norm from cheers said:They both felt any science (like statistics) can be manipulated to meet any argument.
Welcome to any discussion of anything, ever.
norm from cheers said:They both felt any science (like statistics) can be manipulated to meet any argument.
Smiling Joe Hesketh said:On the flip side of that, I've recently had conversations with both a Jets fan and a Bills fan who are utterly contemptuous of the idea that the Pats did anything wrong. Both called the scandal a bunch of bullshit, and both indicated that they'd happily trade their right kidneys for the type of success the Pats had.
So it varies from fan to fan.
TheoShmeo said:My experience in NYC -- where I am around a lot of fans of the local entrants and other teams -- is that (a) there are very few true believers in the Pats' guilt, but many people who haven't given it a lot of thought and simply assume guilt on a "where there's smoke there's fire" basis and (b) yes, every single one of them would trade places and take the scandals along with the SB wins. Literally no one I've discussed the second aspect with doesn't admit to that immediately or exhibits even the smallest sense of embarrassment or sheepishness. "Of course I would take that deal! I'm not crazy." And fans of teams who haven't won, such as the Jets, add that they would make the trade in a heartbeat for even one SB win.
norm from cheers said:On a plane yesterday, I had a conversation with a Bears fan and a Chiefs fan.. we all were strangers before the flight. I know a SSS, but the conversation reinforced my fear that no matter what.. the public has already convicted. Both hated the Patriots and considered the org "dirty." They knew of the holes in the Wells report yet dismissed the science rebuttal of the AEI report.. they cling instead to the "deflator" texts and Brady not releasing his phone text records.
For them, Brady "looked and sounded guilty" during the press conference and Brady's comment about "know the rules" after the Raven's game sealed their conviction that the Patriot try to manipulate the rules to their favor and they should be pounded to the ground every opportunity they are discovered to be in any violation regardless of the severity of the infraction.
They both felt any science (like statistics) can be manipulated to meet any argument. Somehow the fact that because MIT, Harvard, Tufts and other "hoity toity" colleges are in NE, they believe the Patriots think they are smarter then everybody else. Football to them is a blue collar game, not to be manipulated by professors or mad scientists.
The only hard evidence are the texts, by regular guys who are too stupid to cover their tracks. If Brady was innocent he would have turned over his phone, naked pictures of his wife and all.
To these two, nothing that happens in the appeal process short of full confession by Kensil that he (or someone else) deflated the Patriot's ball and set up a sting knowing the effects of the cold on PSI, would change their minds. The Patriots are and always were and always will be CHEATERS.
Asked them about Rice/Peterson.. neither knew anything about appeals or what happened and that was off the field stuff that to them the NFL doesn't really have jurisdiction. They had no real opinion on Goodell and think he is "trying" at least in an era of quick fire media and stuff that was kept out of the press, is now blasted online at all hours..
During that long walk to my connecting flight at O'Hare, I realized that there is no chance the Patriots and Brady will escape an * next to their records in many people's eyes regardless of the outcome of the forthcoming appeal process. The brand has been burned permanently and will probably last past the era of BB and TB.
So, I say, Damn the torpedos, full speed ahead to Federal Court and take out a few more chink's in Goodell's armor..
To further the insanity, one of the two admitted he didn't even see Brady's presser, just read about it and saw reports on ESPN to base his opinion.( . ) ( . ) and (_!_) said:
Do people realize that the Deflator text was sent in fucking May?
Do they seriously think the 8 times that Mcnaully supposedly deflates footballs for Brady each year is such a big deal in his life that he would be talking about it in fucking May? And why would they just dismiss the texts about the Jets game and the ball being at 16 PSI? Those texts occurred during the actual season, after a home game!
The stupid out there is really unbelievable.
All the Dolphins fans I know say the same thing.Smiling Joe Hesketh said:On the flip side of that, I've recently had conversations with both a Jets fan and a Bills fan who are utterly contemptuous of the idea that the Pats did anything wrong. Both called the scandal a bunch of bullshit, and both indicated that they'd happily trade their right kidneys for the type of success the Pats had.
