Yes, I know I am taking a contrary opinion in the Case of the Over-salted French Fries here. Bleacher Report's own
Mike Freeman wrote this week that the Patriots' legacy is forever tarnished. I felt that by Saturday, when Belichick began spouting pseudo-scientific gobbledygook, this story had already started burning itself out.
By Tuesday's Media Day, when kids' network superheroes and dudes dressed in lederhosen are barging into interviews to make "limp balls" jokes, about 98 percent of the football world will be eager to move on. By the start of free agency, we will think back on last week as another week of our lives wasted. In five years, Deflategate will become the province of bottom-of-the-comment-thread denizens who have either cheating-related or homophobic nicknames for all 32 teams. (Cheatroits, Cheatboys, CheatHawks, CheatOlts, CharCheatGers; I will spare you examples of the latter.)
By the time Brady and Belichick are Hall of Fame eligible, the voters who plan to snub them for Deflategate, Spygate or other gates will either be chucked out of the room or severely outvoted on the first ballot. These aren't baseball Hall of Fame voters, after all; they don't think they are appointing a new pope.
Is the Patriots' legacy forever tarnished? All championship legacies are forever tarnished. The Seahawks got away with non-stop pass interference last year, right? Ray Lewis smeared deer antler all over himself and (because message board commenters 15 years later know far more than eyewitnesses or district attorneys) killed people with his bare hands.
The referees gave the Steelers that win over the Seahawks in Super Bowl XL.
Peyton Manning's lone Super Bowl came against Rex Grossman in a downpour; that shouldn't count. The Redskins won three Super Bowls, but two came during strike years—how great a legacy is that? There are people who still think Super Bowl III was fixed.
Al Davis would fill your footballs with plutonium if he thought the radiation sickness would give him a fourth-quarter edge, and his defenders would run over receivers with Harleys in the middle of the field. But the antics of the 1970s Raiders are remembered as "colorful."
Remember Bountygate? The Saints were accused of crimes about 50 times worse than what the Patriots are accused of: You can't permanently injure Kurt Warner or
Brett Favre with a limp football. There were audiotapes, ledgers and other bits of evidence. Roger Goodell went into Angry Caesar mode and torched Saints headquarters, then everyone realized that perhaps they overreacted a bit to some old-school coaching cliches and some overzealous hits, just as everyone will soon realize that football inflation pressures are not subjects worthy of a week of national rancor.
When you think back on the 2009-11 Saints, do you think of them as a bunch of headhunters on a quest to hospitalize opposing quarterbacks? Maybe you do. Maybe you also still hold grudges from sixth grade. I think of
Drew Brees, overtime in the Vikings game and surprise onside kicks. Bountygate ended just two years ago and involved real health and safety issues. It's largely forgotten, except as a chapter in the strange history of Goodell the Lawgiver. Deflategate doesn't stand a chance. It will fade the way our obsession with Manti Te'o's romantic life has faded.
"Sports legacy" is an outdated concept, a holdover from when sportswriters could control narrative and create the 1927 Yankees, Lombardi Packers, Jack Dempsey and Arnold Palmer that they wanted the world to love. You, as fans, can now see everything, find anything you need online, review video or written information that never fades or crinkles and draw your own conclusions. You have also become keenly aware of "narrative" itself, how we spin and counterspin for profit. If the 1927 Yankees played today, Babe Ruth would get treated like A-Rod. If Lombardi's Packers returned, each hagiographic article would include a rehash of
Paul Horung's gambling allegations in the comment thread.
Our generation's narrative legacy will be the death of legacy narratives. Championships are built out of great players and brilliant coaches, who sometimes twist rules, take drugs, do terrible things and get exceptionally lucky with calls and bounces. (They also sometimes give huge sums to charities, save people from car wrecks and inspire millions with their hard work and dedication.) There are lines that can never be crossed—game fixing, for example, or chloroforming the opponent's offensive line during stretches—but fiddling with the footballs does not come within 20 yards of that line.
The Patriots should be punished, of course: Rule violations should be punished. If you are stomping your feet and demanding that Belichick and Brady be suspended for the Super Bowl (or drawn and quartered), ask yourself: Will that make you feel better? Will it make football better? Will there be a parade around Monument Circle in Indy or through Baltimore's Inner Harbor to celebrate a Seahawks victory over Josh McDaniels and Jimmy Garoppolo? If there was, would anyone attend it?
Won't that just created a "tarnished" championship for the Seahawks?
