End of the "cheating" debate -- from the horse's mouth

[BPF]

From Tomase's blog (please, no rocks or rotten tomatos!):

http://www.bostonherald.com/blogs/sports/patriots/



That takes the cake. As far as I'm concerned this quote backs Belichick's story 100%. The violation of the rule was the use of a camera versus the use of a pen and pencil. Another NFL team could have reams and reams of other teams defensive calls written down, and they are no less "cheaters" than the Patriots.

I think the point he is trying to make by saying end of the "cheating" debate is that stealing defensive signals shouldn't be considered "cheating," as Fisher says "There’s not a bylaw against sitting up in a press box and taking notes with a binoculars as fast as you can."

As we all know the Patriots have been criticized in the mainstream media and labeled as "cheaters" because they stole defensive signals not because of the manner in which they did it. When Marcellus Wiley, Mark Schreleth, John Clayton, Steve Young, Sen Specter, etc get on TV and say it's a big advantage to know your opponenets defensive signals and how this is shocking and something they never heard of they are flat out lying. As Fisher mentioned above, it's ok to steal your opponenets defensive signals in any manner other than videotaping, "....there is a bylaw as far as videotaping signals and that is the issue." So the Patriots violated a competitive rule and were punished for it. This is closer to a holding penalty then it is an issue that should be investigated by senators. Just like offensive linemen are allowed to use their hands as long as they keep them to the inside of a defenders body, the Patriots are allowed to "steal" defensive signals. But when the OL's hands get to the outside of the defender's body, it's a no-no, just like it is for the Pats to have used the videotape. What he is trying to say is that this story should be over and done with, yet it's become a national issue and debate.

 

[PatsFanInVa]

I don't get the bizarre definitional debate about the word "cheating."

Fisher's point is valid. There is a bylaw against taping signals. The Pats did break it, whether or not you believe the "interpretation" argument. Fisher's point is that, even if many teams did break it, many did not.

He acknowledges that you can scribble notes from the stands, but you can not use a video camera.

The fact of intelligence-gathering does not make it cheating. The fact that you break the bylaw, which specifies which intelligence-gathering is acceptable, is cheating.

Your logic is similar to saying "Roger Clemens wasn't cheating. I know for a fact that Curt Shilling takes vitamins. It's the same thing, both raise your chances of better physical performance. It's just that one is against the rules and one isn't."

PFnV

 

[Deus Irae]

I don't get the bizarre definitional debate about the word "cheating."

Fisher's point is valid. There is a bylaw against taping signals. The Pats did break it, whether or not you believe the "interpretation" argument. Fisher's point is that, even if many teams did break it, many did not.

He acknowledges that you can scribble notes from the stands, but you can not use a video camera.

The fact of intelligence-gathering does not make it cheating. The fact that you break the bylaw, which specifies which intelligence-gathering is acceptable, is cheating.

Your logic is similar to saying "Roger Clemens wasn't cheating. I know for a fact that Curt Shilling takes vitamins. It's the same thing, both raise your chances of better physical performance. It's just that one is against the rules and one isn't."

PFnV

1.) If you believe the interpretation argument, the Patriots did not cheat.

2.) The analogy is not steroids to vitamins. A proper analogy would be to note that taking steroids orally was legal, but injecting them was deemed to be against the rules.

 

[NYCPatsFan]

I think the OP forgot to add the sarcasm in the title.

Based on the title, I was tempted to click on the link and break my resolution (boycott BH) but lucky I decided to read the postings first. Good that I did.

 

[mb6592]

I don't get the bizarre definitional debate about the word "cheating."

Fisher's point is valid. There is a bylaw against taping signals. The Pats did break it, whether or not you believe the "interpretation" argument. Fisher's point is that, even if many teams did break it, many did not.

He acknowledges that you can scribble notes from the stands, but you can not use a video camera.

The fact of intelligence-gathering does not make it cheating. The fact that you break the bylaw, which specifies which intelligence-gathering is acceptable, is cheating.

Your logic is similar to saying "Roger Clemens wasn't cheating. I know for a fact that Curt Shilling takes vitamins. It's the same thing, both raise your chances of better physical performance. It's just that one is against the rules and one isn't."

PFnV

Your logic is faulty. If I steal another teams playbook, that's cheating. If I use a typewriter to type a paper to finish it faster when the teacher told me to use a pen, that's stupid and against a rule - but is not cheating. Did the Pats gain a competitive advantage by taping versus jotting down notes? Or did they just save time and money (by not having to hire two guys to do it)? Does cheating occur everytime a rule is broken? Are rushers cheating when they run into a kicker?

