Patriots and radio frequency

[JCSunsfan]

I would be for banning any headsets for players.

Just ban them and tell everyone to suck it. Figure out something different.

Then cheating will have to go back to the old fashioned stealing of hand signals.

I agree. And there has to be a helmet check before the game or Brady will cheat.

 

[Russ Smith]

I would be for banning any headsets for players.

Just ban them and tell everyone to suck it. Figure out something different.

Then cheating will have to go back to the old fashioned stealing of hand signals.

In the end you get a situation where you're harming all the other teams, because the Pats won't play by the rules.

Ted Johnson played LB for the Pats for years, in 2006 and again in 08 he admitted on tv that most game days a sheet of the opposing teams audibles would "magically" appear in his locker. He said he didn't know where it came from, assumed it was from Ernie Adams, and that yes if you give me a sheet with their audibles, I'm going to use it, and did.

Doug Flutie was the backup QB to Brady in 05. In one game he meant to grab his own helmet to listen in to the playcalls on the mic but by accident, he grabbed Tom Brady's backup helmet. He said he was completely surprised to find out the communication never cut out, with his helmet NFL rule 15 seconds before it cut out, with Brady's helmet, he could hear Adams up and through the snap. Said he put the helmet down and decided if he wanted to stay the backup he should not say anything.

The thing is stealing the play signals was less than half the battle, Belichich did that the very first preseason game of his first year there, there's even evidence he was doing that when he was the Browns coach. The first year in NE they finished in last place, while stealing signals. the next year according to Matt Walsh, they started doing the signals to the helmet cheating, where they used a second signal to continue talking to Brady. Walsh said they made 2 adjustments, they went more no huddle because it forced the defense to send in their signals faster, and they went to the extra signal in the helmet so while Brady was standing there waiting for the snap he could wait for Adams to tell him the defense even if it got into the last 15 seconds.

That team was last place the year before, and won the Super bowl the next year(with Brady taking over for an injured Bledsoe). That's a pretty remarkable turnaround in one year. Sort of shows how important keeping the mic open was to their success/

THere are other arguments like how come Weis, Crennel and McDaniels were all absolutely brilliant as assistants in NE and awful as head coaches somewhere else? Were they just not HC material, or was it that they weren't really that good as assistants it was just easy when they had the other teams plays?

 

[conraddobler]

In the end you get a situation where you're harming all the other teams, because the Pats won't play by the rules.

Ted Johnson played LB for the Pats for years, in 2006 and again in 08 he admitted on tv that most game days a sheet of the opposing teams audibles would "magically" appear in his locker. He said he didn't know where it came from, assumed it was from Ernie Adams, and that yes if you give me a sheet with their audibles, I'm going to use it, and did.

Doug Flutie was the backup QB to Brady in 05. In one game he meant to grab his own helmet to listen in to the playcalls on the mic but by accident, he grabbed Tom Brady's backup helmet. He said he was completely surprised to find out the communication never cut out, with his helmet NFL rule 15 seconds before it cut out, with Brady's helmet, he could hear Adams up and through the snap. Said he put the helmet down and decided if he wanted to stay the backup he should not say anything.

The thing is stealing the play signals was less than half the battle, Belichich did that the very first preseason game of his first year there, there's even evidence he was doing that when he was the Browns coach. The first year in NE they finished in last place, while stealing signals. the next year according to Matt Walsh, they started doing the signals to the helmet cheating, where they used a second signal to continue talking to Brady. Walsh said they made 2 adjustments, they went more no huddle because it forced the defense to send in their signals faster, and they went to the extra signal in the helmet so while Brady was standing there waiting for the snap he could wait for Adams to tell him the defense even if it got into the last 15 seconds.

That team was last place the year before, and won the Super bowl the next year(with Brady taking over for an injured Bledsoe). That's a pretty remarkable turnaround in one year. Sort of shows how important keeping the mic open was to their success/

THere are other arguments like how come Weis, Crennel and McDaniels were all absolutely brilliant as assistants in NE and awful as head coaches somewhere else? Were they just not HC material, or was it that they weren't really that good as assistants it was just easy when they had the other teams plays?

