#DFG: Canceling the Noise

[Section15Box113]

Article 46 section 2 (d) of the latest CBA
 
 
Plus they just got slapped in court for changing Ray Rice penalties.

Wouldn't it be fun if he increased it anyway?

#notreallyserious

 

[Over Guapo Grande]

Edit - nevermind

 

[scotian1]

I sure wish Kraft had never given in to these assholes.

 

[twibnotes]

I sure wish Kraft had never given in to these assholes.

Wish he never supported Goodell during the Rice affair. That was bothersome in its own right. Goodell should have been donezo after that debacle, and the word "deflategate" wouldn't exist today.

 

[geoduck no quahog]

Does Goodell actually make these decisions? Typically executives delegate the tough stuff down the line to the Kensils and Vincents of the world. The guy seems like a dolt. Which makes sense given the Kensils and Vincents of the world.

 

[DJnVa]

 
What part of the NFL rules do you think rules out increasing the suspension? 

 
Wasn't there some issue with Ray Rice getting suspended, then suspended again, that caused an issue?

 

[ifmanis5]

Dale Arnold:  "Why, why doesn't the League find out who leaked to Mortenson?"
 
Schefter (quietly): "I think they know."

Great question, interesting answer.
 
Could Bob Irsay be listed as a "league source?" He doesn't work for the league office but technically that would be correct. I still think it was Irsay.

 

[bowiac]

I've checked out of this situation due to the emotional trauma involved, so forgive me for the remedial question, but are people really expecting this ends up in court?

 

[Shelterdog]

Great question, interesting answer.
 
Could Bob Irsay be listed as a "league source?" He doesn't work for the league office but technically that would be correct. I still think it was Irsay.

 
Yes.  League source is used for anybody remotely connected with the league.

 

[j44thor]

PP, I think the story is meaningful for one thing and one thing only: it suggests that there is a view among NFL executives and possibly NFL officials about Tom's performance that is less positive than some of the reports we have heard, and that view might be shared by or affecting Goodell.
 
That possibility should come as no surprise.
 
Nothing about my posts should be taken as a prediction.  The full season thing was apparently hyperbole from the start.
 
The NFL executive involved is not a dumb man.  Not even close. And that he is apparently convinced of Brady's guilt and has strong anti-Tom views wouldn't tell me that he's a dope if I did not know something about him prior to today.  A lot of very smart people have perceptions about Brady that I think are way off the mark.

 
Isn't it just as likely that this executive, not executives, has an axe to grind and no matter what transpired yesterday his mind was made up?  That is how the story reads to me.

 

[Ed Hillel]

I've checked out of this situation due to the emotional trauma involved, so forgive me for the remedial question, but are people really expecting this ends up in court?

Odds are about 99.9%.

 

[Devizier]

Great question, interesting answer.
 
Could Bob Irsay be listed as a "league source?" He doesn't work for the league office but technically that would be correct. I still think it was Irsay.

 
Probably not, since he's dead. I think you mean Jim?

 

[ipol]

 
Probably not, since he's dead. I think you mean Jim?

"I think I'll go for a walk."
 
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sh8mNjeuyV4

 

[Mugsy's Walk-Off Bunt]

This whole ordeal reminds me of this clip from drowning Mona

I'm a little distracted by the fact that anything reminds anyone of any clip from Drowning Mona.

 

[Myt1]

Let's assume that TB12 was a compelling and credible witness yesterday.  If you are his legal/PR team, do you build on this and have him sit for a long interview (not with Jim Gray, for God's sake) in which he addresses the claims and hope to move the needle of public opinion while this thing continues to pend before Goodell?  Or do you leave well enough alone for now, understanding full well that this might all end up in court and that there are risks associated with any public statement while this is unresolved?

No.

 

[tims4wins]

http://wp.me/p3LRnW-1Vm9

More Florio

As for the science, I think that has been sufficiently debunked by people like the American Enterprise Institute, Florio said. Weve been making the point for weeks now you cant take four Colts footballs and thats the comparison, youve got 11 Patriots footballs and if the real numbers had come out early on, the Patriots would have been able to shout this down as normal application of the Ideal Gas Law. And oh by the way, the NFL is using two different gauges, which differ by up to .45 PSI, which is embarrassing in and of itself. But those numbers didnt come out.

