Did you really think spygate was just going to go away? It's as much part of NFL history as the 3 rings they cheated to get. Those 3 rings, Tom Brady and Bill Belichick will forever be tainted and you will never stop hearing about it. I don't know why you think you would.
You alternate between saying that the Patriots used to be a "class act" but "lost their way" and saying that they never acted in any special sort of way to begin with. And Borges does the same thing in his article. Which is it? My argument is that the Patriots have always taken chances with guys with character issues. They drafted Christian Peter back then, and picked up guys like Dillon and Harrison. Now they drafted Dennard and Hernandez and picked up guys like Ocho and Haynesworth. There is no difference until you start talking about the football production that resulted from those moves, which is irrelevant to this argument. The strength of the Patriots system has been in the fact that they have been able to corral those character issues in, and encourage good behavior from their players while they are a member of the team. You have brought up a bunch of examples of players with character issues, and they all fit perfectly into that argument. Hernandez might be an exception, but he is the only one, and the facts on that case still aren't clear. You are filtering out all of the stories and comments that don't fit your argument, and acting like what is left is automatically "what everyone thinks". I mean c'mon, we are sitting hear arguing over an article blasting the Patriots for the Hernandez incident, and somehow you are trying to argue that everyone is giving the Patriots a free pass. And most of the people calling for Goodson to be released weren't even outsiders. We never gave two shits. The people making those comments were shithead Jets fans on sites like this, who are mostly just tired of dealing with all of the drama created by Santonio Holmes. People like reading scandals. Maybe it isn't a good thing, but a celebrity cheating on his wife is just too common to be a big scandal these days. A celebrity posting naked videos of his wife on public foot fetish forums, and saying that he wants to see her get gangbanged is a pretty big scandal. Or at least that's the way our culture sees it. Yes the Patriots do get preferential treatment from the media, and I just explained why in several of my last posts. It's not because the media loves the Patriots. It's because the media loves the team that wins 12+ games almost every single year and a HC/QB combination with 5 Super Bowls and 3 championships under their belt. If the Jets can become that team, they will receive the same treatment too. You can cry injustice all you want, but winning teams are always going to get looked upon in a favorable light. That fact applies to almost every other aspect of life too, not just sports.
you are filtering out everything from this thread and the article and basically sticking your head in the sand going 'NO THE PATRIOTS ARE AWESOME!' the article isnt saying they used to be that way but now have changed, it is saying that they have never changed the only difference is the spin the media threw onto the pats storyline.
No. You just want to believe that because I am a Pats fan and it is easier than actually reading what I have been writing. I am responding to specific points about the Patriots taking greater character risks recently and seeing cracks forming in their teams strength as a result. I am not sticking my head in the sand and saying "THE PATS ARE AWESOME". Many of the players that we are talking about still sucked, and ended up being bad decisions for the Patriots, just not because of their character issues. No. That is not what the article is saying. Borges contradicts himself in the article, going back and forth between saying they "lost their way" and they were always the same, but he clearly makes the point that they have changed their ways and started taking bigger risks. Read my other comment here (http://forums.theganggreen.com/showpost.php?p=2793646&postcount=278) for the quotes and examples. Or just read the article again, since it is pretty plain to see.
Fair enough, but your sarcasm is not always immediately obvious, perhaps I need to read your posts a little more carefully, will try:beer:
He's in deep shit! I don't get a vibe from those around me that folks are worried about the Pats so much as they wonder how someone who has the world by the balls could throw it all away...
The media loves the Pats because the NFL is a money making machine for the 3 largest media companies in the country. The Pats have never been a class team, they have always been on the edge. They, both the league and the Networks, have an economic incentive to legitimize the thugery as long as it's winning. This is exactly why the Commissioner comes down on players like a ton of bricks and burns evidence of criminal behavior by one of it's top franchises. The problem the league and the networks have is they need brands with squeaky clean images to fork up the money. That's why the networks and the league wash their dirty laundry at the team level and come down on the marginal players who are expendable. BB did a great job of cheating by using technology to steal players signals. What goes ignored is the Pats won their first SB by going out of the spirit of the rules regarding holding in the SB. Instead of enforcing the rules the league clarified the rules the following year. Lets not forget that BB built his HC resume on his defensive brilliance, largely built on the back of Lawrence Taylor who while a drug addict was protected by the networks and the league for one reason, he was the single best and most exciting defensive player of his era.
QED The stuff before and after is just attempt to justify it, to make a point that Pats deserved it. The problem is that media is supposed to just report, not promote, individual teams. In all seriousness I appreciate you being honest about it. There is nothing wrong with enjoying overly positive coverage, I know I would if this was about Jets. So long as we acknowledge that it's overly positive and calling it what it is, there is no harm in bathing in sunlight. As to "lost" vs "never had".... I think the pressure of demand for success caused deviation from prior more honorable way. And I think media not scrutinizing increased ambition, ex. from drafting a player with a flawed background to violating NFL policy.
The answer would be "habit, sense of entitlement and protection from above". This is a problem with a lot of young NFL players. In fact, I heard somewhere that NFL hosts some kind of behavior education session for new draftees each year. I think in Hernandez's case it went so far be because of his past affiliation. For an average 22 yo getting drunk and hooking up with 3 girls after money fell is the top. For Aaron the stop sign was much, much farther.
Not necessarily, given my statement. However that doesn't mean I can't indict the NFL's Lance Armstrong for (proverbially) leading the pack. In sports like the NFL where the difference between teams' skill is both luck-based and marginally similar I do see it as a coincidence. However I acknowledge, as a hypothetical, that if the Patriots were not in fact cheating during their '08 SB loss vs NYG (and assuming they were cheating during at least one SB victory), I would argue that stealing signals (or any other use of videotape to gain an advantage over the opponent) would be enough of a difference to have given NE the victory (given that the game was so close). Then again, this is all conjecture, but I feel as though it's meaningful within that context.
Hernandez's wild past is catching up with him big time. As he has had such a wild past and childhood growing up.