 

[BPF]

I don't get the bizarre definitional debate about the word "cheating."

Fisher's point is valid. There is a bylaw against taping signals. The Pats did break it, whether or not you believe the "interpretation" argument. Fisher's point is that, even if many teams did break it, many did not.

He acknowledges that you can scribble notes from the stands, but you can not use a video camera.

The fact of intelligence-gathering does not make it cheating. The fact that you break the bylaw, which specifies which intelligence-gathering is acceptable, is cheating.

Your logic is similar to saying "Roger Clemens wasn't cheating. I know for a fact that Curt Shilling takes vitamins. It's the same thing, both raise your chances of better physical performance. It's just that one is against the rules and one isn't."

PFnV

I guess that's where we disagree, is it "cheating" in school if you had the answers to a test ahead of time?? Yes, does it matter how you got those answers?? No. If the NFL was really concerned about competitive balance and the integrity of the game with this rule, they simply would have a bylaw in place that states no "stealing/intercepting" of defensive/offensive signals, period.

 

[mb6592]

1.) The analogy is not steroids to vitamins. A proper analogy would be to note that taking steroids orally was legal, but injecting them was deemed to be against the rules.

Exactly....

 

[PatsFanInVa]

Okay, let's say that some steroids which are not also illegal, can be taken, with prescriptions, and only orally, not injected.

Then your guy injects them.

Fine.

Now let's say your team has recourse to popping the pills, and does that, but in addition also just has to use injectables.

The reason a rule is a rule and not a law of God or a biblical verse, is that the rule itself is the standard. You cheat if you break it.

The nit I have with this holier-than-thou bullcrap coming from Fisher, is that he and Dungy colluded about the outcome of the final regular season game, and that at least three other teams have committed the same "sin" as the Patriots, regarding videotaping.

He goes further and says he "believes" the Pats are the only ones, but that part isn't true. He also has just gotten away, pure and simple, with the cardinal sin of non-competitive football, i.e., having an "agreement" with an opposing coach about how the game will be played out.

I've accepted that only half this story will be told, at least for a while. We might hear the second half in retrospect. These little sound-bites are just the sounds of teeth gritting around the league as they realize they have been directed to consider the Goodell handling of the matter "satisfactory."

My problem isn't with people saying the Pats "cheat." It's with seeing other "cheating" happening throughout the season, but no enforcement happening, for whatever reason (and there's always a reason those situations are "no big deal.")

Okay fine, they're still cheating. If it's the letter of the rule you're concerned with, clean it all up.

PFnV

 

[PatsFanInVa]

Your logic is faulty. If I steal another teams playbook, that's cheating. If I use a typewriter to type a paper to finish it faster when the teacher told me to use a pen, that's stupid and against a rule - but is not cheating. Did the Pats gain a competitive advantage by taping versus jotting down notes? Or did they just save time and money (by not having to hire two guys to do it)? Does cheating occur everytime a rule is broken? Are rushers cheating when they run into a kicker?

Bullcrap. If the prof says no typewriters, the rule is the same for everybody. If I hand-write my essay, and it's a 40-pager, and the pure stupidity of the rule distracts me and makes me stop short of that last rhetorical flourish that slams home my point and I get a B, and you type yours up easy-peasy, and get an A, then you can be argued to have been more successful because of a competitive disadvantage. That's why they're called rules. By all rights, the teacher should indicate a woulda-coulda-shoulda-grade on my paper, and knock off points for the typing. The teacher is even within his/her rights to just not accept the paper.

I doubt the addition of the camera was "just" to save time and money. I think they preferred having images to notes only. I think if you think otherwise, you're looking through some serious rose-colored glasses.

I also think that this year's games demonstrate clearly that we got nothing out of the practice even worth mentioning, and that BB's statement about how "important" those tapes were is pretty accurate. Again, I'll use the 2007 season as exhibit A in determining this.

My real problem is that other teams have "unfair" outcomes or disadvantages based on other rules-breaches. These are also cheating. It's just that they're unimportant teams (like the Colts and the Titans this year.) Nobody is saying the Giants/Patriots super bowl could have been affected by the Browns playing instead of the Titans. So the collusion happened, is against the rules, is pretty much the quintessential form of cheating, if only in a very diluted way, and affected a team's chances (the Browns.) To me, that's cheating.