And when they finally did come out, he continued. You had Ted Wells working with the company Exponent, which, among other things, has been the expert witness in a case arguing that secondhand smoke doesnt cause cancer which is a ludicrous proposition, but it just shows you that there are companies out there that will give you whatever opinion youre paying for. It happens all the time, and its easy to get jaded about when youre a lawyer, but it just shows that theres companies out there that will give you whatever opinion youre paying for. These companies will give you something scientific that proves whatever it is you want, and plenty of people, including me, believe thats what happened here.

I think that they deliberately delayed the process of getting the real numbers out because having the false numbers out there kept the Patriots feeling like they were on the ropes when the reality was that they were on ropes that werent even there, Florio said. We didnt get the truth until May. That is the one fact that bothers me more than anything in this entire ordeal, and thats the one fact that causes me to believe that someone was out to get the Patriots. The false information was put out there, or deliberately not corrected.

 

[JimBoSox9]

http://wp.me/p3LRnW-1Vm9

More Florio

I cant wait till Florio remembers that not only was the misinformation put out there and not corrected, but the league office issued a gag order to the Pats to prevent them from doing so as well.

 

[ifmanis5]

 
Probably not, since he's dead. I think you mean Jim?

Yes, sorry, Jim.
 
And of course this is destined for court. RG isn't going to budge and neither is TB.

 

[tims4wins]

Good point. Just tweeted that to Florio

edit : to jimbo

 

[RG33]

This matches my preconception of how NFL (and other franchise) owners operate, psychologically. Maybe I'm a little unfair but it's nice to have some confirmation.

While my interactions weren't as severe, I can assure you that some NFL owners don't like the Patriots and Brady. My experience is with one team, and there is some regional bias that comes with it, but the conversation I had recently ended with "see what your cheatin' boys can do come September". They are just like normal fans, are super competitive, and they hugely resent the continued success of the Patriots and love seeing the King fall (or be pushed) off the mountain.

 

[GeorgeCostanza]

I'm a little distracted by the fact that anything reminds anyone of any clip from Drowning Mona.

Touché mugsy. Just love the way Fitchner says "shit salad".

 

[tims4wins]

Found this gem on twitter

http://www.newsday.com/sports/columnists/bob-glauber/spygate-tapes-hardly-a-must-see-1.532081

 

[dcmissle]

Good lawyers and wise clients usually confine their talking to the courtroom, which is where we almost certainly are headed. No reason to mar a reported A+ performance with yakking that will do no good.

I care a ton more about getting our QB on the field than about perception. Fortunately, federal judges with lifetime tenure generally don't give a rat's ass about perception.

Those who care about perception can take comfort in the facts that journalism eventually yields to history, and that historians likely will view these last 5 months as a war on excellence waged by third-rate people.

 

[ipol]

Found this gem on twitter

http://www.newsday.com/sports/columnists/bob-glauber/spygate-tapes-hardly-a-must-see-1.532081

Nice find. If memory serves, Belichick didn't ask for Walsh to tape outside of the designated area but did watch the tapes when presented to him.

 

[J.McG]

Dale Arnold:  "Why, why doesn't the League find out who leaked to Mortenson?"
Schefter (quietly): "I think they know."

  
FWIW, Dale & Holley did an interview w/ Mike Reiss about an hour before Schefter came on, and Reiss said the exact same thing. So you now have two ESPN employees on record saying the league knows who leaked the false PSI measurements to one of their colleagues.

I didn't catch the Schefter interview, but I got the impression from Reiss that the league has probably known all along who leaked it, and it wouldn't be surprising if it was done with the implicit approval, if not at the explicit direction, of League execs. Reiss didn't flat out say that, but that's what I implied based on his tone and the tiptoeing he did around it. It would explain why the NFL has shown zero interest in investigating the leaks, and why they refused to provide the Pats with the correct figures for over two months, and only did so after they agreed to sign a gag order to keep them from being publicized.

Could Bob Irsay be listed as a "league source?" He doesn't work for the league office but technically that would be correct. I still think it was Irsay.

