#DFG: Canceling the Noise
- Thread starter nattysez
- Start date
I don't think Richardson has said anything publicly, but his ex-GM Marty Hurney has been all "cheater-cheater-pumpkin-eater" for years about the Patriots, hearkening back all the way to SBXXXVIII and various acts of (fabricated) skullduggery...
Let's not forget the Shula Belicheat bullshit.
While he's not an official voice of the Fish, he is, at the least, loosely affiliated with them.
Add the Dolphins to the list of teams suffering karma's wrath.
While he's not an official voice of the Fish, he is, at the least, loosely affiliated with them.
Add the Dolphins to the list of teams suffering karma's wrath.
"It's the Wednesday before Thanksgiving, I wonder how I can get some clicks? I know, I'll say I'm a Patriots fan who thinks they're big cheaters. I'll also say that Brady is immobile, evincing a complete lack of understanding of football."
Edit:
It's on Deadspin. Here're the relevant portions:
Another, dumber interpretation [of ESPN's tweet] would be that it was an expression of ESPN’s biased, anti-Patriots agenda. In this reading, the tweet is about how the Patriotscheat, as evidenced by the (deflated) footballs and cameras (illegally taping walkthrough practices). Take note of the fact that earlier, with 1:34 left on the clock, Taylor had pointed to his headset as he looked towards the sideline, recalling past eyebrow-raising headset activities in Foxboro. Also note that NFL reporter Chris Mortensen, who’s employed by the Worldwide Leader, supremely fucked up his Ballghazi reporting by taking anything the NFL would give him. Why would you take note of these things? So you can follow the high trutherism with which the bad tweet was met by aggrieved Patriots fans.
***
The clarification was stupid and unnecessary, especially the last sentence. (“We’ll be better.” This isn’t Dan Rather apologizing for the Killian documents.) Regardless, it was, to many, another page in the pile of evidence proving that ESPN is out to get the Patriots with their Bias Journalisms, just like Roger Goodell and the NFL tried to make an example of them because they win so much and their starting quarterback gets to hump Gisele and ur all jealous haters.
***
I’m a Patriots fan, and I can admit that the Patriots do shady shit. Yes, Mortensen was sloppy in his Ballghazi reporting. At the same time, John Jastremski and Jim McNally were not texting each other about weight loss. Yes, Goodell is indeed an inept knob who could complicate a peanut butter sandwich—not even jelly, just peanut butter, on one side—but at the same time, Bill Belichick’s science report was just an excuse for him to say “balls” multiple times.
***
Before deflated footballs were a hotly debated topic, New England fans were already insufferable. When it came to choosing sides between Goodell and the Patriots, the best outcome was mutually assured destruction, but somehow, everyone with a Tom Brady jersey avatar believed that they were the wronged underdogs. That thought process ignores the fact that everyone else despised the Patriots long before the circus started in January. It also retroactively tries to frame the Patriots as being screwed over in the Spygate investigation, despite Bill Belichick admitting they broke the rules and the NFL literally stomping the tapes to keep them from catching more hell.
The Patriots exploit a loophole, and move on to the next one after their competition complains. Sometimes, they break rules and try to defend themselves within the gray area. They’re not martyrs. The Patriots are a shifty, extremely unlikeable organization, and that comes with the territory when you support them. Maybe one day they’ll cross a moral line and kill an opponent’s assistant on the sideline for some sort of advantage no one else comprehends—classic Belichick, always one step ahead—but until then, I’m at peace with rooting for an immobile quarterback who snaps at his teammates if they’re facing a deficit and a football genius in the body of a gremlin enveloped in the paranoia of Richard Nixon’s ghost. The Patriots are sketchy as fuck and definitely did some bad shit, and while ESPN’s dumb Twitter account wasn’t actually alluding to that, if they had been, it would have been okay. On to Denver.
Edit:
It's on Deadspin. Here're the relevant portions:
Another, dumber interpretation [of ESPN's tweet] would be that it was an expression of ESPN’s biased, anti-Patriots agenda. In this reading, the tweet is about how the Patriotscheat, as evidenced by the (deflated) footballs and cameras (illegally taping walkthrough practices). Take note of the fact that earlier, with 1:34 left on the clock, Taylor had pointed to his headset as he looked towards the sideline, recalling past eyebrow-raising headset activities in Foxboro. Also note that NFL reporter Chris Mortensen, who’s employed by the Worldwide Leader, supremely fucked up his Ballghazi reporting by taking anything the NFL would give him. Why would you take note of these things? So you can follow the high trutherism with which the bad tweet was met by aggrieved Patriots fans.