So it varies from fan to fan.
Again, im shocked that people are shocked at this.( . ) ( . ) and (_!_) said:Do people realize that the Deflator text was sent in fucking May?
Do they seriously think the 8 times that Mcnaully supposedly deflates footballs for Brady each year is such a big deal in his life that he would be talking about it in fucking May? And why would they just dismiss the texts about the Jets game and the ball being at 16 PSI? Those texts occurred during the actual season, after a home game!
The stupid out there is really unbelievable.
Just about every non-Pats fan I've talked to thinks that Brady & the ballboys did it. HOWEVER, most of them agree that the penalty was nuts, and that it should have been just a fine.Smiling Joe Hesketh said:On the flip side of that, I've recently had conversations with both a Jets fan and a Bills fan who are utterly contemptuous of the idea that the Pats did anything wrong. Both called the scandal a bunch of bullshit, and both indicated that they'd happily trade their right kidneys for the type of success the Pats had.
So it varies from fan to fan.
TheoShmeo said:I'm not so sure of that, Average Reds.
Yes, the Wells Report gave the NFL the necessary cover to level heavy penalties against the Pats and firm up public opinion against them.
But when Brady takes this issue to Court, his team will continue the assault that the NY Times/AEI and Washington Post carried out in the last several days. The narrative -- which will be widely reported -- will be that the NFL's centerpiece was deeply flawed and possibly based on lies. If Brady's sentence ends up being wiped out, I think the NFL will look pretty stupid, and Goodell might wish that the Wells Report was better constructed.
That doesn't negate that the NFL already got what it wanted from Paul Weiss. It just might not prove to be long term value.
Average Reds said:Again, im shocked that people are shocked at this.
I do know better then to expect the average American to be smarter then a wet paper bag. I was just venting. Sometimes the stupid just gets to be too much.Average Reds said:Again, im shocked that people are shocked at this.
The Wells report was important to the NFL because it established the narrative. Regardless of the facts, people will follow the narrative:
- Something happened; deflator texts prove that.
- Brady instructed them how he liked the balls, therefore he probably knew they were deflating them.
- The fact that Brady didn't cooperate only further convinces us of his guilt.
- The Pats refused an additional interview request, so they were less than fully cooperative.
-- etc.
The farther out we get, the more I am convinced the NFL got their money's worth from Ted Wells.
TheoShmeo said:I'm not so sure of that, Average Reds.
Yes, the Wells Report gave the NFL the necessary cover to level heavy penalties against the Pats and firm up public opinion against them.
But when Brady takes this issue to Court, his team will continue the assault that the NY Times/AEI and Washington Post carried out in the last several days. The narrative -- which will be widely reported -- will be that the NFL's centerpiece was deeply flawed and possibly based on lies. If Brady's sentence ends up being wiped out, I think the NFL will look pretty stupid, and Goodell might wish that the Wells Report was better constructed.
That doesn't negate that the NFL already got what it wanted from Paul Weiss. It just might not prove to be long term value.
TheoShmeo said:I'm not so sure of that, Average Reds.
Yes, the Wells Report gave the NFL the necessary cover to level heavy penalties against the Pats and firm up public opinion against them.
But when Brady takes this issue to Court, his team will continue the assault that the NY Times/AEI and Washington Post carried out in the last several days. The narrative -- which will be widely reported -- will be that the NFL's centerpiece was deeply flawed and possibly based on lies. If Brady's sentence ends up being wiped out, I think the NFL will look pretty stupid, and Goodell might wish that the Wells Report was better constructed.
That doesn't negate that the NFL already got what it wanted from Paul Weiss. It just might not prove to be long term value.
ivanvamp said:
If a court of law determines that there was zero basis for suspending Brady, how on earth could Goodell manage to keep the team penalties in place?
Kenny F'ing Powers said:
For the millionth time:
RG penalized the team because he knew there could be no recourse. RG knew Brady would appeal, knows that he will win, and knows that there will ultimately be no suspension. He will make Brady go to court to prove it (because thats what he does) and he knows the only way this will stick to the Patriots (therefore proving his ruling "right") is my punishing the team.
