You have such a robotic and black/white philosophy on this. I think that every owner thinks it is a big deal and would love to have it cleaned up, but they are between a giant rock and a very hard place right now because they have to "protect the integrity of the league." Your whole take on this sounds like a math equation rather than a realistic take on a very unique situation. a+b=c is not the proper way to look at this. With your philosophy, Mike Martz must not give a shit that he was cheated out of the Super Bowl because he claimed the investigation on spygate was thorough (which was forced and then fabricated). He never called the Patriots out so therefore he doesn't think its a big deal. Is that also true? How about if he called out the Patriots we would have been blackballed from the league.
-The refs gambling on the games are comparable as far as atrocity goes, I'll give you that, but they are not a team. It's definitely just as embarrassing for the league though. -The giants were not the only team to do that, the whole league did that (ex. shanahan with the broncos against the Jets one year) and they made rules to change it, it was an overt league wide problem that was fixed. Nothing the Patriots have done was overt aside from the Baltimore play. -Steroids were a league wide problem not attributed to any specific team at all. That was a problem with the game itself. -The Falcons using fake crowd noise is weak, but they were punished accordingly and was an isolated incident. Most of the things you brought up were league wide problems within a sport, that had to be changed because it was easily exploitable. There was never one team habitually committing these crimes in utter secrecy, and then openly defying the commissioner and mocking the league after they had been accussed. That is what they've done, it's like a big "fuck you" to the commissioner (who saved your ass during spygate) and the rest of the league and most importantly the fans, who want to know they are watching a football game, not a game of espionage and trickery. With that being said though, Goodell can go to hell. As far as the Harbaugh whining, Bill found a loophole (yet another) in the rules and sought to exploit it. It's unsportsmanlike, and they actually have to create rules for this repressed egomaniac who gets off on finding loopholes and exploiting them to the detriment of the game. That shit he pulled is now illegal. That's great they do it in college, that's why the NFL is a totally different game. Give credit to Bill for pushing the envelope so tastelessly that the league has to come up with rules that nobody knew even had to be written. There is ONE team that habitually violates and exploits the rules, yet they are running the show. Kraft and Belichek know that they are untouchable for a number of reasons, and they are loving every second of it. I understand your need to support your team assuming you were a fan before the year 2000, but I would be embarrassed to have to come up with all the excuses in the world if my team did this. You can have the 4 superbowls, I would take one that comes with out more than a decade worth of serious accusations against my franchise.
No, my position simply isn't dependent on completely making up what the owners must feel, which coincidentally likely mimics what you feel. Take ownership of your opinion, don't project it to the owners and think you are making a reasonable argument. There is nothing to validate that owners focus is to protect the shield but the perception of cheating doesn't hurt the shield. These rumors are worse for the shield than one team getting publicly exposed for cheating. The owners own the league. Nothing can happen in the league without their consent. If cheating was something that they wanted to end it would end. If it isn't it isn't as big deal to them as it us to you. There just isn't a reasonable explanation to justify why they would permit it but be opposed to it. The "protect the shield" nonsense is just some lame phrase journalists have made up and people latch on to.
Do you mean the same loophole that the Titans used? Tennessee ran that same formation twice earlier in the year. So did a few college teams. Saying "Nobody has seen that before" like Harbaugh did and then whining about it like a 3rd grader just makes him look unprepared and a terrible loser. And you really have to be a special kind of moron to attach spygate to the first three titles and to take deflategate seriously. Cliffnotes for you: NFL lied about every single "fact" about the case. When they couldn't prove it Goodell change the reason for the penalty, even though the investigator (Wells) said that it was not punishable and NFLPA told Brady to not give up the phone. But hey, who likes facts when you can just hang on to ESPN headlines and b.s. because one team winning annoys you. And if this were the Jets with 4 titles you'd be screaming from the mountain top how unfair the situation is. And you know what? I would agree with you.
The Deflator was just losing weight. Guess the NFL lied about that too. GTFO of here with this weak shit. _
Your coach supports covering up cheating. That must burn you up, huh? http://espn.go.com/nfl/story/_/id/1...end-discussion-headset-issue-gillette-stadium
No just being told to handle it out of press........ Wipe your chin c@ckhead Oh by the way, to my is guilty as charged http://bleacherreport.com/articles/...oys-proves-tom-brady-is-guilty-in-deflategate