#DFG: Canceling the Noise
- Thread starter nattysez
- Start date
Is anyone else starting to think that Aaron Rodgers "calf injury" and withdrawal from the Pro Bowl is pretty much due to the fact that he realizes with the scrutiny all game balls are sure to face going forward, there's no way he's going to be able to over-inflate them to his liking? The timing of his announcement and these revelations seems a little odd.
Right now it seems the NFL is damning the Pats by simply not responding at all but letting Mortenson's report spin through the morning news cycle.
This is bad enough.
All of that being said, this story still seems like much ado about nothing and still seems like the Occam's razor approach might be wisest: nobody checks these things, QBs get the balls to their liking on feel, Brady is a softy and has probably gone years without hard balls. Indy's pride got wounded in both games and it then become a story.
To imagine a conspiracy to doctor the balls and 'cheat' imagines a level of obsessive, detailed malevolence on the part of the Pats that, at a minimum, should at least come up with an explaination for why they did not reinflated the balls to the correct level after the game.
Cheaters cover their tracks better.
This is bad enough.
All of that being said, this story still seems like much ado about nothing and still seems like the Occam's razor approach might be wisest: nobody checks these things, QBs get the balls to their liking on feel, Brady is a softy and has probably gone years without hard balls. Indy's pride got wounded in both games and it then become a story.
To imagine a conspiracy to doctor the balls and 'cheat' imagines a level of obsessive, detailed malevolence on the part of the Pats that, at a minimum, should at least come up with an explaination for why they did not reinflated the balls to the correct level after the game.
Cheaters cover their tracks better.
Lose Remerswaal said:
Only when Brad Johnson did it, it wasn't allowed in the rules to doctor the ball to the QB's liking. Manning and Brady pushed that change through well after Super Bowl 37.
This is exactly right. Did it impact the ultimate outcome of the game? No. As one Colt said, the balls could have been soap and they would have lost. But the Patriots cheated the rules again. Either it comes from the top or there is a lack of control from the top. Either way it fucks with all of the hard work the players and coaches put in to get to this point, gives fodder for opposing fans and the media, and annoys the shit out of Pats fans that want to enjoy this sixth trip of the BB/TB era to the Super Bowl. It absolutely sucks and whatever silly competitive advantage under inflated balls may or may not provide is not worth this.B H Kim said:
crystalline said:
That's why I mentioned that the Colts' pregame measurement would also need to be taken into account. If the differences are similar relative to the starting PSI in both teams' footballs, then this is a non-issue.
Someone mentioned that the Pats ran more plays, but I don't think that's a feasible explanation for a significant difference in PSI differences post-game. Both teams' football were outside, whether in play or not, and theoretically the Patriots were rotating 12 balls throughout the game, so I can't imagine each ball should have seen more than a handful of plays...which you wouldn't think would have an effect on differences in PSI, though if there are, they should be expected to be minor.
In other words, if the Colts' footballs started at 13 PSI and ended at 11 PSI, and the Patriots' footballs started at 12.5 PSI and ended at 10.5 PSI, then this should be a non-story. But if the Colts started at 13 PSI (or whatever it was) and ended at 12.5 PSI, and the Patriots started at 12.5 PSI and ended at 10.5 PSI, I don't think "the Patriots ran more plays" can be a feasible reason to explain the difference when you consider 12 were in rotation, so each ball should have only seen a limited number of 'game time.'
This is all so stupid.
No, but.....OnWisc said:
Lost in the " what's so wrong with Aaron Rodgers admitting that his game balls are above the legal limit, it just makes them harder to throw, not easier" rationalization:
anyone want to guess which starting QB had the lowest interception rate in the NFL this season? (second lowest, 47 out of 48 qualified, if we consider all QBs with 50 or more attempts)
http://www.sportingcharts.com/nfl/stats/quarterback-interception-rates/2014/
It amazes me how with twitter "professional" columnists and writers have turned into weatherman, scientists, and judge and jury. The amount of garbage these writers constantly spew on twitter with no actual knowledge of what they are talking about is just unbelievable. Embarrassing.