***
The clarification was stupid and unnecessary, especially the last sentence. (“We’ll be better.” This isn’t Dan Rather apologizing for the Killian documents.) Regardless, it was, to many, another page in the pile of evidence proving that ESPN is out to get the Patriots with their Bias Journalisms, just like Roger Goodell and the NFL tried to make an example of them because they win so much and their starting quarterback gets to hump Gisele and ur all jealous haters.
***
I’m a Patriots fan, and I can admit that the Patriots do shady shit. Yes, Mortensen was sloppy in his Ballghazi reporting. At the same time, John Jastremski and Jim McNally were not texting each other about weight loss. Yes, Goodell is indeed an inept knob who could complicate a peanut butter sandwich—not even jelly, just peanut butter, on one side—but at the same time, Bill Belichick’s science report was just an excuse for him to say “balls” multiple times.
***
Before deflated footballs were a hotly debated topic, New England fans were already insufferable. When it came to choosing sides between Goodell and the Patriots, the best outcome was mutually assured destruction, but somehow, everyone with a Tom Brady jersey avatar believed that they were the wronged underdogs. That thought process ignores the fact that everyone else despised the Patriots long before the circus started in January. It also retroactively tries to frame the Patriots as being screwed over in the Spygate investigation, despite Bill Belichick admitting they broke the rules and the NFL literally stomping the tapes to keep them from catching more hell.
The Patriots exploit a loophole, and move on to the next one after their competition complains. Sometimes, they break rules and try to defend themselves within the gray area. They’re not martyrs. The Patriots are a shifty, extremely unlikeable organization, and that comes with the territory when you support them. Maybe one day they’ll cross a moral line and kill an opponent’s assistant on the sideline for some sort of advantage no one else comprehends—classic Belichick, always one step ahead—but until then, I’m at peace with rooting for an immobile quarterback who snaps at his teammates if they’re facing a deficit and a football genius in the body of a gremlin enveloped in the paranoia of Richard Nixon’s ghost. The Patriots are sketchy as fuck and definitely did some bad shit, and while ESPN’s dumb Twitter account wasn’t actually alluding to that, if they had been, it would have been okay. On to Denver.
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I can't figure out Deadspin on this one. It seems like one really up their alley of no access therefore we can take on the establishment has been fairly piss poor on their coverage of ballghazi. Very much a pox on both their houses type coverage.
That article is a fucking disgrace. Kalar gets about a thousand facts wrong while proclaiming he's a Pats fan so it's OK to shit on the team. He can fuck right off. Utter steaming garbage.
Maybe it's because I filtered everything I read and saw regarding this whole debacle through SoSH, but I was unaware until this particular article that anyone outside of this site referred to what is commonly called Deflategate as "Ballghazi". Is that a reference someone "borrowed" and it caught on here, or is this author a lurker around these parts and picked it up from us?
I saw Ballghazi out in the wild long before I joined here, but not sure where it originated.
Really didn't need to read that post when I'm in a good Thanksgiving mood. There's an infinite amount of Stupid on the web and I hate to see it regurgitated here.
Couldn't we just post porn?
Couldn't we just post porn?
I think it's an interesting topic. Buried under 500 layers of bullshit, but still interesting. Deadspin seems to be the HQ of Boston/Pats fans who rush to out-do one another in terms of denouncing the rest of the fanbase for being whiny assholes. In my opinion, this is much more lame than simply being a whiny asshole, because the world is full of idiots and every team has ignorant dipshit fans that can easily be called out as such from their social media postings.
The original post by Samer is the epitome of this behavior as no one has been talking about DFG for a couple months and it doesn't seem to be in response to any specific controversy beyond the Sportscenter tweet, which is a pretty thin foundation for an article like this. Then you get to the the comments section, and people like this:
Maybe I was insulated by primarily following the whole saga on SOSH but to me the panderers are worse than the sports radio whiners because they see themselves as the cool, self-aware Pats fan who's not like all the other tools -- but don't have the spine to just brush it off and go about their day. They gotta distance themselves like Obama did to Jeremiah Wright, with the small caveat that instead of a presidential race, it's the internet, and the additional caveat that no one gives a fuck.
I guess this turned into more of a rant than a thesis but this phenomenon is bizarre. You don't really see it with other teams or cities unless I'm just blind. It does reinforce my main takeaway from the DFG saga, however, which is that Everyone Sucks.
The original post by Samer is the epitome of this behavior as no one has been talking about DFG for a couple months and it doesn't seem to be in response to any specific controversy beyond the Sportscenter tweet, which is a pretty thin foundation for an article like this. Then you get to the the comments section, and people like this:
...who are pandering to the non-New England commentariat and the narrative that we are all insufferable hotheads with a victim/inferiority/persecution complex.