I think the only reason Crennel didn't go forward with that charge is,

1) didn't want to be perceived as turning the whole spygate thing into a circus and bring it up again, and

2) the way the Browns were playing, it was like a blessing from above that they did not make the playoffs anyway (and everybody would have known it.)

Like I said, I don't really believe in the definitional argument. I think you can just call it cheating and move on. But by the same token, it's the responsible thing to say a lot of cheating is going on, and has gone on. If you're the new sherrif in town and all that, clean up all the cheating, fixed games included, and taped games that the "victim" doesn't bring forward, because the club doesn't want to "squeal" also included.

PFnV

 

[mb6592]

So you feel that "the rule itself is the standard. You cheat if you break it." So all rule breakers are cheaters. Others feel that some rule breakers are just that, committed a rule infraction, but not automatically cheaters.

 

[IcyPatriot]

From Tomase's blog (please, no rocks or rotten tomatos!):.

Saw your thread and name (GoWhalers) and that song "Brass Bonanza" stuck in my head ...

http://www.brassbonanza.com/hcc/whalers-audio/new-england-whalers-ep

Sorry for the side-track but I had to say it.


http://www.brassbonanza.com/hcc/

 

[PatsFanInVa]

So you feel that "the rule itself is the standard. You cheat if you break it." So all rule breakers are cheaters. Others feel that some rule breakers are just that, committed a rule infraction, but not automatically cheaters.

I just don't get the definitional argument.

In-game penalties are established ways to take care of in-game infractions. But as to the other infractions?

I could go with "It's not cheating!!!!" but then it would seem like nothing is. The accused will always say "I didn't think I was doing anything wrong," or at least in every case where there's a shadow of a doubt.

Don't get me wrong: this is cheating, yes. But blown way the hell out of proportion. Even the league is basically saying as much right now.

I view it as similar to the Dungy/Fisher collusion.

My belief is this: The definitional argument is probably important in a propaganda sense, but the Pats have been busted breaking the rules. The league handed down a penalty. The Pats paid it.

Now the point becomes one of proportionality. In that sense, the Pats have paid once, heavily. But it is perceived (of course) as not heavily enough. That's a problem, because regardless of the penalty, that will always be a complaint among some.

Secondly, there is a question of selective enforcement. If you define the behavior as cheating, based on the rule book, don't make up parentheticals about "unless one team doesn't bring it forward," a la the Jets case.

I'm pretty sure agreeing on the outcome of a game or how it's to be played in the final minutes is against the rules too. So prosecute that too.

It's obvious what happened: Goodell wanted to play "new sherrif in town." He came down heavy on the Pats. But the story got out of his control.

Now he's stuck trying to play both ends against the middle, to keep senators out of league business. I don't know what his whole issue earlier this year was about the super bowl parties at churches, but he's already had to cave on that one... who knows how many other markers he has to cash in, just to have the power to police his own league.

The NFL is now "satisfied," the competition committee is "satisfied," but of course a jackass or two has to add a "...but" at the end of it. Whatever.

I just don't get how there even is a "cheating debate." It seems like there is cheating, and then there's cheating, and everybody is doing one or the other.

The type of "gamesmanship" that this form of cheating involves is part of the storied history of the league by this point. the Landry/Allen wars of the 70s are legendary, as well as quite a few capers pulled by old Papa Bear Halas. But yeah it's cheating. Halas sold tickets to the other team's bench, so their players couldn't sit down between plays. I mean, come on now.

Is collusion cheating, though? How about the Jets' cheating where they broke the rules, but said it's okay because th other team (us) "said they could" (we say we never said that)? How about buying tapes of signals? (Miami)?

What I believe is that if the league, or the senate, or anybody else wants to take any further action, they don't just need to prove the rule was broken.

They need to prove that
1) it had some effect (I think we've been punished enough for something that made no difference, according to all concerned,) and
2) That it was a unique or at least rare practice.

As a corollary, any others found engaging in the same practice should face disciplinary measures of their own, proportionate to their involvement.

But does any of that turn on the definition of "cheating"? No. Just enforce the rules evenly, whether you call it "cheating" or "oopsies", I don't much care.

PFnV

 

[Deus Irae]

Bullcrap. If the prof says no typewriters, the rule is the same for everybody. If I hand-write my essay, and it's a 40-pager, and the pure stupidity of the rule distracts me and makes me stop short of that last rhetorical flourish that slams home my point and I get a B, and you type yours up easy-peasy, and get an A, then you can be argued to have been more successful because of a competitive disadvantage. That's why they're called rules. By all rights, the teacher should indicate a woulda-coulda-shoulda-grade on my paper, and knock off points for the typing. The teacher is even within his/her rights to just not accept the paper.

