OT - Patriots, again- say it aint so Bill

[oldpotatoe]

Originally Posted by Len J

All 12 balls were under inflated. 11 of them were 2 lbs under. The other was 1 lb according to published sources.

So each team uses only the balls they bring? Ought to be neutral balls.

[MattTuck]

Originally Posted by oldpotatoe

So each team uses only the balls they bring? Ought to be neutral balls.

I have no issue with teams bringing their own balls, so long as they are inspected ahead of time and controlled from that point forward by the officials.

[oldpotatoe]

Originally Posted by MattTuck

I have no issue with teams bringing their own balls, so long as they are inspected ahead of time and controlled from that point forward by the officials.

But I read a lot of them aren't new. Should be, IMHO.

[OtayBW]

I think they should just throw the balls away (up into the stands) after every play where the ball touches the ground - just like in baseball....
That'll give everyone a new, fresh ball with plenty of air each and every time.

[sitzmark]

Originally Posted by Bruce K

Actually, according to ESPN and a press release from the Patriots, the balls were NOT re-inflated.

An additional set of 12 balls was inspected during half time and brought to the field. The delay to start the third quarter, when the officials "forgot to change the kicking ball" was due to the fact that they did not complete the inspection of the new set of balls until after the teams had returned to the field.

BK

As the rules are written, there should have been no reason to change a "kicking ball". Those balls are sent directly from the manufacturer to the officiating staff and segregated from the 12 "conditioned balls" that each team/QB is allowed. The home team submits an additional 12 (non-kicking) balls for validation to be used by either team if replacements are needed. In this case the 12 "backups" should have been delivered to the Patriot's equipment manager if the original 12 were taken out of play.

[buddybikes]

Thinking about this a bit, my guess now is that Patriots ball boy pumped bunch of them up, Brady picked out his 12. Then refs perhaps checked them but didn't bother checking closely, basically good enough. Who knows if they even checked. So much going on before a game, pressure in game ball has never been highest concern. This has probably been the process forever.

[MattTuck]

This thing is both sad and hilarious to watch.

Team is playing in the super bowl in 10 days, and the coach and QB are doing press conferences about ball pressure.

The NFL has no facts because the officials probably failed to do their job, and the rules as written are so open to manipulation, that the NFL isn't going to come out of this looking any better than the Patriots. So, the patriots keep the footballs, next to a furnace that warms them up to 105 degrees, inflate the balls to 12.5 psi, and deliver them the officials for testing. Against the rules? Not according to the way it is written.

A bunch of the other QBs are probably rolling their eyes, thinking "jeeze, our footballs are going to be under a microscope next year."

I'm actually quite curious to read whatever report the NFL produces, simply because I'm curious what the facts are. Did the officials actually check the balls? Were the balls tampered with? If the second round of balls were low in air when they were in the ref's control, why was that not discovered until the third quarter?

If someone actually took a ball that the officials approved, and removed air out of it, then someone should probably be punished, but if it is someone on the Patriots, I'd hope there is someone at the NFL that gets in trouble for coming up with such a poorly written rule in the first place.

It's almost like a twilight zone episode. One wonders if the Ray Rice debacle hadn't blown up in the NFL's face in the fall, if they wouldn't be so concerned with this investigation.

[verticaldoug]

I tend to agree with someone who posted earlier this is a marketing ploy to hype the game and NFL is playing fans for dumbsuckers. The only thing which will get their attention is a fan movement to turn off the game.

I listened to Brady on the radio yesterday and came away with the opinion whatever happened was SOP. So somehow the deflation story went viral with ESPN behind it, and now the NFL is flogging it for all the pre game hype it can generate. (13 pages and counting on a cycling forum. They are good, aren't they?)

