Bill Belichick and the Patriots - Cheaters supreme, but does anyone care?

The Game Room
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If anyone was watching the Fox pregame today (Sunday), they showed evidence of the Patriots putting up the famed “human wall” on special team plays, exactly the same as the Jets did earlier this year. Supposedly, the Jets picked up someone on the Pats practice squad and they tipped the Jets off about this tactic.

Fox then showed a video clip clearly showing the Pat coaches creating the wall. The only difference is that the last guy in the wall actually STICKS HIS LEG OUT to try to trip the player racing down the field. The Pats happened to be playing the Jets, which, of course, made it a more interesting story for today.

Also, supposedly the Jets notified the league about the Patriots doing this when they were questioned about their “human wall”, which caused the league to get pissed at the Jets. I think the story said that the league wanted the Jets to send some proof, not to throw another team under the bus. So, guess what? The Jets provided the film.

My question(s). Does anyone care and should we?

I find the Patriots in general and Bill Belichick in particular to be a reprehensible franchise and piece of shit (respectively) who look for any and all ways to cheat to gain an edge. Filming walkthroughs and videotaping practices? Busted, but quickly flushed under the rug. I’m sure this will be too. But I wonder what else the Pats are doing that they are not supposed to be doing, and I wonder what if anything, this will ultimately do to the Pats legacy in this decade? They have a great team and a great QB. Is the coach just a great cheater? I find it hard to believe that they wouldn’t be a great team without these revelations, but then again, I wonder… if it didn’t give them an edge, why do it?
I hate the hoodie.

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Link to the video?

The wall itself is not illegal as far as I know, but certainly sticking a leg out is.

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Upfront I’ll say that I’m a Patriots fan and I’m not really bothered by those things. But I don’t care if any other team does it.

I would care if the Pats (or anyone else) did things like steroids, paying off refs, illegally altering game equipment, or intentionally injuring other team’s players.

4

I was watching the same pre-game show. The problem the Jets had is that they released the film rather than turning it over to the NFL. Never embarrass the NFL.

Too many players/teams cut corners because the gains for succeeding far outweigh the penalties for failing - at least in their minds.

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The key point in my mind is that between this and the secret filming, the Patriots now have a pattern of flouting the rules … what the hell else are they up to? Maybe the Pats fans are willing to put up with it for the sake of success, but how will fans of those teams (if any) who are defeated will feel at the end of the day: “They beat us fair and square” or “Wonder what kind of cheats they used to beat our guys?”

I’m betting it’s option B.

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There are probably some other things that would bother me but I can’t think of at the moment.

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So the officials missed tripping call, and that’s the reason the Pats have three rings?

No, I don’t buy that and I don’t care. The videotaping thing was much ado about nothing. Belichick really is just that much better than everybody else, and the Pats are a class outfit as far as I can see.

8

Screeeeeaach, what?

Class outfit?

I would argue that a missed tripping call is not the reason the Patriots have mutliple Super Bowl victories, but I would say that it’s one of the methods that they use to get an advantage over their opponents.

You know, and they’re a pretty good team without the cheating. They can win without, so why do it except to be a-holes?

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I don’t buy that they cheat.

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Sigh…probably going to regret this, but here goes.

I don’t doubt for a second that the refs miss calls. And it wouldn’t surprise me in the slightest if there was outright corruption.

If you’re going to be a fan, you have to accept this. If the league can’t be arsed to enforce its own rules, what kind of recourse do you have? Hell, the Steelers benefitted from the most nakedly one-sided officiating imaginable in Super Bowl 40, and the overwhelming response has been “spread 'em and smile”. Hell, no one even tried to deny it!

I mean, when you really think about it, can you point to any time period in any big sport that wasn’t full of injustices? When was the golden age of fairness for major league baseball? The NBA? The World Cup? The Olympics? The Tour De France? Golf? Every year, every event, there are multiple horrifying injustices, and every time we’re reassured that They’re Only Human, and this sort of thing is perfectly normal. Because it is.

So, rags-to-riches franchise becoming a league darling and getting away with crap? Yeah, I can see that. Not losing any sleep over it, though.

(Re. “Spygate”: Personally, I think the psychological edge Belechick got from all the paranoia and hysteria this created far outweight any information he was able to get from this silly stunt.)

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O.K., maybe violating NFL rules by forming the wall isn’t cheating. Maybe violating NFL rules by videotaping an opposing team isn’t cheating. Maybe violating NFL rules by lying on injury reports isn’t cheating. Maybe violating NFL rules by micing their defensive players isn’t cheating. Maybe vio… oh the hell with it. Look Dio after the taping scandal, the league fined Belichick half a million dollars and striped away the Patriot’s first round draft pick for the following year. The NFL didn’t do that because the Pats are a “class act”.

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Sorry, can’t find the video yet, but I’m sure it will be out there sometime tonight/early tomorrow.

The wall isn’t illegal. The leg sticking out probably isn’t either, only because no one ever thought that they’d have to make it illegal. I’m sure what the Jets did was not “illegal” under any rule, but sticking a knee out to trip up an opponent certainly flies in the face of fair play and that’s the reason that coach was suspended. Notice I did not say fired. He wasn’t fired simply because he was told to do it by his boss, Rex Ryan, and I suspect that there is technically nothing in the rules against it (at least then. Maybe now there is).

