Academic/professorial statistical analysis always confuses me. Add that to the fact that I'm a Jets fan [though in all honesty I've always harbored a loathing for the Miami Dolphins far more intense that what I harbor for the Pats, even in the Belichick-Brady era], and I'm inclined to believe what I see here--some highlights [or--lowlights?]:
"Careful analytics reveal that suddenly in 2007, a strange and statistically impossible phenomena began to occur at Patriots games....Starting in 2007, the Patriots suddenly began to hold onto the football at a statistical rate likely to occur 1 time in 16,233. A rational person might conclude this is the moment when someone on the Patriots cooked up the scheme to illegally deflate the ball...
"Patriots partisans might crow — well, what good does deflating a football do? Simple. It creates angles on a football that didn’t exist when playing by the rules and allows a runner, passer, center, and, most importantly, a quarterback to better grip the ball. With the avoidance of turnovers being so central to winning football, a deflated football helps you win."
The owners currently have Roger Goodell's back, DV-gate notwithstanding. However, I would think at this point 31 owners should demand that Goodell look into this from every possible angle--and Robert Kraft, mensch that he is, should insist publicly on an investigation even while giving up a "vote" on the matter. At this point the league is not dealing simply with "image" of the "shield"--it's an issue of the the game's very integrity.
If the claims made turn out to have any credibility, the implications are worse than even the Terry Donaghy scandal in the NBA, because that was ostensibly one rogue official with a gambling issue that he likely kept under wraps; the steroids scandal of the post-strike MLB because it happened across multiple teams with multiple players and there were no official "rules" until after the Mitchell report; and--I may be going out on a limb here--the Black Sox scandal, because the modern major leagues were in relative infancy and the game was not adequately policed at the time.
The NFL has no such cover. This scandal involves:
*One team, the most consistently--and now, it seems, ridiculously--successful of the past decade and a half, and one that outpaces the consistent success of almost any franchise in NFL history over any period of time, so that unlike baseball's "steroid era", the "goods" of "cheating" were not nearly as evenly distributed;
*A League that employs a security apparatus that might rival [or actually have better resources than] most government agencies [with whom it has extensive ties], so there's no room to make claims about "inadequate policing";
*An episode that implies--on the part of the NFL--either [or both?]: gross incompetence, because the officials responsible didn't figure this out for eight seasons; or a wholesale corruption, because enough people knew what was going on and--if they didn't abet it--didn't try to stop it.
Maybe it's a good thing for the NFL that this came out before the 50th Super Bowl. Either way, SB XLIX is now going to be under a cloud for posterity, possibly sharing said dark cloud with the 1919 World Series, especially if the Pats win. [Goodell should be very quietly praying very hard that Seattle wins, and wins decisively.]
Once the game is over [maybe it shouldn't even wait that long], there should be a full scale, no-expenses-spared investigation. It should be spearheaded by the other 31 owners but primarily funded by Robert Kraft, who I think is enough of a mensch that this horrifies him [personally, I think it was all Belichick's idea and stopped with him. At least he might have had the decency to shield Kraft].
If there's any truth to the allegations, the following MUST happen:
The Patriots' franchise should be suspended from the League for at least one season, maybe two. [Consider this a hybrid of the NCAA's "death penaltly" meted out to SMU in the 1980's for recruiting violations, and Sean Payton's 2012 suspension for "Bountygate".] All 16 games are to be automatically forfeit to the 16 teams on its 2015 schedule, which means the 2015 Patriots will officially end the season 0-16. [Now THAT'S poetic.]
[This may cause some competitive imbalance, especially since every AFC East team will essentially start 2015 at 2-0, and ten other teams at 1-0, but it at least goes some way towards instituting an "affirmative action" for the way the Pats have dominated that division since 2001. More on that in the Coda. This is one alternative; the other is a temporary divisional realignment based on the 1999-2001 31-team NFL, with an absent New England. I'll leave that to the NFL's math people.]
Bill Belichick must be expelled from the NFL and deemed ineligible for the Hall of Fame, akin to the punishments meted out to Pete Rose and the Black Sox Players by MLB. He may also be subject to civil and possibly criminal sanction for fraud. [The rest of the League should insist this happen.] Members of his coaching staffs during his entire Patriots tenure should be grilled to determine the extent of the conspiracy. As long it took the NCAA to act against Joe Paterno, it all but erased his legacy when it did act. Not to compare the magnitudes of Paterno's and Belichick's particular sins, but the NFL at least has a template for forcefully disavowing one of its more revered figures, and it has good reason to.
[In theory, the NCAA's actions against Paterno and USC indicate precedents for at least attempting to vacate wins and titles. The possibility should at least be broached even if the NFL never intends to carry it out.]
There's no reason to disband the Patriots' franchise. However, Patriots fans should receive full refunds for their 2015 tickets, all concessionaires and other businesses that profit from gamedays should be indemnified by both the League AND the Patriots, and the TV networks should have their fees prorated based on the missed Patriots games. Everyone has to make this right financially. Additionally, the Patriots should be banned from any prime-time broadcasts for at least three seasons after their reinstatement.
As far as the Pats players--they should all become free agents at least for 2015. I'm sure the League lawyers and the NFLPA can work out contractual issues, though the NFLPA might have some extra leverage because the owners will be scrambling to salvage what's left of the NFL's image. Maybe the reinstated Patriots should be forced to undergo the humiliation of an expansion draft. Now THAT would be a delicious irony.