I doubt the addition of the camera was "just" to save time and money. I think they preferred having images to notes only. I think if you think otherwise, you're looking through some serious rose-colored glasses.

I also think that this year's games demonstrate clearly that we got nothing out of the practice even worth mentioning, and that BB's statement about how "important" those tapes were is pretty accurate. Again, I'll use the 2007 season as exhibit A in determining this.

My real problem is that other teams have "unfair" outcomes or disadvantages based on other rules-breaches. These are also cheating. It's just that they're unimportant teams (like the Colts and the Titans this year.) Nobody is saying the Giants/Patriots super bowl could have been affected by the Browns playing instead of the Titans. So the collusion happened, is against the rules, is pretty much the quintessential form of cheating, if only in a very diluted way, and affected a team's chances (the Browns.) To me, that's cheating.

I think the only reason Crennel didn't go forward with that charge is,

1) didn't want to be perceived as turning the whole spygate thing into a circus and bring it up again, and

2) the way the Browns were playing, it was like a blessing from above that they did not make the playoffs anyway (and everybody would have known it.)

Like I said, I don't really believe in the definitional argument. I think you can just call it cheating and move on. But by the same token, it's the responsible thing to say a lot of cheating is going on, and has gone on. If you're the new sherrif in town and all that, clean up all the cheating, fixed games included, and taped games that the "victim" doesn't bring forward, because the club doesn't want to "squeal" also included.

PFnV

Why are you now back arguing the wrong side of this argument? You'd gotten it right not that long ago. The unintentional violation of a rule is not cheating.

 

[mb6592]

Bullcrap. If the prof says no typewriters, the rule is the same for everybody. If I hand-write my essay, and it's a 40-pager, and the pure stupidity of the rule distracts me and makes me stop short of that last rhetorical flourish that slams home my point and I get a B, and you type yours up easy-peasy, and get an A, then you can be argued to have been more successful because of a competitive disadvantage. That's why they're called rules. By all rights, the teacher should indicate a woulda-coulda-shoulda-grade on my paper, and knock off points for the typing. The teacher is even within his/her rights to just not accept the paper.

I doubt the addition of the camera was "just" to save time and money. I think they preferred having images to notes only. I think if you think otherwise, you're looking through some serious rose-colored glasses.

I also think that this year's games demonstrate clearly that we got nothing out of the practice even worth mentioning, and that BB's statement about how "important" those tapes were is pretty accurate. Again, I'll use the 2007 season as exhibit A in determining this.

My real problem is that other teams have "unfair" outcomes or disadvantages based on other rules-breaches. These are also cheating. It's just that they're unimportant teams (like the Colts and the Titans this year.) Nobody is saying the Giants/Patriots super bowl could have been affected by the Browns playing instead of the Titans. So the collusion happened, is against the rules, is pretty much the quintessential form of cheating, if only in a very diluted way, and affected a team's chances (the Browns.) To me, that's cheating.

I think the only reason Crennel didn't go forward with that charge is,

1) didn't want to be perceived as turning the whole spygate thing into a circus and bring it up again, and

2) the way the Browns were playing, it was like a blessing from above that they did not make the playoffs anyway (and everybody would have known it.)

Like I said, I don't really believe in the definitional argument. I think you can just call it cheating and move on. But by the same token, it's the responsible thing to say a lot of cheating is going on, and has gone on. If you're the new sherrif in town and all that, clean up all the cheating, fixed games included, and taped games that the "victim" doesn't bring forward, because the club doesn't want to "squeal" also included.

PFnV

Again, you describe a competitive advantage (or disadvantage). I'm not sure the Pats gained a competitive advantage doing what they did, unless you think saving some time for some inconsequential underling is gaining a competitive advantage.

 

[PatsFanInVa]

Irae, I don't think I "caved" on the damn definitional argument. I have recently said, screw the league, screw the senate, screw everybody. They now have a much higher burden of proof, in terms of any further action. They have to prove that it mattered, and they have to prove that the enforcement is not selective. Otherwise they are punishing some cheating and not others.

Or alternately, they can continue to say "well, it's cheating, but it's been dealt with satisfactorily." But that is unlikely to hold up, because of the propaganda value of the word.

My point here, and I believe my point in the thread you are referring to (with me "seeing the light,") is that enforcement has to be even and not hyperbolic based on the success of the franchise in question (which is what we are seeing here.)