Thing is, the tape seen by at least one other poster, and I’m sure others, was worse in that the guy is actually seen sticking his whole leg out, like a Radio City Rockette. He missed, but that doesn’t change the fact that 1) The Jets seemed to imply that they learned the wall trick from the Patriots practice squad player and 2) unless the Jets say anything, no one knows that the Patriots invented the practice.

I know that cheating goes on. Hell, in baseball, it’s almost a crime if you don’t try to cheat here and there. But what constitutes “good” cheating from “bad” cheating? Good question. Faking an injury to slow down a team ramming it down your throat may seem ok, but if the guy isn’t really hurt, isn’t that cheating?

The thing that bugs me about the Patriots is that for 10+ years now, I’ve bought into the fact that Belichick was a great coach and that Brady was a great quarterback.

Then I’m reminded that Belichick was no genius in Cleveland. No big deal, I tell myself. Many coaches become geniuses by finding a QB that becomes great. A 6th round draft pick is a fluke, but the Patriots were the ones that drafted Brady, so they and Belichick benefit. No different than Walsh and Montana, who he took in the 3rd. Every team in the NFL had multiple chances at each of these guys, but weren’t smart enough to draft them. So, I don’t hold a grudge against Belichick for being lucky enough to have Brady.

I just have to wonder why the seemingly strong focus on cheating. If what A Monkey With a Gun is correct (and I’ve personally never heard the Johnson quote), that’s a great advantage.

What else is going on to make the hoodie look like a genius? Maybe he’s just a great cheater. Personally, I’m going with this. The Patriots have been a part of strange doings for a decade now. If cheating doesn’t get them over the top anymore, and Brady eventually retires, I suspect New England is going to turn into Cleveland under Belichick very quickly.

You suck, Belichick. As much as I can’t stand the blowhard Ryan, I’m actually quite happy he kicked your ass.

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cite for the Ted Johnson quote

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here is a link to the video and the Glazer piece on Fox as well as an article about the issue.

The video is not very clear on my computer, so I’m looking for another link. If anyone else stumbles on one, feel free to post it. I could clearly see it on my TV, but I cannot see it here very well at all.

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Are they cheaters? Yes, of course.

Does anyone care? No.

Would Belichick still be a successful coach without the cheating? Of course he would. It’s silly to pretend that you can win 176 games in this league through dishonesty alone. He’s a great (but ultimately evil) coach who also will work any advantage he can find, regardless of its morality.

The year we discovered the cheating, and the Pats were under intense scrutiny, they still went 18-1.

I think the NFL and Roger “No Balls” Godell bear as much blame as the Patriots in this case. They were so scared of damaging the NFL brand that they destroyed all of the tapes before we could see the extent of the cheating and basically swept the whole thing under the rug as soon as possible. That only raises suspicions about how extensive the cheating was and whether it would have cast doubt on previous championships. For the NFL to have to vacate a Super Bowl (like the Heisman Trophy) would be an unimaginable disaster for them. However, the NBA had a much worse corruption scandal, and they seemed to have weathered it fine; though perhaps because they were already so diminished, no one really cared.

Also, it’s impossible in the NFL today for anything to remain a secret for long, which is why I doubt there is much more cheating going on. Players change teams constantly and your coordinators today will be your opposing coaches tomorrow. This is a copycat league, as we saw when the Jets copied the sideline wall and the Broncos videotaped the 49ers (with the same damn videographer the Pats used!). If there is anything hinky going on, eventually it will come out.

In conclusion, fuck the hoodie.

16

QTF.

My priority is fair play. Rules exist for a reason. Saying that it’s OK because there’s no specific rule against it is nonsense. There may not be a rule against sticking your leg out to trip up a player but how does that differ from that same sideline “player” walking out onto the playing field to trip an opposing player?

Saying it’s OK because everyone else is doing it sounds like you’re 12 years old and trying to convince your mom to let you smoke pot because “Johnny’s mom lets him do it”.

If you can’t beat your opponent fair and square, is it worth selling your pride and dignity?

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[Shrug] If you’re not cheating, you’re not trying.

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I love the perception. Usage of the word “Belicheat” or “Cheatriots” makes for an excellent moron detector.

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Apparently it is, or the Hoodie wouldn’t keep doing it.

I can’t imagine Lombardi doing this, or Noll. Or just about any coach. I would think it would be a matter of pride that you were a better, smarter, sharper football mind than the rest of your peers.

Belichick certainly doesn’t have that mystique anymore. I can almost understand it if you are in danger of losing your job, but I guy who has the kind of W/L numbers Belichick does?

Just doesn’t make sense why he’d risk his reputation as a great coach and cheat the way he has (and seemingly continues to).

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If “the snowplow incident” and the subsequent lionization of the actual snowplow at Gillette Stadium is any indication, the Patriots have a three-decades-long tradition of not just cheating and poor sportsmanship, but also glorying in their getting away with it. (That blatantly partisan deployment of the snowplow led to an immediate change in the rules; the NFL promptly banned all uses of snowplows during the games.)

I ALWAYS root against the Pats, no matter who they play or what the stakes may be for other teams.