I'm pessimistic about the outcome of this report, for several reasons.
- Having had considerable physics training, it is obvious to me that there is no evidence of impropriety by the Patriots whatsoever. Despite that, much of the media took the allegations seriously, some scientists took them seriously - even Belichick seemed to take them seriously. Even some people on this board have said "everyone does it" as if the Patriots did something, rather than "nothing happened". That demonstrates that these allegations have a kind of stickiness to them that is hard to wash off.
- The fact that so many exaggerated and damaging leaks were released just before the Super Bowl demonstrates that the NFL is biased against the Pats: not only were the leakers of the false information obviously biased, but the belated and insipid corrections the NFL eventually released demonstrate pervasive institutional bias. This is a problem because the law firm doing the investigating was hired by the NFL.
- The fact the media put so much credence in the word of anonymous source in implausible anti-Patriots schemes shows the media is mainly biased against the Pats. Also a problem, because it means that the law firm's PR will be better if it releases an anti-Pats report.
- This investigation is probably becoming more wide-ranging than just the balls. These kind of investigations led by law firms have a way of eventually encompassing everything, especially when the firm is paid hourly. The play given to that absurd story about the Patriots person giving a ball to an official illustrates this.
- Here I'm going to say something that will only sound believable to those of you with experience in litigation: it is virtually impossible to plow through an entire organization's emails and records and not find something suspicious. Organizations, even sophisticated businesses, are made up of many employees, and there is no way, there is no chance, that at least one of them did not email something that would look bad excerpted on the front page of the Times.
You see, in litigation, the first thing one side does is try and get every possible record from the other side (called "discovery"). There's *always* something. If there's not, there's always something that can be taken a bit out of context and spun to be something. It's just how people are, particularly people without experience in this. As long as the law firm doing the investigating is able to get all of the Pats records and emails - and because of the bad publicity that would go along with a claim that the Pats are "not cooperating", they well might - there is very little chance that the firm won't be able to find something damaging to quote.
And that's true for sophisticated organizations that are used to being sued, are used to discovery: financial firms, software giants, police departments, movie studios. A sports team that is made up of people who are chosen for their expertise in football, not in composing bland emails, just isn't likely not to have something someone wrote that is either damaging or can be spun to be damaging.
- The fact that this very simple investigation, one that should take about half-a-day with a high school physics book, is taking so long, strongly suggests to me that the firm is on a fishing expedition against the Pats. And since the media and the NFL both hate the Pats with a passion, there is no reason for the expedition not to continue until something is found, and something always will be.
