Friday's NFL statement

The key part of the NFL statement is that they've interviewed 40 people so far....which presumably would have to include Walt Anderson, for sure. Yet they failed to conclusively state that the balls were at a specific psi that was within the range specified in the rule. They could have easily done so if, in fact, Anderson told them that he had applied a gauge to each ball....and obtained readings that were between 12.5 - 13.5. But that WASN'T stated! In fact, I'm suggesting that they intentionally put the sentence defining the rule adjacent to the next sentence concerning the inspection...thereby creating such an impression. Why did they do that? To buy more time to figure out how they're going to address the official's actions, or lack thereof. Why the legal team? To remove them from sticky aspect about the officials, and how they did their job. Why the forensics? If you'll notice more closely, the forensics they're talking about are related to the electronic and video aspects of the game tape - i.e. they're going to see if there's any evidence of an equipment manager or ballboy tampering with them during the game. Why? Because then they can state, once and for all time, that there's no evidence that they can find....while diverting attention from the officials.

Anybody who has ever worked within a large corporate environment, will see these glaring indicators.

All in all....the NFL statement, its content, and its timing, looks to be a "net-positive" for the Patriots.

Kdo5 said:

Could easily be interpreted the other way around. They can't find anything but it is such a firestorm that they need to "thoroughly" investigate so they decide to drag it out to look like they did a good job.

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They wouldn't have stated that the Patriots balls were deflated, but the replacement balls weren't.

Dr Pain said:

I just ran this by another attorney and they agree that this is written by a lawyer and they have nothing at all. It is very important to see what is not included in this which should be.

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I just sent this to my attorney/girlfriend and she replied: "The statement reads 'We have wasted a lot of time and are gasping at strings but if we find something we will LET YOU KNOW ASAP'."

TheBostonStraggler said:

IMHO if only the 'squeeze test' by refs is true (albeit that is based on almost hearsay at this point), the NFL should be in hot water. Obviously the refs cannot tell the difference from a squeeze as they were squeezing the footballs after every play. It's almost as if the refs just didn't think it a big deal -- which we know can't be true as this is 'cheating' on a significant scale (just ask Jerome Bettis and Brunel).

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..which in the court of public opinion this does not confirm the team's innocence. Which really sucks.

Let the haters hate. Screw 'em

TommyBrady12 said:

Based on this, the weather theory goes out the window. It states the balls in the second half were properly inflated and were tested after the game and remained properly inflated. If the weather were an issue, the second half balls would have experienced a decrease in PSI too.

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Unless they were inflated outdoors.

Again-

The goals of the investigation will be to determine the explanation for why footballs used in the game were not in compliance with the playing rules

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There are no "in game" rules for compliance. They're starting from a false premise, it is now impossible for them to make a correct conclusion.

This seems pretty cut and dry to me. BB and TB both said they didn't deflate the balls. If they did actually deflate the balls and then went on the national news and lied, then they deserve to get smacked for being so dumb. Or they went on the national news and said they didn't deflate the balls because they, wait for it, didn't deflate the balls.

This is all nonsense, and the way this was handled only invites further innuendo, rumor, mis-reporting, and "SOMEBODY THINK OF THE CHILDREN" theatrics. At this point, it is what it is. It's up to everyone else now to turn the attention to the actual game now and let the NFL "investigate", "review", or whatever the hell it is they want to do.

robertweathers said:

..which in the court of public opinion this does not confirm the team's innocence. Which really sucks.

Let the haters hate. Screw 'em

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Which is what the league wants. Win/win for Goodell. Follows the "rules", still screws over BB.

TommyBrady12 said:

Based on this, the weather theory goes out the window. It states the balls in the second half were properly inflated and were tested after the game and remained properly inflated. If the weather were an issue, the second half balls would have experienced a decrease in PSI too.

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no.. second half balls were retested to be put in play, found to be under, inflated -outside on field- to specs and used, psi would hold

JackBauer said:

I just sent this to my attorney/girlfriend and she replied: "The statement reads 'We have wasted a lot of time and are gasping at strings but if we find something we will LET YOU KNOW ASAP'."

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Just ran it by my dog and he replied: "woof."

TommyBrady12 said:

Based on this, the weather theory goes out the window. It states the balls in the second half were properly inflated and were tested after the game and remained properly inflated. If the weather were an issue, the second half balls would have experienced a decrease in PSI too.

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No, it doesn't. Because if the balls that had been outside and were now full of cold air had some air added to increase the pressure back to regulation, even if that added air was warm their internal temperature would still be a lot closer to the outside temperature than the balls that had been stored inside all day before the game. Hence the psi dropoff would be much smaller. (perhaps undetectable)

Having worked at exec positions in corporate America I can state that this is simply a buying time to find something statement. They are trying to keep the media at bay (NFW) with the forensics etc. statements. They're looking thru the haystack and have found nada. Not surprising that the Big Names aren't interviewed yet because if they did find something, say a ball boy with a needle who "pleads out", they'd want to hang BB or TFB by their own statements first so that they could maximize their penalties as liars.

robertweathers said:

..which in the court of public opinion this does not confirm the team's innocence. Which really sucks.

Let the haters hate. Screw 'em

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I don't care about the haters. They are simply out en masse right now -- they'll ebb back closer to normal numbers soon enough. This is about the league. This is abut the league issuing a statement that all but said it's *cheating if true*, a league ready to damage the Patriots like they did before.