The public will say "The Patriots cheated". Patriots fans will say "No, they didn't". The public will say "Then why were they fined draft picks?" And RG will smear his ball sack all over the integrity of the NFL. We've been on this ride before, folks.
grandjordanian (Park City, UT)
Mike, in business there is an old adage, "I don't mind you messing up, but don't make the same mistake twice". So I can't for the life of me understand how a league owned by billionaire businessmen can tolerate Goodell repeating the same pattern of errors over and over again and not replace him. Not only has Goodell messed up, he hasn't taken one step to address his organization's missteps or fire the guys under him who put him in this unwinnable situation, so how can he look the owners in the eye and say "this won't happen again under my watch"?
Mike
(12:13 PM)
Grand, I think they "tolerate" it because: 1) He's lining their pockets with money at record-type levels; 2) To a lesser degree, they probably feel like they don't have a better replacement. As my good friend Ted DiBiase once said in the WWF days, "Everyone has a price."
Mike (Hartford)
It's clear that science proves there was no football tampering, so doesn't everything have to be thrown out now? Shouldn't Goodell just apologize, rescind everything, and move on? Will Brady sue for defamation no matter what happens with the appeal?
Mike
(12:28 PM)
Mike, I feel like my stance on this has been consistent from the start: This never should have gotten to this level. Poorly managed situation by the NFL. I think everything is on the table for Brady in terms of how far he wants to take it. I find it hard to believe that Goodell will rescind everything and move on, but if you're asking my opinion, the penalties handed down are way, way over the top.
Roger (NYC) [via mobile]
Any advice for me? Kinda feel damned if I do, damned if I don't... Know what I mean?
Mike
(12:49 PM)
My advice would be to vacate Tom Brady's suspension and move everything forward. What you've already done to one of the game's best players and ambassadors over the last 15 years -- without definitive proof he did anything -- is penalty enough. And after doing that, can I suggest you focus some more attention on issues that truly matter? Thanks for listening.
Scotty (MN) [via mobile]
For most of your updates I understand the placement on your feed and the pats page as the info is valuable day to day material for us homers. That said, can you share with us the process with national ESPN and what kinds of editor feedback you might get when a story you write has more national value. Examples like the AEI report and others. Love some insight on the feedback you get from national as to their process to decide not to run it...
norm from cheers said:Lelands Auctions is offering a "Deflategate Ball" from the AFC Championship game.. the one Blount ran in. The bidding start at $25,000.00 and will be held on July 18.
http://www.lelands.com/Auction/AuctionDetail/75800/Summer-2015/Sports/Football/Lot1024~Deflategate-Ball
I wonder if a Patriot hater will buy it in hopes of landing more proof :blink:
norm from cheers said:Lelands Auctions is offering a "Deflategate Ball" from the AFC Championship game.. the one Blount ran in. The bidding start at $25,000.00 and will be held on July 18.
http://www.lelands.com/Auction/AuctionDetail/75800/Summer-2015/Sports/Football/Lot1024~Deflategate-Ball
I wonder if a Patriot hater will buy it in hopes of landing more proof :blink:
Smiling Joe Hesketh said:Anyone who bids on this thinglooking for some sort of proofis a goddamn moron.
So you're saying it will go for $2 million then?Smiling Joe Hesketh said:Why? By Lelands' own admission, this ball was used for the TD in the 3rd qtr, when supposedly all the balls had been reinflated to proper pressure.
Anyone who bids on this thing looking for some sort of proof is a goddamn moron.
amarshal2 said:From Reiss' chat (still live):
[...]
People have been talking about how it's becoming evident that Reiss is unhappy with his employer. Well, he published this question without comment and just left it there for people to see.
http://espn.go.com/sportsnation/boston/chat/_/id/51853
In terms of actual interesting football news (I know, not the thread), he said that Easley still isn't 100%. Damn.