Re: Tom Brady's "legacy"--it'll likely be too difficult to establish a deliberate role in the scandal as far as he's concerned, but if the HOF Selection Committee wants to maintain any integrity, they should ignore him the way the baseball writers have ignored--and apparently will continue to ignore--Roger Clemens, Mark McGwire, and Sammy Sosa--when Brady's name comes up for induction, as it will. In addition, I would say that Gisele should leave him for cheating--but wasn't he still with a then-pregnant Bridget Moynihan when they hooked up? Hmmm, I see a pattern here...
In theory, Goodell should immediately be fired and replaced with a Landis analog to perform the cleanup. But if not--AFTER the penalties are enforced, Goodell MUST step down. This scandal calls the entire NFL product [and recent history] into question. This will define his legacy even more than Ray Rice, and the stink will persist the longer he holds the office. Bart Giamatti inherited a scandal and tackled it with alacrity and integrity, pursuing all investigative avenues until acting, and it may have killed him. Goodell inherited a scandal and either didn't police it or let it metastasize, even with his security resources.
If NO action is taken--and the owners insist on protecting Goodell and even the Pats in the face of the evidence--then someone really smart [probably should be someone who REALLY hates football] should cobble together a mass of NFL season ticket buyers, Direct TV subscribers, even possibly Verizon customers who watch games on their smartphones [guilty], and possibly anyone with sponsorships or other business with the NFL, and institute a colossal class-action lawsuit alleging consumer fraud, the potential penalties of which might drive the League out of business [if not send some very prominent figures to prison]. That might scare the NFL even more than the spectre of CTE-driven class action suits, because there are a LOT more fans than former players. It also might scare every NFL municipality [other than Boston?] into pressuring their owners into action saving the rest of the NFL and forestalling the possibility of the suit, because it could create economic messes rivaling Obamacare in several major US metropoli--and it would be hard to blame W for this. Furthermore: a Dem candidate would pay more dearly for a crippled NFL in 2016 than a GOP candidate would. You can count on it. NFL fans vote more like "soccer moms" or "NASCAR dads"? You tell me.
The X factor in all of this? Fans like me who are stupid enough to keep watching. I'll probably keep watching [and rooting for the Jets, even] even if the NFL finds an NSA-like way of sweeping this under the rug [likely with some help from their contacts in Intelligence], and even if the Pats win this Super Bowl. I love watching the game too much even though the ride it's taken me and most of its fandom on ostensibly is not the one any of us had in mind. At least I hope not.
[P.S. I'm revealing my obvious biases here, but bear with me. Here's a sicker set of thoughts.
First--consider that the historically awful Jets--my Jets--actually put together some of their better teams during this very era. These weren't the 70's Jets that didn't break .500 for 11 years in a row; or the Rich Kotite Jets that went 4-33; or even the Joe Walton Jets that would throw 5-yard outs on 3rd-and-8. Consider: Herman Edwards [!] made the playoffs 3 of his first 4 years; Eric Mangini made it his first year, and probably would have made it his third year if Brett Favre's arm hadn't fallen off; and we all know what Rex Ryan did [with MARK SANCHEZ]. The Jets have a unique way of infuriating their fan base [it's kinda parta the charm of being a Jets fan], not least because the Giants have won four Super Bowls [and because Sanchez' "Buttfumble" is more iconic than even Joe Pisarcik's "TheFumble". That's an accomplishment]. But they're not the Bills, who haven't smelled the playoffs for 15 years; the Bengals, who haven't won a playoff game since 1990; the Lions, who haven't won one since 1991 [and only that one since 1957]; the Browns, who've been there once [and lost] since their 1999 rebirth; the Dolphins, who've made it twice since 2001 [and lost both times]; I could go on. At least from 2001 until Victor Cruz caught that 99-yard touchdown against them in Game 15 of the 2011 season, the Jets fielded some credibly competitive teams. [And don't even suggest that they had games fixed: who else in this country besides Jets fans wants to SEE the JETS win?]
Second--that's just the Jets. Look at it from a divisional angle:
The Jets don't get anywhere despite their relative success compared to previous eras [from 2001-10, 6 playoff trips in 10 years, vs. 8 in the previous 41].
The Bills beat Brady three times in 26 tries after their incredible run of success in the '90s [including 4 consecutive AFC titles, 10 playoff trips in 12 years].
The Dolphins through 2006 have the best Won-Lost percentage of any NFL franchise since the 1970 NFL-AFL merger. Since: nothing [except for 2008, which Brady misses in toto when Bernard Pollard destroys his knee in the opener at KC.]
I haven't done the research, but I would reckon if you looked at each NFL Division and examined periods where one team would dominate it still wouldn't look this one-sided. Even considering the 70's Dolphins, Steelers, Raiders, Cowboys, Vikings, and Rams: a] that's SIX teams, and b] the bulk of the dominance predates the 1978 rules changes. Even prior, none reach the Pats' run of 11 straight titles if you take out '08, and even then they tied Miami but lost on the tiebreaker. This kind of intradivisional domination against a] two historically successful and generally well-managed and coached franchises, and b] one shaking off its historical incompetence even when it fails to get out of its own way on or off the field--seems to be rather unprecedented. NOBODY is THAT good. Not even the Yanks or Habs. Maybe the Harlem Globetrotters...
Third--this year, in the midst of a 4-12 season, the Jets came within a pair of blocked field goals of sweeping the Pats. [And Nick Folk had an off-year. But maybe deflating the football affects kicking trajectories...hmmm...]
Finally--and this might be the craziest indicator--only ONE quarterback other than Tom Brady has won an AFC East title since 2001. One.
CHAD PENNINGTON.
STILL think something ain't fishy?]