I would assume the Pats did this against the Ravens as well. It was really cold and I find it hard to believe the Pats would deflate the balls by up to 16% for the first time in the AFC championship game. It seems like a huge risk if it wasn't something Brady was comfortable with and had done before.
Bob420 said:
Or maybe it's done ALWAYS and nobody gives a crap, but the Indy guy decided to tweak Brady by complaining to the refs, knowing he'd get balls that weren't to his liking after the half. Lot of good it did them. Brady laughing at the question Monday was probably in response to the idea that anyone was investigating the air pressure in the balls, not whether he liked them a bit soft if he can get them that way.
Gerry Austin on Mike & Mike:
"PSI is measured every game in the official's locker room 2 hours before the game"
"If air pressure is low, they bring it up to about 13 pounds. If it's high, they bring it down"
"My understanding is all 12 balls were under 13 pounds, but 11 of them were over 2 pounds under 13 pounds"
"All 24 balls were checked, to my understanding. Colts balls were up to 13 pounds and Patriots balls were not."
"My understanding is balls were brought up to standard at half time. I don't know this for a fact, but it would surprise me if this did not happen."
"PSI is measured every game in the official's locker room 2 hours before the game"
"If air pressure is low, they bring it up to about 13 pounds. If it's high, they bring it down"
"My understanding is all 12 balls were under 13 pounds, but 11 of them were over 2 pounds under 13 pounds"
"All 24 balls were checked, to my understanding. Colts balls were up to 13 pounds and Patriots balls were not."
"My understanding is balls were brought up to standard at half time. I don't know this for a fact, but it would surprise me if this did not happen."
I hope that the Patriots did not doctor the balls. I hope that the reason that Belichick didn't hear about this until Monday and Brady laughed it off is because they are innocent. I hope that the celebration after a Pats Super Bowl win in eleven days will be as sweet as it is in my dreams. I hope.
The league is between a rock and a hard place here. If they come down with a strong punishment, then Goddell is going to have to come out and explain the process, opening themselves up for criticism if they didn't do cover all possible angles in their review. Same if the punishment is light. They make take the middle option and announce that they are unable to determine if the under-inflation was the result of tampering or some combination of environmental condition and gameplay usage, but that as a precaution, the league will make changes to the ball handling procedures for 2015.
singaporesoxfan said:
I have no firsthand experience, but from talking to guys who have handled the K ball, it generally sucks in all aspects. It's never been kicked, so it isn't rounded like kickers prefer, and it's also slick as hell since it doesn't have any dirt or grime on it to grip. So it would theoretically make fakes a little harder, but there's so little evidence that I can't say definitively. Having said that, it's probably the reason people think specialists can't throw.
I work with Pressure and Vacuum stuff for a living and if anyone has any questions feel free to get in touch but Sumner(as usual) is exactly correct.SumnerH said:
Gauge pressure references local atmospheric pressure and is typically what is used in positive pressure applications. However if you do math using the ideal gas law(PV =nRT) or it's derivitives(in this case P1V1 = P2V2) you have to use absolute pressure. You also have to use Kelvin as a temp scale so going from room temperature to the outside temperature isn't as big a change as you might expect.
When he says "all 24 balls were checked" is he saying at halftime or before the game? In other words is he reporting that Anderson did indeed check the balls before the game, or just that this is what usually happens?Corsi said:
Two games in eight days, two off-season rule changes/modifications:Hoya81 said:
On To Seattle!!
Not quite. As SumnerH keeps saying, we need to know when and where the balls were tested before drawing any conclusions. I can easily see them thinking "oh shit, we should test the Colts balls too" after the game, once they've already had time to warm up.H78 said:
Chain of custody comes into play here as well.