IF they take that tact, I want measurements, I want documents, I want differences, I want solid evidence they unquestionably show the football was 'regulation air pressure'. Otherwise I want Kraft n front of an arbitrator appealing any damage the league tries to cause in their quest for their repugnant phony moral high ground.

When you damage someone or something in the quest for 'fairness' you damn well better be prepared to show proof. Proof is not some ref saying 'sure I used a gauge....umm..I think?.....I just know they were regulation' (especially as they do not know regulation by grasping them -- as evidenced by no ref saying anything in the first half though they grasped the football repeatedly).

rlcarr said:

Disagree. It clearly says that they were:



(my emphasis).

I mean, if you want to say the NFL is lying, go ahead, but their official stance (which is all that matters, whether they are lying or not) is that the balls were tested and found to be within the 12.5-13.5 specification.

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That's how I read it as well. I went from being convinced NE did it to ambivalent due to all the misinformation, but that seems like a pretty definitive statement on the NFL's part.

condon84 said:

Not that I'm disagreeing with you about how they screwed up that Ray Rice incident, but I'm willing to bet the NFL will do it's best to make sure they do this right. I think they are being as thorough as possible and will want to avoid the disaster that was the Ray Rice fiasco.

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The NFL will look to do what's right for the NFL. And the NFL has its finger in the wind on almost every decision it makes now. Once they went down that slippery slope it is difficult to go back (because of the tangled web that was created).

Keep your guard up and expect the NFL to do just as much wrong as it does right.

Sicilian said:

It's crossed over from patently absurd to mind-bogglingly absurd. If you can't determine guilt, innocence, or reasonable doubt after five days and 40 interviews, then you're either grossly incompetent or you're desperately reaching for something you can use, which is disgusting.

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They come out and say "they don't know how it happened, but either way the Pats didn't do it". The media and the haters will go absolutely out of their minds!

They can't punish the Pats minus solid evidence unless they want a worse debacle when the punishment gets overturned on appeal or Kraft gets fed up and takes it to court. But they also can't exonerate us until they know exactly what caused the problem. Even if they do exonerate us with proof of what actually happened there are going to be more conspiracy theories than the Kennedy assassination.

Thankfully our guys are really good at tuning out distractions.

Don't take any of this to mean I'm not seriously pissed at the league. I am. They screwed this whole thing up in many different ways.

Oswlek said:

That's how I read it as well. I went from being convinced NE did it to ambivalent due to all the misinformation, but that seems like a pretty definitive statement on the NFL's part.

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Again - the most pertinent information is: how far is the drop?

It's still perfectly reasonable that the balls dropped due to nature, and that since this is the first time (that we know of) that balls were tested mid-game, the NFL didn't know how to deal with them being under-inflated. Somebody in Colts/Ravens might've known Pats go to the minimum with natural deflation in mind, and set them up to fall.

That's still a very believable course of events to me. I believe that more than I buy that Brady/BB would lie.

TheBostonStraggler said:

I don't care about the haters. They are simply out en masse right now -- they'll ebb back closer to normal numbers soon enough. This is about the league. This is abut the league issuing a statement that all but said it's *cheating if true*, a league ready to damage the Patriots like they did before.

IF they take that tact, I want measurements, I want documents, I want differences, I want solid evidence they unquestionably show the football was 'regulation air pressure'. Otherwise I want Kraft n front of an arbitrator appealing any damage the league tries to cause in their quest for their repugnant phony moral high ground.

When you damage someone or something in the quest for 'fairness' you damn well better be prepared to show proof. Proof is not some ref saying 'sure I used a gauge....umm..I think?.....I just know they were regulation' (especially as they do not know regulation by grasping them -- as evidenced by no ref saying anything in the first half though they grasped the football repeatedly).

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We think they are hiding out, but I am sure the Krafts and their team are taking down everything that every media outlet is saying and if (hopefully when) BB, Brady and the team are exonerated, they will come full barrel at them. They played nice with the Herald last time when they could have put them out of business. Not so this time

TommyBrady12 said:

Based on this, the weather theory goes out the window. It states the balls in the second half were properly inflated and were tested after the game and remained properly inflated. If the weather were an issue, the second half balls would have experienced a decrease in PSI too.

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No, they could have been inflated in the cold on the sideline. And we still don't know the initial readings, or the temp they took them at. It's fairly basic stuff, they could get a temp/pressure chart to determine what pressure they want at what temp. These charts are used in aviation and many other things. Or they could mandate the pressure be at a certain range when checked at game time. They did neither, and no amount of lawyers or witnesses can un ring that bell now. It's virtually impossible to determine anything when nobody ever recorded temp/pressure.

They didn't care, and now that someone threw a fit they're trying to avoid saying their procedures are garbage. The only conclusion that can be drawn from that statement is that they didn't, and still don't have any procedures in place to ensure consistent pressure when checked, let alone pressure during various games that could be nearly 100 degrees difference on the field.

TommyBrady12 said:

Based on this, the weather theory goes out the window. It states the balls in the second half were properly inflated and were tested after the game and remained properly inflated. If the weather were an issue, the second half balls would have experienced a decrease in PSI too.

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Again - not necessarily. It all depends on the temperature of the air going in in both cases AND how far above the minimum the Pats took it to for the second half.

Remember - the pressure drop comes from the air in the ball coming into equilibrium with the air outside. As the air inside gets colder (moves less fast) - the Pressure drops relative to what it was when the temperature was higher. If the temperatures were the same to begin with (2nd half), there's going to be no drop.