For most of your updates I understand the placement on your feed and the pats page as the info is valuable day to day material for us homers. That said, can you share with us the process with national ESPN and what kinds of editor feedback you might get when a story you write has more national value. Examples like the AEI report and others. Love some insight on the feedback you get from national as to their process to decide not to run it... (Mike's answer) Not sure what happened here, but I don't think my original answer got through. There are basically two layers to it: 1) We have a news desk and sometimes they reach out and ask me to write stories that are more national in scope; 2) I pitch stories to our news desk and they decide whether they want them. So it's a centralized desk that decides what ultimately is worthy from a "national" news perspective.
This in my mind is one of the KEY points ... if McNally was releasing air from the balls after the referees measured them, WHY wouldn't he have have done so before the Jets' game? He knew the ref pumped MORE air into the balls than what he presented, yet he didn't take air out THEN?( . ) ( . ) and (_!_) said:
Do people realize that the Deflator text was sent in fucking May?
Do they seriously think the 8 times that Mcnaully supposedly deflates footballs for Brady each year is such a big deal in his life that he would be talking about it in fucking May? And why would they just dismiss the texts about the Jets game and the ball being at 16 PSI? Those texts occurred during the actual season, after a home game!
The stupid out there is really unbelievable.
JeffLedbetter said:This in my mind is one of the KEY points ... if McNally was releasing air from the balls after the referees measured them, WHY wouldn't he have have done so before the Jets' game? He knew the ref pumped MORE air into the balls than what he presented, yet he didn't take air out THEN?
Suggs could write the definitive account of the Deflategate debacle and have it go to #1 on the NY Times list, and it would still be wrong to use the term "good guy" to describe him, regardless of context.dcmissle said:This would warrant unlocking the "good guy thread.
Terrell Suggs: (paraphrasing)
TB's reputation will not be diminished by this DG nonsense. TB is a winner who has won with whoever they put around him. The media just need something to write about.
Tis the offseason of hurt butts and exploding heads. This is effing awesome.
GeorgeCostanza said:Does he get extra consideration for the white list due to his liberal use of bleach?
twibnotes said:Suggs could write the definitive account of the Deflategate debacle and have it go to #1 on the NY Times list, and it would still be wrong to use the term "good guy" to describe him, regardless of context.
It would be one thing if the Wells Report (which consulted Daniel Marlow, experimental high energy physics expert at Princeton) just said that additional evidence (bathroom breaks and text messages, among other things) was more compelling than the pressure data. Or if it noted that the pressure data are ambiguous, collected so haphazardly that they wouldn’t be allowed in a high school science fair: Two different gauges that differed by approximately 0.4 psi were used in taking measurements, and it isn’t clear which one was used in the pre-game measurements because those data were not recorded. At halftime, 11 Patriots’ balls and four Colts’ balls were measured, and while all of the Patriots’ balls measured below 12.5 psi, three of the four Colts’ balls also did, according to one of the gauges.
Post-game psi measurements of four Patriots balls ranged from 12.95 to 13.65. These data, the Wells Report acknowledges (in a footnote), “did not provide a scientifically reasonable basis on which to conduct a comparative analysis.” If the report can acknowledge poor methodology for the post-game data, why not acknowledge that for the pre-game and halftime data as well?
Roderick MacKinnon of Rockefeller University specifically addressed the scientific methodology in aletter posted to The Wells Report in Context, the Patriots’ rebuttal to the report’s conclusions (MacKinnon, professor of molecular neurobiology and biophysics, and chemistry Nobel laureate, was conducting experiments in a basement microscope facility and couldn’t immediately respond to my requests for his team allegiance):
“The scientific analysis in the Wells Report was a good attempt to seek the truth, however, it was based on data that are simply insufficient. In experimental science to reach a meaningful conclusion we make measurements multiple times under well-defined physical conditions. This is how we deal with the error or ‘spread’ of measured values,” MacKinnon notes.