Well I realize this would penalize all teams but equally so and honestly it would roll things back to where they should be.

You know who's really getting robbed here?

If any to all of what this guy is saying is true it's someone who can actually read defenses himself and any other QB like even say Carson Palmer for example who has to read them himself, they are the ones getting cheated here the most.

As well as any DC that plays by the rules.

Volkswagen is a real life example currently going on that may have massively cheated I don't know but so far it looks bad. Cheating when unpunished is one of the banes of human existence because it's all fun and games until it's you or your family that gets hosed by it.

Not saying something about it sounds cool in some ways but if everyone takes that approach and mostly they are then at some point cheating starts to infest everything.

I mean EVERYTHING.

It will not stop until people stand up to it and don't put up with it.

It's almost a law of human nature that if you allow this to go on if people essentially get away with it then you have just coded it into their set of options.

The reason even small violations of the honor system in our military colleges will get you kicked out is simple.

Honor is an all or nothing thing. You can dishonor yourself precisely ONCE.

 

[Russ Smith]

Well I realize this would penalize all teams but equally so and honestly it would roll things back to where they should be.

You know who's really getting robbed here?

If any to all of what this guy is saying is true it's someone who can actually read defenses himself and any other QB like even say Carson Palmer for example who has to read them himself, they are the ones getting cheated here the most.

As well as any DC that plays by the rules.

Volkswagen is a real life example currently going on that may have massively cheated I don't know but so far it looks bad. Cheating when unpunished is one of the banes of human existence because it's all fun and games until it's you or your family that gets hosed by it.

Not saying something about it sounds cool in some ways but if everyone takes that approach and mostly they are then at some point cheating starts to infest everything.

I mean EVERYTHING.

It will not stop until people stand up to it and don't put up with it.

It's almost a law of human nature that if you allow this to go on if people essentially get away with it then you have just coded it into their set of options.

The reason even small violations of the honor system in our military colleges will get you kicked out is simple.

Honor is an all or nothing thing. You can dishonor yourself precisely ONCE.

The main reason for it is so the OC can call in the play to the QB. Look at the advantage Seattle has at home with crowd noise. Now imagine if every game teh QB could only get plays signalled in, that becomes a HUGE advantage for the home team in some venues(Arizona included).

They put in mics to help level the playing field.

 

[conraddobler]

The main reason for it is so the OC can call in the play to the QB. Look at the advantage Seattle has at home with crowd noise. Now imagine if every game teh QB could only get plays signalled in, that becomes a HUGE advantage for the home team in some venues(Arizona included).

They put in mics to help level the playing field.

That's a bit like saying some horses are mudders and some are not.

I realize why they did it but homefield is homefield and QB's who are aren't as smart would be at a disadvantage.

At the end of the day you could argue for the DH too or against it but it's just a rule and if they can't enforce a rule effectively then they should look to remove it or roll it back to a level they can enforce it.

 

[chickenhead]

I assume the league will do what it can to prevent its signature event from being tainted, and this commissioner has demonstrated an inability to both police the league effectively and to prevent official relationships from being compromised.

But if substantiated, all this stuff will come into play historically. The Pats had a claim to being the greatest dynasty because they won their four Super Bowls with a salary cap and free agency. Now they don't get to take credit for excelling under restrictive conditions. Tom Brady had a claim to being the greatest QB in NFL history. Now it looks like Joe Montana and Terry Bradshaw won just as many Super Bowl wins without illegal feeds in their helmets.

Peyton Manning losing the Super Bowl to the Seahawks, followed by Brady beating them to win it, seemed to settle that debate for good. Probably still does. But now a Manning fan can insist that at least Peyton read his own defenses and called his own audibles.

Not that I'm so naive as to think that other NFL teams aren't cheating as well. But it definitely makes me regret cheering for Pats during their first Super Bowl win against the Rams...

 

[Russ Smith]

That's a bit like saying some horses are mudders and some are not.

I realize why they did it but homefield is homefield and QB's who are aren't as smart would be at a disadvantage.