Maybe I was insulated by primarily following the whole saga on SOSH but to me the panderers are worse than the sports radio whiners because they see themselves as the cool, self-aware Pats fan who's not like all the other tools -- but don't have the spine to just brush it off and go about their day. They gotta distance themselves like Obama did to Jeremiah Wright, with the small caveat that instead of a presidential race, it's the internet, and the additional caveat that no one gives a fuck.
I guess this turned into more of a rant than a thesis but this phenomenon is bizarre. You don't really see it with other teams or cities unless I'm just blind. It does reinforce my main takeaway from the DFG saga, however, which is that Everyone Sucks.
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(Repeating my post from January)
"SoSH, can we nickname the next scandal using the name of a Washington DC hardcore band?"
"Bad Brains?"
"Nah, already used that for concussions."
"Jawbox?"
"Ray Rice case."
"Minor Threat?"
"Adrian Peterson case."
"Burning Airlines?"
"We're not talking about Pete Carroll's beliefs here."
"What about Fugazi?"
"By Jove, I think you got it!"
Even the friggin soap operas are getting into the act, on GH Thanksgiving program today, a Jets and Bills fan were watching the game on TV. It was Bills vs Pats tied with 20 seconds to go and Brady had the Pats almost in field goal range when he threw a pick six that was returned 60 yds for the Bill to win. Soap was on ABC, are they affiliated with ESPN?
My buddy mentioned something about Deadspin and the Pats cheating about 12 hours ago. I came here and saw nothing. Ergo, I conclude this is clickbait from the screen that is SoSH.
Thank you for putting into words what I've found so irritating about Deadspin and it's comment section over the past 2+ years.
If you read any comment section on any site looking for anything other than material to mock others, you kind of get what you deserve.
To summarize for those who don't have the time to watch:
The real problem with the data is not why the Pats balls were too low when measured at half-time -- they were right where the ideal gas law says they would be -- but why the Colts balls were so high.
He points out that the Colts balls were in a plastic trash bag during the fist half and stayed dry, while the Pats balls got wet because they were not protected. The NFL/Exponent analysis failed to properly account for the difference between the rates that a dry football and a wet football would regain PSI when warmed up. (It conducted experiments on this fact but then its report improperly addressed this issue.) This difference would explain why the Colts balls were so much higher in PSI when measured at halftime after having warmed up in the locker room.
He's an Eagles fan.
The real problem with the data is not why the Pats balls were too low when measured at half-time -- they were right where the ideal gas law says they would be -- but why the Colts balls were so high.
He points out that the Colts balls were in a plastic trash bag during the fist half and stayed dry, while the Pats balls got wet because they were not protected. The NFL/Exponent analysis failed to properly account for the difference between the rates that a dry football and a wet football would regain PSI when warmed up. (It conducted experiments on this fact but then its report improperly addressed this issue.) This difference would explain why the Colts balls were so much higher in PSI when measured at halftime after having warmed up in the locker room.
He's an Eagles fan.
Really well done. Wish he was a little less classic frenetic college professor, but does a great job with it.
Especially like the part on the transient wet/dry graphs. It would be nice if we had the full exponent data set to see if it's true that the lines are parallel when data shows they shouldn't be.
Especially like the part on the transient wet/dry graphs. It would be nice if we had the full exponent data set to see if it's true that the lines are parallel when data shows they shouldn't be.
After watching that video, one cannot help to wonder what really happened with Exponent. Were they rushed? Are they incompetent? Did they have an agenda? Unless this professor made some sort of mistake, isn't this the slam dunk debunking in a very digestible format (i.e. a layperson can follow it)?
Mr. "it's wrong to criticize my independence" is going to represent Exxon in New York State Attorney's investigation into the company’s climate science. I will leave this posted without comment - as I realize he is just performing his duties as an attorney (which is to advocate for his client much like he did for the NFL).
http://thehill.com/policy/energy-environment/261771-exxon-hires-deflategate-lawyer-for-climate-investigation
http://thehill.com/policy/energy-environment/261771-exxon-hires-deflategate-lawyer-for-climate-investigation
They were told by the NFL to "prove" the hypothesis that evil Patriots had deflated footballs. They're a junk science outfit whose job is to "prove" the laughably absurd (e.g. petrochemical spills don't harm the environment) and muddy the waters enough at trials that juries are confused.
I know that Brady is waiting for the appeals to play out, but if he wins he really should sue Exponent, even though it would drag this disaster out even longer
As we've discussed before, nothing "happened" with Exponent and they are perfectly competent. However, Exponent was not engaged in a search for the truth. They were hired by a client (Ted Wells and, ultimately, the NFL) and produced a report that was faithful to the assumptions that guided their work. Some of those assumptions were dubious to the point where they were laughable, and Exponent went to great lengths to hide the more indefensible of those assumptions. And to a great extent, it worked.
