They already have figurative asterisks on their 3 Super Bowl “championships” for secretly recording the actual plays that the opposing teams planned on running.
Now there’s quite a bit of discussion on the internet regarding the scoreboard showing the wrong down before Cundiff’s miss.
Everyone on the Ravens, including Cundiff, admits that he still should have made the kick. But this is a different discussion.
I wouldn’t put anything past Belichick. Scoreboard errors often occur, but the timing on this one was pretty bad for the Ravens.
So what do non-Patriot fan dopers think of all this?
I despise Bellicheck and the Pats, but this accusation is just silly. Any coach, player, or kicker who doesn’t know what down it is without having to look at the scoreboard should be out of a job. It’s silly to try and pin this on Bellicheck.
Much ado about nothing. I watched the game. They were on 4th down, no matter what the scoreboard said about the down. And yes, they knew it. You don’t blow a major 3rd down and lose track. Don’t just take my word for it. Check the play-by-play (and yes, it actually did happen that way).
They had a chip shot kick on 4th down and missed. End of story.
And even the previous Superbowl wins don’t deserve any asterisks. If anybody still brings it up, they’re overblowing the whole “cheating” scandal. And it plays into this current bit of internet douchery.
I get it. People don’t like the Patriots. But, in this case, it’s a manufactured controversy based on absolutely nothing.
How is that cheating? Is the theory that Cundiff ran onto the field late because he got the down wrong and missed the kick as a result?
I also despise New England, but from what I remember, the Spygate thing wasn’t cheating either. They broke a rule for sure, but my understanding is that what they were doing was not very different from the kind of videotaping that is actually allowed and they didn’t gain any further advantage by doing it the way they did it. I know there’s some dispute over those issues, but that was the sense I got.
I was thinking the Ravens still had a timeout. That close to the end of the game, their last offensive play and they let their kicker rush out… and he misses. They were saving it for what exactly?
I blame someone, but it ain’t Belichick or the Pats.
The Ravens definitely screwed up at the end of the game. I don’t know why they tried to pass on that 3rd-and-1 and I don’t know why they didn’t call a timeout. As it was, the kick may have been rushed.
Indeed, the Ravens had a timeout left. Should have used it instead of a rushed kick. But this BS about Cundiff sucks? Does he suck in general or just because he missed the one time? Because your game plan should never come down to requiring a clutch kick, field goal or punt. If it does, you have fundamentally failed in other ways.
I’ve been a Pats fan for 30 years so take my opinion with a grain of salt, but that’s just ridiculous. Everybody in the stadium knew it was 4th down. Cundiff just choked.
The ‘spygate’ thing is also overblown, but I don’t want to start that argument all over again.
Even if he legitimately didn’t know the correct down, the existence of a time out negates any complaint. If you don’t have enough time to get out there and comfortably set up for your kick, you call the TO.
I would also think it bizarre to think that the scoreboard operator fudged the down in order to mess up the opposing team. You’re just as likely to foul up your own Special Teams unit, if players routinely rely on the scoreboard for down information.
“Bellicheat” is one of my test words. Use it in a serious manner, and you automatically take a strong dip towards the “fucking idiot” end of the scale.
There was no cheating back when, and there sure as hell was no cheating on Sunday.
Even with the new kicker friendly kickoff rules, he’s regressed in touchbacks while he led the league last year. And he’s missed a TON of FGs this season, while he was virtually unstoppable last season
Thank you. So he sucked in other situations that this. I honestly didn’t know, I don’t follow the NFL closely enough to know stats like that.
FoieGrasIsEvil - Its BS if he Cundiff is fine at all other times of the year and sucks because he missed that one kick. If he has sucked all year, then well he certainly still sucks. My point being, no matter how normally makeable the field goal was and even if he had been on the field in time to setup normally, the Ravens should not have even been in that position.
More to your point, while I am no Ravens fan, they certainly don’t suck as a team. Judging by number of teams still playing, they could be ranked as being third or fourth best in a 32 team league. They certainly played longer this year than everybody else in their division.
It wasn’t cheating, and they left a timeout on the board. Hell, worst case scenario, take a delay of game penalty and turn the kick from 32 yards to 37 (unless they were at risk of a 10-second run off, but I don’t think they were since they did have the timeout).
Wait, so you’re telling me people think Cundiff is going “If I knew it was fourth down, I would’ve known to kick it through the goal posts! You’re supposed to kick it wide left if it’s third down!” Are you kidding me?
Y’know, when I was four, I was watching a Pittsburgh Pirate get caught in a run-down. I appealed to my father “But what if he just goes to the umpire and explains that he just got tired and doesn’t want to be out?” I was pissed at the umpire when my Dad told me that wouldn’t work.
Well, no. They openly (not secretly) videotaped plays that opposing teams ran in actual games (you know, in front of 30,000 people, a TV audience, and, well, the Patriots players and coaches, 11 of which were actually on the field for the play). It’s completely within NFL rules to do so, as long as the camera is in a structure (or possibly even just a 3 foot by 3 foot temporary roof). The Patriots violation was that the camera wasn’t inside a shed or otherwise covered.
Frankly, while it’s a clearly a technical violation of the rules, I have yet to have anyone explain how exactly, moving the camera gave the Patriots any real benefit.
Screwing with the scoreboard is pretty egregious, and I don’t really think any professional would intentionally do such a thing. Well, maybe Red Auerbach, but I don’t think even he would have gone quite that far. As noted, the Ravens clearly knew it was 4th down, since the did kick, and had several options for stopping the clock and giving the kicker more time, so if it was a nefarious scheme, it should have come to naught, anyway.