I'm 100% convinced Irsay was the source of the original Kravitz leak that an investigation was underway, but I doubt he was the source of the false Mort report. Had to be someone involved with the investigation or in game day ops, as the Mort leaker seemed to possess at least a working knowledge of the rules surrounding game ball protocols and specifications. Hard to imagine Irsay would know, or take the time to know, that info.

It also wouldn't explain how the false measurements made their way into Gardi's letter informing the Pats of the investigation, which was sent prior to the Mort leak IIRC.

 

[lambeau]

That's a great Florio interview. He confirms all SOSH's worst suspicions. Great long story of the five hours on Superbowl Sunday during the NBC pregame show he spent trying to resolve the conflict between Mort's two pounds and Rapoport's fresh report
the balls were only "a few ticks under." With all his contacts, he couldn't get a straight answerr, and that's when he realized the fix was in. He also says Roger was so weakened by the Rice case that underlings were free to go after the Patriots. He mentions
Vincent and Gardi, but I think it's clear his first choice is Kensil--as we suspected all along. This interview is gold.

 

[Mugsy's Walk-Off Bunt]

Is anyone getting the impression that Florio is beginning to be the media member who DOES see not mere bias and wrongdoing but, perhaps more importantly, THE BIGGER STORY? It would be nice to think someone with his megaphone realizes that it would be a pretty significant notch on his belt not just to flip the angle on this story, but to flip it to something clearly (you'd think) more earth shattering than Patriots and footballs being down a tick or two - i.e., league office scandal.

If Florio is really continuing to dig on this, in hopes of being The Guy who broke this wide open, that'd be pretty spectacular. Please, Florio, lean hard into your own self-interest. Go, go, go.

Edit: autocorrect b.s.

 

[lambeau]

Florio:  Could the Pats clinch the top AFC seed by Dec 20 against the Titans? If so, and TB12 was still appealing a two-game suspension, could he drop his appeal and serve his suspension by resting up and sitting out the final games in New York and Miami?
 
Would that piss everybody off? Gotta love Florio thinking this up --guess whose side Mike is on.

 

[Gorton Fisherman]

Just to clarify something; My take on the science is that it does not prove (by preponderance of evidence, more likely than not, or any other rational scale) that the footballs were deflated after being checked by the officials, BUT...
 
The data also doesn't disprove that they were deflated. Take into account a combination of readings, standard deviations, assumptions and gauge accuracy and it's certainly possible they were deflated.

AEI actually does disprove that they were deflated, at least to the extent that "science" can be construed as proving anything.  From the report, regarding the halftime PSI measurements:
 

As table 6 shows, the Patriots balls do not significantly deviate from the prediction of the Ideal Gas Law in the direction that one would expect based on the Wells report’s conclusions and the NFL’s disciplinary measures. The only significant result, in fact, indicates that the Patriots balls were more inflated than the Ideal Gas Law would imply. 
...
Note that this situation is observationally distinguishable from a situation in which the difference in pressure drops can be explained by the Patriots illegally deflating their balls. In such a scenario, you would expect the Patriots balls to measure statistically significantly below the bottom of the range implied by the Ideal Gas Law. You would also expect the Colts ball pressure to not be statistically significantly different from the bottom of the range implied by the Ideal Gas Law. But the Patriots difference is not significant and the Colts difference is significantly above the implication of the Ideal Gas Law. This pattern is wholly inconsistent with the conclusions of the Wells report. 

 
In other words, had there been illegal deflation of the Patriots' balls after they left the locker room, the PSI of the balls as measured at halftime would have been even lower than what was actually observed.
 
Also, regarding the ball that the Colts intercepted during the first half:
 

A crucial piece of evidence supporting this scenario was overlooked in the report’s analysis. The Colts intercepted a Patriots ball during the first half, and Colts staff thought it felt underinflated. Its pressure was then tested separately from the other 11 Patriots balls. This separate round of testing offers a data point in a setting other than the setting in which the remaining 11 balls were tested. Assuming that the intercepted Patriots ball that was tested was inflated to 12.5 PSI before the game, the average of three measurements derived by this separate measurement process (11.52 PSI) was at the top of the range implied by the Ideal Gas Law, according to the Wells report.
 



