said to the best of his knowledge he used the high reading gauge for the beginning and the low reading one at halftime, but Wells refused to use THAT recollection, saying it didn't matter. But it does. If you go with the correct ones, there's hardly any difference. It's pretty much all a witch hunt/farce if your going to use "best recollections" , un-calibrated gauges and the like.

The other obvious flaw: Patriot fans are going to blindly believe whatever the organization says.

 

[GrnMtnMan]

The flaw here is that the report only wants to use what it wants to use. The ref ALSO said to the best of his knowledge he used the high reading gauge for the beginning and the low reading one at halftime, but Wells refused to use THAT recollection, saying it didn't matter. But it does. If you go with the correct ones, there's hardly any difference. It's pretty much all a witch hunt/farce if your going to use "best recollections" , un-calibrated gauges and the like.

You're correct that this single piece of evidence is not convincing. That's the nature of circumstantial evidence. You have to infer its meaning.

Put together with McNally's unexplained trip to the bathroom, his lies about why he went in there (to urinate in urinal, though there is no urinal in that bathroom), calling himself *the deflator*, valuable gifts from Brady to these two equipment managers, all the unusually long phone calls between Brady, McNally, and Jastremski at abnormal hours as the story was breaking, Brady failing to cooperate with the investigation, texts between the managers discussing inflation levels of the balls, all add up to the appearance of a conspiracy.

When you throw in that the typically informal process of pre-game inflation level measurements of the balls happened in an unremarkable manner, but when they were measured again (in a more formal way because of the suspicion of wrongdoing and the unscientific feeling of them being under-inflated) all of the Pats balls measured well-below what would have been expected, there are no other reasonable explanations for what happened to those balls: McNally deliberately deflated them after the referees measured them.

 

[pat fan]

The other obvious flaw: Patriot fans are going to blindly believe whatever the organization says.

No more blind than others unwillling to entertain something that says there may be something fishy going on on the OTHER side of the ball. And I never said I was blind. Just that there is a lot of info left OUT that does make it look damning. You need to be honest and present it all for an independent arbitrator, and that can not be Goodell. I have not heard anyone comment on the recollections of the gauges, just call me blind. Cute.

 

[GrnMtnMan]

Here we go again:
Did Patriots’ response to Wells report violate league rules?
Article 9.1(C)(4), which provides that teams shall not “[p]ublicly criticize any member club or its management, personnel, employees, or coaches and/or any football official employed by the league.” The provision then requires that “[a]ll complaints or criticism in respect to the foregoing shall be made to the Commissioner only and shall not be publicized directly or indirectly.” (Emphasis added.)

More jail time on the way?

 

[pat fan]

Did Patriots’ response to Wells report violate league rules?
Article 9.1(C)(4), which provides that teams shall not “[p]ublicly criticize any member club or its management, personnel, employees, or coaches and/or any football official employed by the league.” The provision then requires that “[a]ll complaints or criticism in respect to the foregoing shall be made to the Commissioner only and shall not be publicized directly or indirectly.” (Emphasis added.)

More jail time on the way?

He's a lawyer, not associated with any club.