Yep, said otherwise, that was a made to order expert report. Just like the Wells Report itself was not remotely a search for the truth and instead served the NFL's agenda.
Neither Paul Weiss nor Exponent fell down on the job...except that much of their work was shoddy and therefore easily exposed. And that's a pretty big exception.
OK, I'm willing to accept that answer. But it also debunks the notion that Ted Wells is anything more than an intelligent, hired lackey/hack of a lawyer. For him to put his name on a report that is so full of holes and logical inconsistency means, at least to me, that the sterling reputation many of the lawyers here genuflected to was misplaced. Unless, of course, they were genuflecting to his "rainmaking" ability. Kudos to Wells for making a lucrative living out of such shoddy work.
He did the best he could with a shitty case. Lawyers "put their names on" shitty cases all the time. IMO his only real sin was his personal proclaimation that he was somehow independent of his client (i.e., his press conference).
But if the employees at Exponent and Wells and his staff were aware that they were applying bad data to help their client frame an innocent man, shouldn't we at least see them as lousy people, regardless of their profession? Or is it like not yelling at the cable company rep when you call, because they just follow the procedures of their job?
It's an adversarial process. They can't lie, and their continued credibility depends upon their ability to defend their methodology, but if there are flaws in the methodology, that's for the process to bring out--as it has, for all to see, and for all to judge the parties accordingly. Again, the problem is with Wells claiming he was "independent." He was not. He was trying to make his client's case against Brady.
Is it fair to see them as lousy people? I don't think so. Sell-outs? Yeah, maybe--and definitely, if they are aware that they are applying bad data to frame an innocent man. But there are some assumptions built into that which are pretty hard to test. Is every sell-out a lousy person? Nah.
But this is old, old ground.
To me Exponent has little if any scientific credibility. They have presented false science in too many court cases to be taken seriously. This whole affair has lessened my opinion also of TV scientists such as Bill Nye and Neil deGrasse Tyson. As far as Ted Wells is concerned it is also obvious that truth matters little to him in his practice of the law.
The severity of the penalty on the Patriots make me wince everytime I hear Kraft saying "The Patriots will accept their penalty" This video is just another in a long line of academics proving that purposeful deflation of the footballs did not happen. The only conclusion is that the League were out to get the Patriots at all costs truth be damned.
It is just so frustrating that so few take the time to fully understand the science involved.
The severity of the penalty on the Patriots make me wince everytime I hear Kraft saying "The Patriots will accept their penalty" This video is just another in a long line of academics proving that purposeful deflation of the footballs did not happen. The only conclusion is that the League were out to get the Patriots at all costs truth be damned.
It is just so frustrating that so few take the time to fully understand the science involved.
I will give Neil Degrasse Tyson at least some credit. He at least came back and admitted he did his initial calculation wrong by not using absolute pressure vs the relative pressure number.
I'm not sure if he still stood his ground on cheating occurred, but he at least admitted his initial error when called out.
I'm not sure if he still stood his ground on cheating occurred, but he at least admitted his initial error when called out.
Wells did what attorneys are paid to do: represent their client, the NFL in this case, in an adversarial proceeding. Nothing more, nothing less.
Exponent's analysis is nothing more than scientific misconduct, but both they and their attorney buddies will come up with all sorts of excuses as to why they did what they did and why it's perfectly acceptable. Because, after all, they "did science on it".
Exponent's analysis is nothing more than scientific misconduct, but both they and their attorney buddies will come up with all sorts of excuses as to why they did what they did and why it's perfectly acceptable. Because, after all, they "did science on it".
And even if someone, say an MIT scientist, was able to completely discredit everything in the Exponent report, the defense of Exponent would go something like this - "you can pay experts to say anything" - and everybody would buy it.
If the Exponent report is anything like what may be presented as scientific evidence in court, then I sure as shit never want to go to trial.
Hopefully one good to come out of this process, is that people have a much more critical eye when it comes to court proceedings and justice in general. Way too much of the general public believes in a fictional world of justice and assume everyone goes through that one versus the more real world machinations that exist in our actual legal system.
There's a reason the Innocence project has been so successful in getting so many convictions overturned. It's not because those people just slipped through the cracks of an otherwise great justice system.
There's a reason the Innocence project has been so successful in getting so many convictions overturned. It's not because those people just slipped through the cracks of an otherwise great justice system.
Ted Wells would sell his soul for a dollar. That is my impression anyway. He has come across as the Captain of Sleaze.