What, no NFL thread? Well let me start...

The Colts are done. The only question now is how much humiliation is left.

I just switched over from something else.

I knew New England would beat them pretty handily, but...wow.

Tom Brady has more post season wins than 21 franchises. Now that's a stat!

Well, if the Seahawks we saw in the NFC Championship game were to meet the Patriots we saw in the AFC Championship game, the Seahawks might as well commit seppuku the night before the Superbowl so that they can at least die honorable deaths.

Depends if you're talking about the first 55 minute Seahawks or the last 7 minute Seahawks.

Not really. The end of that game was more about the Packers' level of play dropping to the level of their coaching--two field goals in the first quarter on fourth and goal from the one? Really? In a sane world that's a mid-game firing offense--than it was about Seattle putting things together.

Not the way it works.

Remember the Buffalo Bills team that destroyed the Raiders 51-7 in the 1990 AFC champioinship game and was +12 point favorites over the Jeff Hostetler led 1990 Giants?

Yeah, neither does anyone else.

I think this will be a good super bowl - could go either way. When I saw yesterday the line was 1 point.

I'm pretty sure Pete Carroll has officially sold his soul to the devil. Which is what you have to do to compete against Belicheck, who did it 20 years ago.

But the Fail Mary and now a comeback like that predicated on the worst 2 point conversion in the history of football and a miraculous onside kick? The Seahawks are good - but damn, helps to be lucky too!

And, oh look, the Patriots got cheating.

Again.

At this point I have to fault the NFL. The price of cheating is clearly so nominal that its worth it for the result it gains.

Let's not forget the Green Bay defender who, after an interception with five full minutes left in the game, took a knee rather than return the pick with nothing but open field and two blockers in front of him, or the six Green Bay points that almost certainly could and should have been fourteen points or seven points plus fantastic field position, or Green Bay being completely asleep at the wheel to the possibility of a fake field goal when leading by 16 in the second half. That's the kind of luck that has no chance of happening against New England.

The cheating in this case is pretty clear cut and relatively severe. The NFL won't crack down, but it really, really should. Suspend Belichick for a year, take the Patriots first round draft picks for the next two years, and give the Patriots a $10,000,000 cap hit for the next two years. Do that and the cheating will miraculously stop.

As I told coworkers on Monday, I rate the Packers' collapse at the end of that game as Dallas-level.

Fault the officials, who handled the balls after every play and somehow never noticed. Or, more likely, it's standard for all games, and therefore officials never remarked on it. Is it really cheating if not monitored for compliance?

Yes. Unless you are a complete schuck, and/or named Bill Belicheck.

They were measured prior to the game - so they were attempting to enforce compliance.

I think suspending him for 2 games would be fine.

Of course, that first game would be the Super Bowl.

You can't suspend anybody for the Superbowl. That would tarnish the result if Seattle wins. What they should do is put out a statement acknowledging:

1. that the officials have not done an adequate job controlling the balls;
2. that this has resulted in many teams pushing the envelope on ball inflation (look up Aaron Rodgers, who is on record in the past stating that he likes to over inflate them, and similarly, look up Brady, who has acknowledged in the past that he likes them under inflated)
3. that lest anybody think the NFL doesn't care about it, they are instituting a new policy, where ball managers are employed by the NFL, not the teams.

And then have that be the end of it.

To his dying day, Bill Belicheck will be haunted by his Perfect 2007 Season having been completely & utterly ruined by the NY Giants!

IIRC Belicheck DIDN'T even walk over & shake Tom Coughlin's hand & congratulate him on his victory.

And it turns out that not only are the Patriots the only ones doing it, but it has had a HUGE effect.

http://www.slate.com/articles/sport...umber_of_fumbles.html?wpsrc=sh_all_mob_tw_top

Yeah, don't be too sure. I'm not bothering to read every article, but there's a whole lot of "I can't believe this, so it isn't true," journalism and very little in the way of revealed evidence. The balls might deflate due to weather, they might be deflated by a person, they might help, they might not. The Patriots won that game because their offensive line crushed the Colt's defensive line. That has nothing to do with the ball.

Also, lest I be accused of being a homer, people can verify through the baseball threads that I have a consistent record of not caring about cheating in sports, regardless of the player or team*. Indeed, I'm supportive of cheating. So, while we don't know the truth of deflate-gate, it also is irrelevant. You play to win, with every advantage available short of breaking actual civic laws.

* I can't say for sure that I've never condemned cheating by the Yankees, but, you know, they are the Yankees, they must always be condemned. Of course, same can be said for the Patriots, so condemn away, but just admit you are being petty for reasons of hatred, not rationality.

This isn't about one game, this going back over five years of data.

"There is no other team even close to... 187 offensive plays per fumble lost. The league average is 105... Most teams are within 21 plays of that number... [In] other words, it’s very unlikely that it’s a coincidence."


One of these things is not like the others....

Yeah, those other teams need to work on their sticky fingers. Still, if the league cares about this, the solution is obvious -- don't let the teams prepare the balls. We have a rule that already guarantees differences even under full compliance. If different inflations aren't fare, drop the range, make both teams use the same balls, and have NFL employees maintain custody. If it matters, then the NFL is once again shown to be run by a bunch of amateurs.

You gotta love Patriots fans.

"If the NFL didn't want the Patriots to break the rules and alter footballs, they should have kept them under armed guard at all times."

"If opposing teams didn't want the Patriots to record their practice sessions to learn play calls, they should have done a better job of sweeping for hidden cameras."

How about instead of the league and everyone else having to adapt to a bunch of dirty cheaters, you just kick out the dirty cheaters and everyone else keeps doing what they are doing?

By this point it is quite obvious the Patriots are rotten. At the VERY least Belichick needs to be banned from football (if the first $500 thousand dollar fine for cheating didn't have any effect, I don't think anything will) and the entire Front Office gone through with a fine tooth comb. How far back does this cheating go? Aside from hidden cameras and altering game balls, what other cheating schemes are going on? For how long? Until those questions are answered I'm not sure if Patriots deserve to keep their Super Bowl titles.

Haters gonna hate, but I can't blame you for setting up the excuse for when the Seahawks lose.

Look, If New England won by 3 points or even 7 it might mean something. But they KILLED the Colts. And if deflated balls benefit the QB, why didn't it benefit Luck? The Colts just LOST and are looking to blame a team that has a bad rep. The rumor was started by an Indianapolis reporter. It should be the NFL and the Refs job to check the balls, not the teams.

Wow, you aren't normally this obtuse.

Willful ignorance to get you through the day feeling good about rooting for a cheating football team.

That's OK - we'll continue to point it out to you. Sometime in 2021 the cognitive dissonance will wear off. We'll be there for you then.

Jerome Bettis said it made a huge difference in fumbling, much more so than the passing game. And there's no stat more important in football then turnovers.

And I'll just laugh at you for continuing to parse what the meaning of the word is, is. Dozens of actual current and former NFL quarterbacks have said it's a joke, the Colts' players have said it's a joke, and science says it's a joke. I can't help it if you guys need to hold on to such notions to explain why some teams are consistently good, and some, well, just aren't. Can't be that they're actually better, no, we don't apply Occam's Razor to this one.