We can quantify how likely it would be for this to occur if we take the conclusions of the Wells report as our null hypothesis. Although the Wells report does not explicitly specify a quantity that the Patriots attempted to deflate the footballs by, the language of the report leaves one with the impression that its authors had in mind a range of 0.45 PSI to 1.02 PSI (Wells Jr., Karp, and Reisner 2015, 114; 9–10).  Thus, one could regard deflation of 0.45 PSI as the low-end estimate and about 1.0 PSI as the high-end estimate of the extent to which human-induced deflation occurred.
 



Suppose one accepts the Wells report assumption that the Non-Logo gauge was used to generate the 12.5 PSI reading before the game. If one also accepts the low end of the range implied in the Wells report—that the Patriots balls had been deflated by about 0.45 PSI—then the intercepted ball should have measured between 11.32 PSI − 0.45 PSI (i.e., 10.87 PSI) and 11.52 PSI − 0.45 PSI (i.e., 11.07 PSI). That is, the intercepted ball should have measured between 10.87 PSI and 11.07 PSI in the low-end case.
 
If one accepts the high end of the range implied in the Wells report—that the Patriots balls had been deflated by about 1.0 PSI—then the intercepted ball should have measured between 11.32 PSI – 1 PSI (i.e., 10.32 PSI) and 11.52 PSI − 1 PSI (i.e., 10.52 PSI). That is, the intercepted ball should have measured between 10.32 PSI and 10.52 PSI in the high-end case. The standard deviation of the Patriots balls reported at halftime was about 0.4. This means that the average of the measurements, 11.52, is approximately 1 standard deviation above the pressure that the Wells report analysis would predict in the low-end case and approximately 3 standard deviations above the pressure that the Wells report analysis would predict in the high-end case. If one were to assume the facts presented in the Wells report to be correct, then the odds of observing the pressure reported by the Colts are about 1 out of 3 in the low-end case and less than 1 in 300 in the high-end case—that is, quite unlikely. 

 
Again, had there been illegal tampering of the balls, the measured PSI of the intercepted ball would have been lower than what was actually measured.
 
Bottom line, the AEI results don't just show that the data doesn't support a conclusion that the Patriots illegally deflated their balls; they actually actively affirm the opposite conclusion. The only conclusion that can be reasonably drawn from the data is that "the Patriots DID NOT deflate their balls", not that "the data doesn't show anything either way". Certainly the AEI analysis isn't definitive proof, but if you're going to apply the NFL's standard of "preponderance of evidence" to the science, than it certainly shows that it is "more likely than not" that no ball tampering occurred.
 
Another way of saying this is that the data is inconsistent with a finding that the Patriots illegally deflated their balls.

 

[grsharky7]

Kessler should have told Goodell this, after Brady left:  "Roger, we know that public opinion probably won't change because they don't even bother to read everything; they don't really know what's going on, just what the media tells them.  But if we take this to court and all this evidence is presented before a judge, you and I both know that we are absolutely going to hammer you.  And the NFL office is going to look very, very bad here.  Your have no case, and we'll destroy you in court.  Spare yourself the embarrassment and take the best way out now.  Drop everything, exonerate Brady completely, but we'll accept a fine for "obstruction" or something - something along the lines of what you gave Brett Favre ($50k).  You can simply say that new evidence was produced that made it clear that Brady knew nothing and was not involved in any shenanigans.  Phrasing it that way allows you to keep the Patriots' penalties in place because it doesn't mean NOTHING happened.  So you still get to play tough cop, Brady doesn't serve any suspension, his reputation is intact.  Win-win."
 
I don't for a minute think this conversation happened, or that, if it did, Goodell would accept it.  But still…..

Goodell and the NFL have doubled down so many times now I can't see them taking that deal even though it would be in their best interest possibly.  RG can't jump ship now because then the rest of the league will cry foul, if he keeps the penalty where it is he's going to have to go federal court and possibly lose. 

 

[tims4wins]

Is anyone getting the impression that Florio is beginning to be the media member who DOES see not mere bias and wrongdoing but, perhaps more importantly, THE BIGGER STORY? It would be nice to think someone with his megaphone realizes that it would be a pretty significant notch on his belt not just to flip the angle on this story, but to flip it to something clearly (you'd think) more earth shattering than Patriots and footballs being down a tick or two - i.e., league office scandal.