Every time I see the definitional argument about the word "cheating" dragged up, it just alienates me. The real argument is how much of the same or comparable behavior is happening across the league. That's the only way you can determine the seriousness of the breach.

I think we have at least 2-3 examples of teams that have been shown to be engaging in behavior that also breaks this very rule.

I think we have 1 example of out and out collusion.

I think all those examples have been dealt with differently from how the Pats are being dealt with.

And as I've stated elsewhere on this board, I regard every new "wrinkle" I'm seeing here as theatrics rather than any kind of true trial.

What can I say? Specter is a whore. Walsh seems to be a pathological liar, but we'll see what if anything he brings forward. And guys like Fisher are pure and simple hypocrites.

But this fixation on the "C word"? I still don't get it. They broke the rule, they paid for the breach, and pretty much everyone agrees they didn't win any games because of it. They cheated, but it didn't matter.

In terms of intent, I'll also allow the possibility of an interpretive difference... but again, Fisher's point of view is valid, in that narrow sense. What if I (or someone I know) does not infract the rules? I am at a disadvantage.

My problem, of course, is that Fisher himself got into the playoffs by virtue of collusion, and that the rules infractions are many and varied.

Are they cheating? Hell yes, but only in the same sense the Pats were cheating.

Again... if you can point to where I said otherwise, I'll eat crow and just admit to waffling.

The truth is I am squarely in the middle of the road with the white stripes and dead armadillos. I don't think the Pats were taping to get a disadvantage. I also don't think the advantage they were trying to get was ever perceived as pivotal or major, and that it never even panned out. The actual value was probably more in making people change up signals than actually stealing them -- a head game, in effect.

But did they do it? Yeah. Did it break the rules? Yeah. Were there others also breaking the rules? Yeah.

So the word "cheating" doesn't set me off... the ignorance of how common "cheating" is, sets me off.

I'd just like to be able to acknowledge the validity of the argument, and also argue in favor of proportionalilty and consistent enforcement.

As you've seen, the clowns that think the Pats are the devil incarnate piss me off much more... but the definitional argument also pisses me off.

Just cranky by nature,

PFnV

 

[mb6592]

Every time I see the definitional argument about the word "cheating" dragged up, it just alienates me

It alienates you because your definition of the word includes trivial rule infractions, for others the word implies much more. I would not use the word lightly and would certainly not use it in this case. If, as has been previously stated on this board, the NFL had a rule about "stealing" signals, then I would also be yelling "we cheated." But, alas, they have no such rule.

American Heritage Dictionary

cheat·ed, cheat·ing, cheats

To deceive by trickery; swindle: cheated customers by overcharging them for purchases.
To deprive by trickery; defraud: cheated them of their land.
To mislead; fool: illusions that cheat the eye.

v. intr.

To act dishonestly; practice fraud.
To violate rules deliberately, as in a game: was accused of cheating at cards.

 

[mb6592]

I'd just like to be able to acknowledge the validity of the argument, and also argue in favor of proportionalilty and consistent enforcement.

Your point of getting past the parsing of what is and isn't cheating is valid. OK, I cheated, so what is a proper and proportional penalty to pay. As long as we engage in this cheating debate we never get to the grossly disproportionate penalty we paid. In this respect, I see where you are coming from.

 

[PatsFanInVa]

Your point of getting past the parsing of what is and isn't cheating is valid. OK, I cheated, so what is a proper and proportional penalty to pay. As long as we engage in this cheating debate we never get to the grossly disproportionate penalty we paid. In this respect, I see where you are coming from.

That's pretty much what I'm trying to get across.

I would say that given what we've seen in this season, in retrospect, the Commish was behaving "new-sherriffy," which also means dictatotially, in retrospect.

I can even deal with that. Busted, punished, accepted, move on.

It's disingenuous to say "we'll find and get the cheaters!" and then stop after one instance. But even that could fall into the category of "signal sending" to the league -- as if to say, "christ, at least have a better excuse!"

The whole "let's try to legislate the winners/losers of games" outcome is bullcrap. The whole giving second chances to losers attempt is bullcrap. The whole uneven enforcement regime is bullcrap.

That's the phase we're in now, and that's why the definitional stuff is just annoying to me. We're in the phase where there is no rationality left in the judgement we see over and over...

the media stories, the "trial" (hearing) talk, blah blah blah. It's all beating a dead horse. Last year's run tells you exactly how dead the horse is. It's all theater at this point, barring new evidence. I doubt Matt Walsh has a hell of a lot of anything to present or say.