At the end of the day you could argue for the DH too or against it but it's just a rule and if they can't enforce a rule effectively then they should look to remove it or roll it back to a level they can enforce it.

Yes and no, all the horses are running in mud if it's muddy. When you take out the communication to the QB in the helmet, you create a huge home field advantage because the home team has the crowd silent and the road team has them screaming. OBviously that advantage is still there for audibles, that's why Seattle is so tough to play at, hard to audible, but the advantage gets even larger for the home team if there's no helmet communications.

There were so many things they were doing they had all their bases covered but by far the most critical one was the radio communication stuff. They could tape signals and then watch the tapes and figure out plays but they realized in real time they simply couldn't consistently get the defense play call in to Brady fast enough before the 15 second cut off. They lost to Tampa Bay in the opener that year, after the game Charlie Weis told Monte Kiffin "we had all your calls and you still shut us down." That's what he was talkign about, we knew your signals, but we didn't have time to get them in to Tom Brady consistently before the mic cut out. The next season they solved that and suddenly Weis was a genius.

 

[Russ Smith]

I assume the league will do what it can to prevent its signature event from being tainted, and this commissioner has demonstrated an inability to both police the league effectively and to prevent official relationships from being compromised.

But if substantiated, all this stuff will come into play historically. The Pats had a claim to being the greatest dynasty because they won their four Super Bowls with a salary cap and free agency. Now they don't get to take credit for excelling under restrictive conditions. Tom Brady had a claim to being the greatest QB in NFL history. Now it looks like Joe Montana and Terry Bradshaw won just as many Super Bowl wins without illegal feeds in their helmets.

Peyton Manning losing the Super Bowl to the Seahawks, followed by Brady beating them to win it, seemed to settle that debate for good. Probably still does. But now a Manning fan can insist that at least Peyton read his own defenses and called his own audibles.

Not that I'm so naive as to think that other NFL teams aren't cheating as well. But it definitely makes me regret cheering for Pats during their first Super Bowl win against the Rams...

I think Brady is a great QB. Manning is apparently so convinced the Pats were cheating that he got to where he wouldn't discuss any X's and O's in the locker room he'd step outside and talk to the OC because he was positive the Pats were bugging the locker room. In fact the Colts were doing dummy discussions in the locker room to try and catch the Pats doing it.

When they played Pittsburgh in the AFC championship game, Hines Ward said "they had our stuff, they were calling out our plays as we were lined up to run them. We switched to calling plays at the line but they had those too(the audibles Ted Johnson mentioned). So we had to start rotating FB's or TE's to get our plays in without them knowing." He also said "luckily we were playing in Pittsburgh, if the game had been in NE, as soon as we started shuttling in plays like that, the QB mic would have gone out to stop us making any changes. the problem was they had planned to run some no huddle against NE because they thought it would surprise them, but they couldn't, because the Pats had their audibles

So we have 3 Super Bowls where they were either caught cheating(Rams and Giants) or accused of cheating(Eagles) and multiple AFC title games where they were accused of it too. So I think it's clear the NFL didn't stop them from doing it in the big games.

I think the issue is unless Matt Walsh still has that tape of the rams superbowl walkthrough, Goodell destroyed all the smoking guns. The Giants Stadium guy(working for the Jets) gave Goodell tapes of audio they intercepted proving the Pats were still talking to Brady after the mic was supposed to be dead, Goodell destroyed them. They got tapes proving they had offensive signals too(they insisted they only did it for defense), Goodell destroyed them. They had tapes proving they were using it during the same game, Belichick had insisted they only used it in later games but Walsh gave them multiple tapes of games where they didn't play that team later in the year. Schlereth on ESPN said if they weren't playing that team later in the year why tape the signals? the only logical reason is they were using the information in THAT same game. So Belichich lied about that too, but again, Goodell destroyed those tapes.

one of the more hilarious points of this whole thing was the excuse Goodell gave to Arlen Specter when Specter demanded to know why he destroyed tapes that in many cases even he hadn't seen. His answer is hilarious. he said we had to destroy the tapes so that if anything popped up in the future(tapes) we would know they were new and not the same ones we already had. That's completely assinine, they are tapes, you mean he couldn't tell it was the same tape of the same game just by who they were taping and when? Hey that's the same Steelers tape we already have. Complete nonsense, Specter said it was the most ridiculous answer he had ever heard. He literally was saying if new tapes came out then we'd know they were still cheating, as if that wouldn't be obvious by the date of the tapes.