If Florio is really continuing to dig on this, in hopes of being The Guy who broke this wide open, that'd be pretty spectacular. Please, Florio, lean hard into your own self-interest. Go, go, go.

Edit: autocorrect b.s.

 
I've had this feeling for weeks. I think he is working feverishly behind the scenes to get the details.

 

[Ed Hillel]

 Another way of saying this is that the data is inconsistent with a finding that the Patriots illegally deflated their balls.

Beyond that, the alternative makes little sense. McNally took footballs into the bathroom and deflated them like two tenths of a PSI, which is imperceptible to human touch and feel? I don't think so.

 

[lambeau]

Exactly. The Patriots have to explain a halftime drop of 0.53-0.63 psi (depending on your gauge choice) greater than the Colts. Exponent's own graph 25 shows a warm, dry ball gains 1.0 psi.
Everybody agrees the Patriots balls were measured at the beginning of the 13.5 minute halftime and the Colts at the end. Voila.

 

[joe dokes]

PP, I think the story is meaningful for one thing and one thing only: it suggests that there is a view among NFL executives and possibly NFL officials about Tom's performance that is less positive than some of the reports we have heard, and that view might be shared by or affecting Goodell.
 
That possibility should come as no surprise.
 
Nothing about my posts should be taken as a prediction.  The full season thing was apparently hyperbole from the start.
 
The NFL executive involved is not a dumb man.  Not even close. And that he is apparently convinced of Brady's guilt and has strong anti-Tom views wouldn't tell me that he's a dope if I did not know something about him prior to today.  A lot of very smart people have perceptions about Brady that I think are way off the mark.

 
I understand the point of your post. It raises this question for me: you mention NFL "execs and officials."  I wonder what sort of disconnect (or lack of one) there is between owners and those "closer to the game" like GMs & coaches.  My guess is that owners, as group (meaning there are exceptions, perhaps like Irsay), place the embarrassment factor higher on the list of concerns and thus "getting it over"(i.e., avoiding another federal court case) is more important to them than it is for the other group, who, having their asses beaten year after year by the Patriots, want several pounds of Patriot flesh.  The owners may not like to lose to Robert Kraft's Team, but they probably *like* making lots of money more than they dislike losing.

 

[garzooma]

Also, regarding the ball that the Colts intercepted during the first half:
 

 

 
 
The Colts intercepted a Patriots ball during the first half, and Colts staff thought it felt underinflated. Its pressure was then tested separately from the other 11 Patriots balls. This separate round of testing offers a data point in a setting other than the setting in which the remaining 11 balls were tested. Assuming that the intercepted Patriots ball that was tested was inflated to 12.5 PSI before the game, the average of three measurements derived by this separate measurement process (11.52 PSI) was at the top of the range implied by the Ideal Gas Law, according to the Wells report.

 

 

 
That's only if the intercepted ball was measured at the outside temperature.  But it was brought inside, so we don't know what the temperature was -- if it had warmed up fully, it should have been back up to 12.5.
 
On the other hand the "range implied by the Ideal Gas Law, according to the Wells report" didn't account for the balls being wet, which should have brought the temperature and therefore the PSI down a bit further.  The Colts reportedly measured the ball outside at "approximately 11 PSI", which would fit.

 

[TheoShmeo]

Joe Dokes, my guess is that there are many people with senior positions across the NFL who (a) have a "there you go again" attitude about the Pats and (b) found the team's conduct regarding the availability of witnesses and Tom's unwillingness to turnover his phone records (after Wells apparently agreed to limit it to only those relating to DG) to be quite damning.  I would guess, also, that some think that the Pats/Brady should have cut a deal with the NFL a long time ago to make this thing go away and blame Tom for not making it known to the NFL behind the scenes that he would move on with a two game suspension (assuming that did not in fact happen). 
 
Not that anyone with those views is being fair or is correct.  I also assume that officials on other teams are affected in varying degrees by their level of regard for Bob, Bill and Tom, and some will be petty types who will be affected by the fact that the Pats have been winners for all these years.  The NFL official I mentioned up thread is with a team whose fans particularly hate the Pats, fwiw.
 