Naturally, all the league sources HAVE to say what the league says to. I am amazed Fisher got the leeway to poke one more time at the Pats, but que sera sera. That doesn't diminish the fact that the league now has to back up its decisions, and that means backing up the Pats right now, against the "outsiders" in the senate.

As to the issue...To take further action - let's say suspend BB, or "nullify" a super bowl, or whatever - I would say you now have to show that:

1) it mattered, and
2) it was unique or unusual.

That is, if there's a charge based on some Walsh tape or another, and it's established that Walsh was acting on behalf of the team, that tape has to be critical in-game.

But that's a standard I would call "just." It is not the standard that will be in use by witch-hunters.

What we see right now is a witch-hunt on Sphincter's part, and bandwagon-jumping on the part of the litiguous masses. Neither are likely to produce justice-based arguments (although both will claim to.) It's about Cable rights, sore losing philly fans, and money to all these parties.

Don't expect a fair trial if you see this brought up in the senate. It's not a trial, it's a hearing, AKA a fault-finding mission. It's theater.

And yeah, I do personally want to get past the whole thing about "cheating". There's a lot of it. You'll always be right in the eyes of other Pats fans, and you'll always be wrong in the eyes of most other fans. I don't see where it matters.

PFnV

 

[Deus Irae]

Your point of getting past the parsing of what is and isn't cheating is valid. OK, I cheated, so what is a proper and proportional penalty to pay. As long as we engage in this cheating debate we never get to the grossly disproportionate penalty we paid. In this respect, I see where you are coming from.

The problem with this approach is that it's a false concession on something that doesn't matter in dealing with the second issue. The easy way to not cave on this is simply to speak the reality:

The Patriots did not deliberately look to violate any rule. There was no intent to cheat, and the activity was done in the open, as it had been for years. They interpreted a rule that was subject to multiple interpretations, but the team's interpretation was different from the new Commissioner's eventual interpretation. The result of this is that the Patriots were penalized for something that the previous commissioner had never deemed problem enough to penalize. The Commissioner has the final say and the Patriots did not appeal, so nobody is arguing that a penalty is inherently wrong in this situation, particularly because, as BB admitted, the Patriots could have simply sent a request for clarification to the League Offices.


That's really not very difficult, and it ends all argument except the knee-jerk "they cheated!". The people who continue to scream that simply show themselves to be fools, and you move on after calling them the names they so richly deserve.

 

[GoWhalers]

I think the point he is trying to make by saying end of the "cheating" debate is that stealing defensive signals shouldn't be considered "cheating," as Fisher says "There’s not a bylaw against sitting up in a press box and taking notes with a binoculars as fast as you can."

As we all know the Patriots have been criticized in the mainstream media and labeled as "cheaters" because they stole defensive signals not because of the manner in which they did it. When Marcellus Wiley, Mark Schreleth, John Clayton, Steve Young, Sen Specter, etc get on TV and say it's a big advantage to know your opponenets defensive signals and how this is shocking and something they never heard of they are flat out lying. As Fisher mentioned above, it's ok to steal your opponenets defensive signals in any manner other than videotaping, "....there is a bylaw as far as videotaping signals and that is the issue." So the Patriots violated a competitive rule and were punished for it. This is closer to a holding penalty then it is an issue that should be investigated by senators. Just like offensive linemen are allowed to use their hands as long as they keep them to the inside of a defenders body, the Patriots are allowed to "steal" defensive signals. But when the OL's hands get to the outside of the defender's body, it's a no-no, just like it is for the Pats to have used the videotape. What he is trying to say is that this story should be over and done with, yet it's become a national issue and debate.

BPF -- thanks for summarizing my point succinctly. That's exactly what I was trying to point out.

PatsFaninVA -- You've got a point, in that the Patriots did violate a rule, and deserve some penalty for it. My issue is primarily with the proportionality of the penalty versus the rule violation.

As BPF pointed out, based on the "Patriots are cheaters by observing defensive signals" mindset of the media, Goodell was forced into a I-must-protect-the-integrity-of-the-game stance. With the entire country looking to Goodell to stop what appeared to be football's equivalent to the Black Sox scandal, the penalty had to be severe to calm the masses.

However, with Fisher's comments as perspective, the issue obviously is not the integrity of the game -- defensive comments are apparently routinely transcribed to paper -- but instead the violation of a rule. There are many precedents for rule violations, i.e. the Bronco's salary cap, etc, that could provide context for an appropriate punishment. But there's no context for an appropriate "cheating" penalty, and unfortunately the Patriots were used as a scapegoat (in my opinion).