Quote:
Originally Posted by PennBF
The answer is simple and does not require a "mensa" meeting. "Just follow the money". You have multi millionares who rely on the outcome of a game to make or loose money. To believe they would not cheat for more money is pretty naive.
It is not a case as to whether someone cheated, it is who and how. Look back on New England cheating by "stealing" the other teams signals. This sets the standards they are willing to follow. Of course they cheated. And of course they should have very stiff consequences. They should not be able to play in the Superbowl. Letting them play is rewarding cheating. Enough said.  |
It is a question of whether someone cheated or not. there have been several reasons put forth by several different sources on how the balls might have come to lose air. the NFL is still in the midst of an investigation to determine if anything intentional was done that would constitute cheating and deserve any kind of punishment.
Even if they find that something was done deliberately, the RULES, which you are so concerned over, call for the team to be fined $25,000. There is nothing int he RULES that require or even suggest that a team be banned from playing in a game.
As far as the video incident that occurred seven years ago, they were not found guilty of stealing the other teams signals. All teams video their opponents practices. The league has rules regarding the locations from which this videoing can be done. In the Patriots case, they had a guy about 25 yards outside of the area where he was supposed to be to be legal. They were found guilty of having a low level employee legally videoing the opponent practice from an illegal spot.
The bottom line is that people love to hate winners so those haters will continue to bring up incidents like that and try to convince people that this is why the Patriots have won as much as they did.
The press also hates The Patriots because Belichick doesn't make their job easy for them. But then again, why should he? He has his job to do and they have theirs. If a player, coach or team representative doesn't give them a nice juicy story or quote, they will make up their own. They'll continue to hammer this forever, the same as the haters will continue to hammer a low level employee doing a perfectly legal video in a barely illegal area.
In neither case was the an advantage gained by the Patriots and neither incident contributed to them winning the games that they have won.