I wish Specter had pushed it more, it would have come out if he'd gone after the NFL and forced them to open it up, but he didn't. Now essentially unless Matt Walsh gives that tape to someone, or some other ex Patriot comes out and tells it, it's probably not going to come out. That's why IMO Goodell went after them so hard over Deflate Gate, he was furious after him helping cover up the extent of Spygate, they were still cheating.

 

[cardpa]

I feel there is no doubt that the patriots cheated. The only question is for how long, how often, and in what ways which seem to be many. I think we could all agree on that. So the only question that remains is why the league took the stance it did to all this cheating. Bottom line is money. What would have happened if all this spilled out and the league ended up not only with egg on it's face but mud, **** and a whole host of other things. The consequences would have been sponsors/corporations pulling out, deals with networks falling through or resulting in less money, lawsuits by fans, etc. etc. etc.

I think even a lot of owners would agree to sweeping it under the rug because right now this may be the biggest cash cow going in sports. I can't imagine an owner saying sure I rather have a million a year and be honest than 10 million a year and look the other way. Money drove this whole thing.

 

[Russ Smith]

I feel there is no doubt that the patriots cheated. The only question is for how long, how often, and in what ways which seem to be many. I think we could all agree on that. So the only question that remains is why the league took the stance it did to all this cheating. Bottom line is money. What would have happened if all this spilled out and the league ended up not only with egg on it's face but mud, **** and a whole host of other things. The consequences would have been sponsors/corporations pulling out, deals with networks falling through or resulting in less money, lawsuits by fans, etc. etc. etc.

I think even a lot of owners would agree to sweeping it under the rug because right now this may be the biggest cash cow going in sports. I can't imagine an owner saying sure I rather have a million a year and be honest than 10 million a year and look the other way. Money drove this whole thing.

Exactly. the other owners realized if they really open this thing up we take a chance of killing the fans belief in the NFL. If they knew what was going on it would cast doubt on almost 10 years of games.

Interesting point that most people don't seem to realize. The Pats were not the last team to get caught taping signals from an opposing team. The last team was the Denver Broncos, I think it was 2010 or 2011, and the head coach was .... Josh McDaniels, the ex Patriot assistant who went from virtual unknown to OC to HC in very short order. McDaniels had hired away an assistant from the Pats who'd been intimately involved in the Spygate taping, and he was caught doing the same thing for the Broncos. They were fined and McDaniels got in trouble, Pat Bowlen the owner apologized profusely.

That person who they caught taping was Steve Scarnecchia, he was taping a 49er workout and was caught redhanded. Denver fired him, and the NFL permanently banned him from ever working in the NFL again.

his dad, Dante, was a coach with.... the Patriots until he retired in 2013.

What made it even weirder was McDaniels tried to get Matt Cassel from the Pats but they wouldn't deal him. The claim is denver offered a first round pick, and the pats ultimately settled for a 2nd rounder from KC. Some people believe it is because they were afraid if Cassel rejoined McDaniels in Denver, and they did the same thing there they had done in NE, the NFL might catch them and then Cassel might expose what he knew about it being done by the Patriots.

The crazy thing is unless they are still cheating their butts off, you can see last year and this year how good Tom Brady actually is. Their defense has fallen off in recent years(since Spygate actually) but the offense has almost gotten better.

 

[Cardsfanstl]

I feel there is no doubt that the patriots cheated. The only question is for how long, how often, and in what ways which seem to be many. I think we could all agree on that. So the only question that remains is why the league took the stance it did to all this cheating. Bottom line is money. What would have happened if all this spilled out and the league ended up not only with egg on it's face but mud, **** and a whole host of other things. The consequences would have been sponsors/corporations pulling out, deals with networks falling through or resulting in less money, lawsuits by fans, etc. etc. etc.

