Welp if you thought the DeflateGate controversy would end once Tom Brady won his appeal, you were sadly mistaken. In fact now a report has come out about the New England Patriots prior controversy, Spygate and how it relates to the prosecution against them for DeflateGate.
via ProFootballTalk:
An ESPN Outside the Lines report, citing interviews with more than 90 sources around the NFL, says that the Spygate cheating lasted “at least 40 games over a period of several seasons from 2000 to 2007,” and that the league never fully investigated all the accusations against the team.
According to the report, the taping of opponents’ signals reached the point where the Patriots had diagrams of the stolen signals that they could use during games.
The report also says that other teams were much more upset about the Patriots’ cheating than they let on, because NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell convinced the rest of the league not to press the issue. Former Rams coach Mike Martz, whose team lost to the Patriots in Belichick’s first Super Bowl, said he was pressured by a “panicked” Goodell to issue a statement saying he was satisfied by the league’s investigation of the Patriots. Martz said he agreed to go along with Goodell’s request to issue a statement backing the league not because he was completely satisfied by the investigation, but because Goodell convinced Martz that a prolonged scandal could badly damage the league.
Basically the report alleges that the league is heavily going after the Patriots for DeflateGate as a “makeup call” for going easy on them for Spygate. Many fans however think the league is running a smear campaign against the Patriots since Brady won his appeal. Either way it appears this will never end…
