I think people who say defaltegate is ******** WITHOUT providing context of what that means are JUST AS BAD as those who support the NFL/Wells report.
Ben is just swearing and talking about how the Pats win and it's a conspiracy. He talks about Eli having a pre-game football procedure and Rodgers preferring inflated balls. Basically, Affleck doesn't have any substance at all to his rant, and I don't think it's worth listening to.
Just who the heck does he think he can convince with his argument? He's just going to further polarize how people already feel one way or another. Pats fans will think "yeah, **** Goodell" and everyone else will think "Patriots are cheaters who got caught and they won't even accept the penalty".
If we really want influential people talking about this, they should be describing it correctly and revealing how ******** the mess ACTUALLY is. Things including but not limited to:
- The NFL ignoring rigorous pre-game measurements, despite being told IN ADVANCE by the Ravens to monitor the balls. And despite the refs losing sight of the balls for "the first time" in the official's career. That wouldn't raise red flags for him?
- The NFL officials not recording any measurements at halftime. Or that they let the Colts balls warm up while they measured every single Pats ball. And even still, one of the two gauges said that 3/4 Colts balls were under 12.5 PSI
- That the two gauges could be so wildly inconsistent, which really speaks to how little the NFL cares about proper air pressure specs.
- That the NFL officials have overinflated balls to 16 PSI (far above the 13.5 PSI max) in a Pats game. Which speaks to how little the NFL cares about proper air pressure specs.
- That the 11/12 balls under 2 PSI tweet was blatantly false, and even though the NFL knew that from day 0, it wasn't deleted until half a year later.
- That there are email correspondences between the Pats and NFL where the Pats are BEGGING the nfl to correct misinformation that hurts the Pats' public image but the nfl responds that they will not allow it and that they will "try their bext to stop the leaks". But when rumors about the NFL and Kensil came out, the NFL issued correction statements within the hour.
- That the Wells Report goes AGAINST what the referee remembers for which measuring gauge he used. He said it was gauge 1 but the report decides it must've been gauge 2, and they use that against the Pats. The gauges are quite different in size but the report deceptively presents the pictures of them by measuring their lengths at different points to make them seem similar in size and easy for the official to confuse.
- That the Wells Report overlooks that the Colts balls were all warming up during the measurement of the Pats balls. This is a key, important idea. Their control/baseline was wrong.
- That an overwhelming consensus of scientists, researchers, and engineers from across the country have weighed in and concluded that the Wells Report uses BAD SCIENCE. Professors from MIT, Stanford, UC Berkeley, Univ of Michigan, and many others have put their reputations on the line by going on record to say the Wells Report Science is bunk. Various engineering firms, including HeadSmart Labs and AEI, have run experiments proving that the ideal gas law DOES explain the air pressure dip. A NOBEL PRIZER WINNER IN CHEMISTRY EVEN SAYS THE NFL IS WRONG.
- The only source that concludes the Patriots are likely guilty of foul play is Exponent. This "science" firm is the same on used by Big Tobacco to conclude that second hand smoking does not cause cancer. Even back in 2010 (five years before this ever began), everyone knew Exponent's reputation was trash and is a hired gunToyota calls in Exponent Inc. as hired gun
- Tom Brady refused to give up his phone to the NFL, which was proven to be incredibly leak prone. Brady did not want the public gossiping about his private life, which we know would've happened because when Brady DID give up his emails, radios and tabloids would not shut up about the "pool cover argument" and how it proved Tom & Gisele would break up.
- The player's union STRONGLY advised Tom not to give up his phone. They did not want to set a precedent that the NFL could take private phones in investigations.
- The NFL told Tom that he would not face punishment for refusing to give up his phone. Brady has said that if he were told he would face punishment for keeping his phone, then he would have gone AGAINST the advice of both his lawyers and the union, and he would have given up his phone.
- The NFL had all of his text messages anyway, since the Pats gave up the phones of the ball boys, because they were using company phones. There was no reason Brady needed to give up his phone.
- The precedent set by Brett Favre for refusing to give up his phone is simply a $50,000 fine and that's it.
- The rule book recommends that a minor equipment violation (which keep in mind, didn't likely happen) is worth a $25,000 fine and nothing more.
- The NFL took away the Patriot's #1 draft pick even though the Wells Report itself even concluded that they were not a part of ANY foul play.
- They justified their unprecedentedly large punishment by saying that the Patriots (who were not involved in Deflategate by the own admission of the NFL) were "repeat offenders" from Spygate, which was ITSELF a joke of a witch hunt.
- Although the CBA allowed for it, it defeated the spirit of a fair process when Goodell (who punshed the pats himself) appointed himself as the one to oversee Brady's appeal.
- In Brady's appeal, Goodell uses NEW information about the cell phone (that was not described in Brady's initial punishment) to justify upholding the suspension.
- By the time the issue got to a real court, the NFL changed it's stance from Brady being probably aware of some deflation to Brady being the head of a conspiracy to knowingly circumvent the rules.
- The NFL compared the alleged tampering of footballs to be on par in severity with steroid use. Strangely, when Peyton Manning was accused of steroid use by a respected and independent network (AKA not ESPN), the NFL did nothing to investigate.
- The NFL says that one of the ball boys referred to himself as "the deflator" numerous times, when in fact it was only in one text out of thousands. This text occurred in the middle of the off season. Since that one text from almost a year before deflategate, there were no more mentions of that nickname.
- That in the VERY FIRST playoff game the Pats had since all of this defaltegate ********, the refs forgot the footballs in their hotel room. This speaks to how little care the NFL has for pre-game football management and preparation. I mean seriously, after millions of dollars wasted on this "integrity" nonsense, you don't even have a guy in charge of making sure the footballs are secure? How do you up and leave the balls in a hotel room?!
And plenty more.
When people make stupid arguments like "everyone else is doing it" and "more probable than not isn't enough", all they do is enable the haters to hate on dumb Pats fans that are blindly defending Brady.
Don't blindly defend Brady. Go to the facts. The facts defend Brady just fine.