Does he mean that they were checked before the game but not fixed until half time? Or that they were fine before the game but not at halftime? I agree that if it's number 2, they're screwed and deserve what they get.H78 said:
Gerry Austin doesn't work for the NFL. Maybe he somehow has some inside information but it's quite likely he's just interpreting the Mortenson story like everyone else.Corsi said:
Corsi, on 21 Jan 2015 - 09:33 AM, said:
Corsi said:
Checked when? Before the game? at Halftime? Both? The bolded statement is not specific enough to implicate anyone.H78 said:
Corsi said:
He also said that the refs keep the balls until 10 min before the game, when the bags of 12 balls are given to each team's ball manager.
Morgan's Magic Snowplow said:
He wasn't interpreting the Mortensen report. It was quite clear he had spoken to someone with information.
Why does everyone assume the refs didn't do their job, which is to check the balls before the game? We have absolutely no evidence of that. If it is common practice, as some suggest, that the refs don't do their job, I am confident there would be stories coming out to that effect.wiffleballhero said:
IMO, the best way out of this is for many more QBs to come out and say this happens all the time. We have heard from Rodgers, Johnson, and Carr. We need to hear more. And it is my opinion that this ends up being much more a Brady issue than a Belichick issue. It appears that the QBs have more say on how they want the balls to feel.
Mark Brunell @M_Brunell8 10m10 minutes ago
“@PriscoCBS: What if Brady had the equipment guys do it and Belichick didn't know? Possible?”VERY
“@PriscoCBS: What if Brady had the equipment guys do it and Belichick didn't know? Possible?”VERY
His understanding? Did someone tell him that was the case or not? If so, who? What level of this is assumption?
The biggest farce in this whole debacle is that nobody from the NFL will come out on the record and say anything, while simultaneously allowing more anonymous leaks than the Titanic.
The biggest farce in this whole debacle is that nobody from the NFL will come out on the record and say anything, while simultaneously allowing more anonymous leaks than the Titanic.
Whether or not they checked them before the game doesn't seem to matter for the argument that weather and conditions changed the pressure. If the Colts footballs were at 13 pounds and Pats were over 2 lbs lighter, the weather didn't change it. Unless one believes the Colts would over inflate to 15+ lbs in prep for a cold/rainy game.
Merkle's Boner said:
Like Rodgers saying he overinflates them and sometimes they get through?
Not all rules are created equal - like the one where you're required to tag second base when turning a double play. I suspect the Patriots (and Rodgers) submit their under/overinflated balls to the refs as required and say, "these are the footballs we'd like to play with today" and the refs typically inspect them and say, "yup, those are footballs." They have a pressure gauge available to them but I suspect they rarely pull it out because why wouldn't you want the quarterback to be comfortable with the ball, even if it's slightly over/under pressure? Is the ball slipping out of their hands more often somehow going to improve the game for the fans? And who decided 12.5 - 13.5 psi was the ideal pressure for a football? Perhaps Clarence Standard had bigger hands than Brady and smaller hands than Rodgers.
I think this is a rule that is frequently bent and everybody knows it and I suspect we're going to hear more Grudens coming out to say it's ridiculous.
Turns out George Brett really did hit that homerun.
I think this is a rule that is frequently bent and everybody knows it and I suspect we're going to hear more Grudens coming out to say it's ridiculous.
Turns out George Brett really did hit that homerun.
Sumner - do you know how rapidly the PSI can drop? Can a football really lose 2.0 pounds of pressure in less than about three and a half hours (the time between when the balls were supposed to be checked before the game started, and half time when the decreased pressure was noticed)?
That's the other thing to consider, isn't it? I think we all agree that a difference in PSI can occur with temperature variances. But how rapidly can it happen when the temperature goes from about 50 degrees to 30 degrees over the course of 3.5 hours?
That's the other thing to consider, isn't it? I think we all agree that a difference in PSI can occur with temperature variances. But how rapidly can it happen when the temperature goes from about 50 degrees to 30 degrees over the course of 3.5 hours?
Bob420 said:
There's no way the temperature didn't change them. That's just physics. It's entirely possible that the Pats let out air as well. We need to see the full report, and the NFL needs to be looking at tape of the sidelines if they have it.