But I do think there is a general sense that the Pats "did something here," regardless of how flawed the Wells Report is and the other many dubious aspects of this whole debacle.
 
For all the talk about Kraft's power and influence, we have not heard ONE owner come out with statement that is even remotely supportive of the Patriots (as far as I know).  That could speak to Goodell's level of control, but it could also reflect that the other owners and team officials just think the Pats did something wrong here, again, and should pay.
 
PS: I know I did not directly deal with your distinction between owners and GMs/coaches.  That's mostly because I simply don't know.  When I speak about NFL executives, I have senior front office people in mind, but that's probably an artificial division.

 

[joe dokes]

Joe Dokes, my guess is that there are many people with senior positions across the NFL who (a) have a "there you go again" attitude about the Pats and (b) found the team's conduct regarding the availability of witnesses and Tom's unwillingness to turnover his phone records (after Wells apparently agreed to limit it to only those relating to DG) to be quite damning.  I would guess, also, that some think that the Pats/Brady should have cut a deal with the NFL a long time ago to make this thing go away and blame Tom for not making it known to the NFL behind the scenes that he would move on with a two game suspension (assuming that did not in fact happen). 

 
For all the talk about Kraft's power and influence, we have not heard ONE owner come out with statement that is even remotely supportive of the Patriots (as far as I know).  That could speak to Goodell's level of control, but it could also reflect that the other owners and team officials just think the Pats did something wrong here, again, and should pay.
 
PS: I know I did not directly deal with your distinction between owners and GMs/coaches.  That's mostly because I simply don't know.  When I speak about NFL executives, I have senior front office people in mind, but that's probably an artificial division.

 
The bolded is also consistent with a desire to "just getting it over."
 
I didn't expect that you would know about any distinctions there. Just food for thought, when we consider leaks from "league sources,"  which is a really broad category.

 

[TheoShmeo]

 
The bolded is also consistent with a desire to "just getting it over."
 
I didn't expect that you would know about any distinctions there. Just food for thought, when we consider leaks from "league sources,"  which is a really broad category.

Agreed and your points are well taken.
 
I did not mean to imply that you thought that I did have such knowledge.  I was just trying to explain why I posted in response to you but did not deal with your main point.

 

[dcmissle]

It also is consistent with 31 other teams benefitting tangibly by the Pats being stripped of a first rounder and fourth rounder -- and intangibly by the erroneous perception that the Pats' success is attributable to cheating.
 
To reiterate a point made several times during this drama, RG's approach is entirely rational if consideration is given to the fact that parity, after money, is the NFL's greatest god.

 

[ivanvamp]

If you start with the assumption that the Pats and Belichick are cheaters, always looking to bend/break the rules, see how much they can get away with (as evidenced by Spygate), then the following narrative does make some sense:
 
- There were previous complaints about the Patriots tampering with footballs.
- The footballs WERE found to be under inflated (ideal gas law be damned).
- McNally taking the footballs into the bathroom, violating procedure.
- Colts capturing a ball and testing it and it being under inflated (again, ideal gas law be damned).
- Pats balls came in lower than the Colts balls (even though they STARTED lower, etc.).
- Subsequent investigation:  "deflator" texts.
- Brady claiming to not know who McNally is (skeptical about that).
- Brady's "shaky" press conference.
- Brunell et al saying that of COURSE the quarterback would know about something like that.
- Brady not turning over phone or electronic communications.
- Pats not allowing another interview with McNally/Jastremski.  (last two points, clearly there's something to hide, right?)
- Bill Nye and Exponent saying the science is consistent with tampering (they're wrong, but whatever).
 
I mean, it's not that difficult to see why people think they did something wrong here.  IF you start with the premise that they, you know, probably did something wrong here.  
 
So those that start with that premise aren't going to be swayed by things like scientific facts that are not easily explained to the layman.  

 

[TheoShmeo]

Exactly, Ivankamp.
 
I mean, don't we all know otherwise extremely intelligent people who essentially say "c'mon, you know the Pats did something here, right?," and really have NO interest in the rebuttal science or anything else in the Pats or Brady's favor?
 