Bellicheck has to play the bad guy laughing all the way to the bank, Brady is Luke Skywalker being corrupted by the darkside, now all we need is for Giselle to weigh in and pull some other WAGs hair for bad mouthing her Tom. (Wait, Johnny Weir and Tara Lipinski are doing pre-game, Giselle can duke it out with Tara) This is now a World Wide Wrestling Production Ring side.

Call it what it is - The Theatre of the Absurd.

[ergott]

Originally Posted by verticaldoug

Brady is Luke Skywalker being corrupted by the darkside

Or perhaps Anakin and we know how that story goes...

We'll have to wait another year to find out if Luke eventually succumbs to the dark side.

[shovelhd]

Hey Tom, did you catch the number of that bus?

[oldpotatoe]

Baseball too.

http://m.mlb.com/news/article/15079018

I am SURE the Colts got their butt kicked because of this, SURE!!

Ya know it were the Raiders who beat the Patriots like this, I would wonder but.

[rugbysecondrow]

Look at the direction the NFL has taken in recent years, it is offense friendly.

They want to see scoring, touchdown passes, great highlight reel catches. The rules have changed to allow this development and teams have responded with higher scoring games. How the QB prefers his balls (he he he) is tied directly to this offense friendly nature of the NFL. I suspect many teams are bemoaning the Colts causing a stink about this. As it has become apparent, many QBs have very specific game balls they prefer to use and I suspect the NFL has turned a blind eye to this because it benefited the direction they have chosen for the league. If both teams had specific team balls, is it really an advantage?

People have used the analogy of baseballs, but how about baseball bats? Each player has a size, length, weight, diameter, material...they even use pine tar to help grip. It is highly customized based on the player.

[DukeHorn]

Brady's press conference was excruciating. Probably worse than Tomsula's press conference.

http://www.si.com/nfl/2015/01/22/tom...ess-conference

I'm guessing a loss of a 3rd round pick at this point.

[Len J]

Update

To those of you claiming that the entire deflation was due to the weather, How do you explain that all 24 balls were tested and certified pre-game......the same 24 balls were tested at halftime and 11 of the 12 NE balls were relatively equally underinflated, 1 NE ball was underinflated but not as much and NONE of the 12 Colts balls were underinflated. I guess the colts were in different weather conditions?

It appears to me that, more likely than not this came out of an environment in NE where the rules are recommendations not requirements. It's a culture of cheating.

I have 2 problems with the press conferences yesterday:

- Bill says he didn't know about it until first thing Monday morning and has his presser on Thursday & claims he has no idea what happened or how it happened. Does anyone really believe that, with all the power and control he has in NE, that if he really wanted to know he couldn't have easily found out what happened? C'mon.

- In one sentence Brady talks about how much time and attention he spends finding the balls that feel the best to him & on the other he says he couldn't tell they were underinflated. LOL. On a team that has a reputation for succeeding because they pay attention to the small details, are we to believe that the person that handles the ball the most, doesn't know the difference between a properly inflated ball and one that is 16% less inflated? Again, C'mon.

- Every ex-QB/player commentator or writer that I've heard practically laughed out loud at Brady's Sqt Schultz imitation.

Anyone want to buy a bridge in Brooklyn.

Len

[velomonkey]

Originally Posted by Len J

Update

To those of you claiming that the entire deflation was due to the weather, How do you explain that all 24 balls were tested and certified pre-game......the same 24 balls were tested at halftime and 11 of the 12 NE balls were relatively equally underinflated, 1 NE ball was underinflated but not as much and NONE of the 12 Colts balls were underinflated. I guess the colts were in different weather conditions?

I'm trying to fair here, there are so many variables that you nor I know.

The balls, we do know - are initially tested indoors and certified - when they retested them how do you know they weren't tested outdoors. The 12th ball could have been a kicker ball which, unlike throwing balls, most kickers want inflated as much as possible.

For all we know the balls could have been heated, air put in, certified and then played. Technically that is within the rules - going on the edges of bad intent, yes, but technically fine.

Just let it play out - or not, this just isn't the bust most people want it to be.