TheoShmeo said:Good points, both of you. Thank you.
tims4wins said:
If you are looking for one simple point that proves the whole thing is a sham: when the Colts tested the Pats ball on the sideline, the average of the 3 measurements was 11.5, which was exactly what the ideal gas law said it should have been. Case closed.
Harry Hooper said:
But 11.5 is less than 12.5 !!!!!
Gambler7 said:
It would be one thing if the Wells Report (which consulted Daniel Marlow, experimental high energy physics expert at Princeton) just said that additional evidence (bathroom breaks and text messages, among other things) was more compelling than the pressure data.
Agreed it's a poorly written article. The point she seems to be making is that the science is inconclusive so it shouldn't have been in the report. She's not making any judgments about guilt or innocence of the Patriots and is saying that Wells should have made his case based solely on the circumstantial, non-scientific evidence.Ed Hillel said:
LOL, that same guy I was talking about in the recent Jenkins article as appearing in every single article about this was the very first comment on this article. That guy is faster than Patriots fans at finding anything Deflategate related and commenting bad.
As for the article itself, it's a bit confusing. I think I understand the point she's making, but she would have been better off just saying it rather than implying it.This line is most confusing to me:
Isn't the point that science should override these issues? The report would have been better off ignoring science altogether? Odd.
amarshal2 said:Agreed it's a poorly written article. The point she seems to be making is that the science is inconclusive so it shouldn't have been in the report. She's not making any judgments about guilt or innocence of the Patriots and is saying that Wells should have made his case based solely on the circumstantial, non-scientific evidence.
Ed Hillel said:
See, I think her point is that it should be over soon because Goodell should listen to the science and end this thing. I am not confident in my interpretation of her article, however, because it's so ambiguous. I'm confused because it appears that, after making this point, she says Wells would have been better off ignoring the science. I dunno, whatever.
amarshal2 said:
She says she hopes it's over soon but she never connects that to what should happen regarding the case. On the other hand, she is explicit about not weighing in on what she thinks happened.
But instead of acknowledging that game day conditions could have accounted for the psi changes, an acknowledgement that wouldn’t preclude other evidence of foul play, the NFL’s Wells Report concludes that there’s an “absence of a credible scientific explanation for the Patriots halftime measurements.”
It would be one thing if the Wells Report (which consulted Daniel Marlow, experimental high energy physics expert at Princeton) just said that additional evidence (bathroom breaks and text messages, among other things) was more compelling than the pressure data.
Well according to Troy Vincent's letter, the Patriots were punished for using footballs that were "...inflated at a level that did not satisfy the standard set forth in the NFL's Official Playing Rules and that the condition of the footballs was the result of deliberate actions by employees of the Patriots." So at least according to the NFL, they structured the sentence to bring up the inflation issue first and then the deliberate tampering second. Vincent later writes that "...the footballs were intentionally deflated in an effort to provide a competitive advantage to Tom Brady after having been certified by the game officials as being in compliance with the playing rules." The (alleged) deflation levels itself is clearly pretty important in terms of the discipline.simplyeric said:They're not being punished for having balls below the 'required' pressure.
They're being punished for tampering with the balls after they were approved by the refs. That the tampering was deflation is neither here nor there.
The faulty science calls into question whether there was any tampering. That's the issue.
If the refs approved the balls at 16 psi, or 10 psi, and then the ball boy deflated/inflated to get exactly to the middle of the range noted in the rules, that's still punishable.
Of course it matters since under your scenario a mere accusation is enough to convict. This is analogous to the NFL accusing the Patriots of applying a substance to the footballs. If there is no substance on the footballs, and science backs that up, then it does not matter if someone sent texts about vaguely referring to substances or took a bathroom break. There are no rules about texting or bathroom breaks in the NFL rulebook.EL Jeffe said:ed football handling guidelines (taking them to the bathroom). They still likely would have argued that tampering could have occurred, even if the psi levels were within an acceptable range.
In the grand scheme of things, does the science matter in this case? I'd say no based on the league's actions. However, the science (and the readings of a gauge Walt Anderson specifically remembered not using) gave the league an easier case to make.