Many of these people are not trolls or jackasses.  They just have a perception about the Pats and nothing they hear later will be actually heard and nothing will change their minds.  And, as you said, there are plenty of facts that are consistent with their preconceived notions.
 
That NFL owners, executives and officials would also be in that boat doesn't take a lot of imagination.  If anything, many of them have more reasons to have an axe to grind than the people  we know who have these attitudes.

 

[snowmanny]

It doesn't really surprise me that some ownership types would end up "outraged" at the Brady defense. There is no love lost between the NFLPA and the NFL over discipline and punishment, and by its nature and with the attorneys involved this was bound to be a
contentious proceeding, with Brady's group going after the science, the impartiality of Wells and the NFL office and the commissioner, and arguing that power was abused, rules weren't followed and so forth. Goodell making himself the arbiter only adds to the friction and pushes the point that from his end this is all more about test case squabbling rather than trying to get something right.

 

[ivanvamp]

Theo, there are still tons of people who believe the Patriots taped the Rams' super bowl walk through. Even though you point out that the story was false and the author of the story retracted it and issued an apology, they say, oh come on, you don't think they really did it? Puh-leeeeeze...

That's what we're dealing with here.

 

[Gorton Fisherman]

Exactly, Ivankamp.
 
I mean, don't we all know otherwise extremely intelligent people who essentially say "c'mon, you know the Pats did something here, right?," and really have NO interest in the rebuttal science or anything else in the Pats or Brady's favor?
 
Many of these people are not trolls or jackasses.  They just have a perception about the Pats and nothing they hear later will be actually heard and nothing will change their minds.  And, as you said, there are plenty of facts that are consistent with their preconceived notions.

 
Really? What would be some examples of these "facts", other than the very specific Spygate rule violation?

 

[lambeau]

People feel profoundly it's improbable nothing happened, and it is hard for pure logic to triumph--but it is impossible that the Patriots plotted to take 0.1 psi out of their balls. So as Holmes says,
"Once you eliminate the impossible, whatever remains, no matter how improbable, must be the truth."

 

[crystalline]

Exactly, Ivankamp.
 
I mean, don't we all know otherwise extremely intelligent people who essentially say "c'mon, you know the Pats did something here, right?," and really have NO interest in the rebuttal science or anything else in the Pats or Brady's favor?
 
Many of these people are not trolls or jackasses.  They just have a perception about the Pats and nothing they hear later will be actually heard and nothing will change their minds.  And, as you said, there are plenty of facts that are consistent with their preconceived notions.
 
That NFL owners, executives and officials would also be in that boat doesn't take a lot of imagination.  If anything, many of them have more reasons to have an axe to grind than the people  we know who have these attitudes.

This is a great example of the value of propaganda.

If you say two words together on TV enough times, eventually it becomes common wisdom that the two things are associated.

Here, the words are "Patriots" and "cheat". And phrases like "Did the Patriots cheat?" "'We did not cheat', say Patriots" are all effective at persuading people the Patriots DID cheat. In the past six months the words have been "Patriots", " Brady", and "deflate". And ESPN is the major offender.

Propaganda works. Could there be a better example?

 

[TheoShmeo]

 
Really? What would be some examples of these "facts", other than the very specific Spygate rule violation?

"Facts" was a bad word and was intended as short hand for the list of items in Ivankamp's post #738.  My mistake for not being more precise.

 

[lambeau]

Florio made the point that the League office carefully orchestrated a three-month drumbeat of " 11 out of 12 balls two pounds under" for propaganda purposes to brainwash people.

 

[Reverend]

It's fine if people want to keep going over what people believe or want to believe about the Patriots, but those posts are going to be moved over to the Perceptions thread. There are a lot of questions and points being made here about how the case will actually proceed and what is happening that I don't want to get drowned out.

 

[Harry Hooper]

In that vein, I will re-post my question from yesterday to the legal folks here:
 

 
 
Yes, in regard to the bolded, can the legal types provide some insight on why Kessler & Co. would "show their hand" here with the hours of proceedings (possible making a successful appeal more difficult) vs. the walk out of the Commish's sham procedure with the Saints players?