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CLICK HERE to Register for a free account and login for a smoother ad-free experience. It's easy, and only takes a few moments.I thought it was implied, quite strongly, that penalties should only be levied if the Patriots were found guilty of toying with the integrity of the game, but I failed to establish that clearly in those tweets and in my columns.
But he didn't answer the one elemental question that is at the bottom of this bizarre controversy: How is it that 11 of the Patriots' 12 footballs were deflated well below the NFL's minimum specifications?
Will they get to the bottom of it? My guess is they won't. Everything is circumstantial at this point. The facts are the facts – 11 of 12 deflated by two PSI – but how it happened, why it happened, that's the tough part of this investigation. How do you pin it on Belichick, who has sounded mildly convincing in his last two press conferences? How do you pin it on Tom Brady, who looked as uncomfortable the other day as anybody has ever seen him? Ball boys? Ball girls? The Deflation Fairy?
There's no smoking gun here, which will make it very difficult for Commissioner Roger Goodell to rule on this issue.
It is very hard for me to believe — no, it's impossible for me to believe — that this was one large, cosmic accident. A deflated football, and we're talking about two pounds worth of deflation, gives the team using it a distinct advantage when it comes to throwing and catching, especially during a rainstorm. It's very hard for me to believe that some rogue ball boy, acting on his or her own, unilaterally decided to use a pressure gauge to independently take some of the air out of the ball.
There's only one way this could happen, and that's with Belichick's full knowledge and approval.
If Patriots owner Robert Kraft has an ounce of integrity, he will fire Bill Belichick immediately for toying with the integrity of the game for the second time in his otherwise magnificent career — the first issue being the SpyGate fiasco that earned Belichick and the team fines and a forfeited first-round draft choice.
If Roger Goodell has an ounce of integrity, and he's not spending all his time going to pre-game soirees at Kraft's mansion, he will not only fine Belichick and take away draft choices, but suspend the head coach for the upcoming Super Bowl.
What a load of f ********. Being taken to the woodshed for a major ass kicking by Dale and Holley on WEEI right now. Good for them. Kravitz knows the league has zero on the Patriots and he's trying to get out in front of it.
Hammer him. Tweet everyone with his story from today and this tweet https://twitter.com/bkravitz/status/557766880459759617
Fraud
Here is his e-mail address: [email protected]Hammer him. Tweet everyone with his story from today and this tweet https://twitter.com/bkravitz/status/557766880459759617
Fraud
Here is his e-mail address: [email protected]
In ensuing tweets and a column or two, I wrote that if owner Robert Kraft had an ounce of integrity, Belichick would be bounced immediately, draft picks should be forfeited and the Pats should be fined. What I failed to do was make it abundantly clear, “IF the Patriots are found guilty of having tampered with the footballs…'' I failed to understand, at least at the time, that each tweet, taken by itself, is an independent organism, not a part of a continuing narrative.
I thought it was implied, quite strongly, that penalties should only be levied if the Patriots were found guilty of toying with the integrity of the game, but I failed to establish that clearly in those tweets and in my columns. Thus, it appeared I was calling for Belichick's head and other penalties before any investigation was completed. Clearly (or maybe not so clearly), I would never call for Aaron Hernandez to get a life sentence before he got his day in court, and I did not mean to suggest that Belichick and the Patriots should be penalized before an investigation was complete. But that's the way it came out, and for that, I apologize.