I think even a lot of owners would agree to sweeping it under the rug because right now this may be the biggest cash cow going in sports. I can't imagine an owner saying sure I rather have a million a year and be honest than 10 million a year and look the other way. Money drove this whole thing.

What you say makes a lot of sense. You would think with the amount of money they make and the amount at stake they would invest in fool proof technology or at least reliable technology regarding the headsets that work in each stadium without interference or tapping into the headsets of the opposing teams.

 

[Russ Smith]

What you say makes a lot of sense. You would think with the amount of money they make and the amount at stake they would invest in fool proof technology or at least reliable technology regarding the headsets that work in each stadium without interference or tapping into the headsets of the opposing teams.

THey did. After spygate they fined Belichick personally 750K, his money, the Pats could not pay it for him. They used that money to buy new radio equipment to better prevent anybody from doing what the Pats had been doing.

One assumes they are still using that equipment or equipment like it to monitor this stuff.

Although given the reaction of the patriots to all this so far, which is essentially repeatedly lying about what they were doing and the extent to which they were doing it, you almost wouldn't be surprised if the NFL caught them doing it again somewhere down the line.

note where Josh McDaniels is right now, OC and QB coach for the Pats.

 

[chickenhead]

Meanwhile, as many have pointed out, for their transgressions the Saints lost some very valuable draft picks, and their head coach, assistant head coach, defensive coordinator, and GM all received lengthy suspensions. I'm not saying they shouldn't have (I would have been fine with more), but it puts some things into relief. Huge penalty for conspiracy to injure (while soft-pedaling the issue of player safety in other areas) but minor penalty and possible cover-up for cheating. I think it's probably the league being reactionary and greedy rather than a premeditated stance, but it seems like the NHL thinks the fans will turn a blind eye to concussions because they love football so much, but reasonable doubt cast on the outcome of playoff games and the Super Bowl will irrevocably hurt the sport.

 

[Russ Smith]

Meanwhile, as many have pointed out, for their transgressions the Saints lost some very valuable draft picks, and their head coach, assistant head coach, defensive coordinator, and GM all received lengthy suspensions. I'm not saying they shouldn't have (I would have been fine with more), but it puts some things into relief. Huge penalty for conspiracy to injure (while soft-pedaling the issue of player safety in other areas) but minor penalty and possible cover-up for cheating. I think it's probably the league being reactionary and greedy rather than a premeditated stance, but it seems like the NHL thinks the fans will turn a blind eye to concussions because they love football so much, but reasonable doubt cast on the outcome of playoff games and the Super Bowl will irrevocably hurt the sport.

I think that's a great point, the Saints got hit much harder in relation to what they did than the Pats did.

I fully agree with the punishment for the Saints, what they were doing was dangerous, but in terms of integrity of the league it wasn't nearly as bad as what New England did, and NE did it for MUCH longer.

 

[conraddobler]

I feel there is no doubt that the patriots cheated. The only question is for how long, how often, and in what ways which seem to be many. I think we could all agree on that. So the only question that remains is why the league took the stance it did to all this cheating. Bottom line is money. What would have happened if all this spilled out and the league ended up not only with egg on it's face but mud, **** and a whole host of other things. The consequences would have been sponsors/corporations pulling out, deals with networks falling through or resulting in less money, lawsuits by fans, etc. etc. etc.

I think even a lot of owners would agree to sweeping it under the rug because right now this may be the biggest cash cow going in sports. I can't imagine an owner saying sure I rather have a million a year and be honest than 10 million a year and look the other way. Money drove this whole thing.

Short term money sure. Sweeping things under the rug never really solves anything and just kicks the can.

We as human beings are excellent can kickers but eventually the can gets so big you just break your foot.

Now you have a broken foot and a big fat can that starts spewing out all the undone things you should of done.

It's short sighted is what it is unless the NFL wants to be something akin to pro wrestling they had best deal with cheating when they find it.