I'm a lifelong Patriots fan, but let me tell you, today, first Belichick lied to me, then Brady lied to me. I at least had some hope after Belichick essentially said, I don't know anything, but Tom does. So I waited for Brady to come clean and let me know what happened, good or bad. He essentially said, sorry guys, I know just as little as my coach. And he chose his words very carefully by saying, and I paraphrase, "the balls I choose before the game are the balls I expect to play with." OK, so were these the balls you chose before the game and are these the ones you expected, or were these different?
I knew a couple days ago that the only way out for them was to play the 12.5 PSI card, which both Belichick and Brady did today. So by essentially saying 12.5 PSI, that means that *any* loss, no matter how small, already starts them outside the lines of the legal limit, but since they were "approved" at 12.5 PSI, they feel they are good. So right now, they are essentially saying, NFL, prove we did something wrong.
And guess what, that's probably the best approach for them, even know I know they are lying to me. Because I'll bet you that the refs DID NOT initially measure the PSI in those balls, I'll bet they just felt them, they felt good, just like they felt during the game, and that's that. The only measurements they have is the balls AFTER the first half, and after they have been played. So Brady and Belichick have a pretty good alibi since for their purposes, they had no opportunity to do anything. So if the NFL only has measurements of the balls at the end, and not the beginning, you have Brady confirming he had them 12.5 PSI, then you have refs confirming they were below that level at halftime. But by how much?
Even if the balls are 10 PSI or lower, without a confession or evidence/proof, there is no way the NFL can put this on any one person within the Patriots. So my guess is that they will fine the team, change rules for next year, and the SB will be played as usual.
So Belichick comes up and says, talk to Tom. Brady comes up and says "I have no idea how balls got deflated." I'm assuming the equipment manager needs to come to the podium and explain he did what Brady wanted 12.5 PSI, then who knows what happened after he gave the balls to the ball boy. Then the ball boy comes to the podium and says everything was fine, and nobody touched them once he got them on the field. And there you go, everyone passes the buck, and nobody admits anything, and the NFL is left to just fine someone or some entity.
Bottom line for me, Brady lied. Belichick lied. But, right now, there is still a chance the Patriots actually offered the refs balls that were below 12.5 PSI and the refs OKd them, without checking them very well. So if that's the case, the Patriots offered say 10.5/11 PSI balls, the refs didn't catch it, and they played the game.
If that is the case and the Patriots DID NOT tamper with those balls after the refs initially inspected them, some people may not like me for this, but I would have much less of a problem if that were the case. If that happened, the NFL didn't do their job. But if someone actually went and tampered after the refs inspected them, I think Patriots/Belichick/Brady deserve big fines. I can't see any suspensions unless it's found someone actually tampered.
IN any event, I was so excited and looking forward to this game, and now for an entire week I've had to go through this. Through no fault of my own, other than being a fan. The NFL is totally inept in this matter if they haven't even interviewed Brady on day 4. That's beyond belief.
I understand teams try to play loose with rules, and I bet Brady has been doing this since he injured his throwing hand back when, I heard he had ligament damage. But if they gave the NFL under sized balls, and the NFL didn't do their job inspecting, this is a totally different case than tampering with balls post inspection. Just saying. It sucks either way, and I don't like being lied to!
