Boston Herald-Possible Rams/Pats Superbowl Spygate?

[BigGameMN]

It's pretty much known that the unnamed source for the story is Matt Walsh, who most likely is the one that filmed the walkthrough. It's just he won't talk, he's scared of being sued by the Patriots or The NFL or both. He says that the only way he will tell what he knows about the Patriots cheating ways (and it's believed he knows a heck of a lot) is that if his interviewers agree to pay all legal fees, fines, etc.. for whatever comes from what he says. Nobody is willing to do that because that cost could be very high.

Enter Congress. If Specter is serious about having hearings on this then Walsh would be at the top of the list of potential witnesses. They could compel him to talk. So if were patient and Specter is serious about this we should have some hard answers in the next couple of months.

[RAMMAN68]

This does not surprise me; I painfully watched the replay the other night. In the end, none of this really matters ; there's no way the league will take action on anything that might have happened prior to the 2007 season. And we will not gat our much deserved second Lombardy Trophy. You have to remember that there is a new Commissioner, and I doubt he really wants to dig up anything from the past.

Anyone want to bet the Pats coaching staff is reviewing tape of the Giants walk through from today?

[RealRam]

AAAAARG!!! Why those ..."#!@&*~^ patriots." Pfff!

Wouldn't it be something that SB XXXVI would at least -- and forever -- carry a special asterisk to favor the Rams in some way?

[btimsah]

Originally Posted by woody1351

i always thoguht something was up with that game. we beat them pretty good in the reg season and then all of a sudden they could stop us on a dime. it would be nice to see a second banner hanging in the dome next year once they take that win away from the cheatriots. whats the chance that would happen?

My Sooners had games stripped from their bad 2004 season or something. From what I understand, the teams we beat do not get a win, they still get a loss. But our wins were removed.

Even though Oregon still get's a win after this bullsh...

YouTube - The officiating that changed my philosophy on life.

[ramsbruce]

Originally Posted by RAMMAN68

This does not surprise me; I painfully watched the replay the other night. In the end, none of this really matters ; there's no way the league will take action on anything that might have happened prior to the 2007 season. And we will not gat our much deserved second Lombardy Trophy. You have to remember that there is a new Commissioner, and I doubt he really wants to dig up anything from the past.

Anyone want to bet the Pats coaching staff is reviewing tape of the Giants walk through from today?

I think it matters a lot actually. Whether the league takes action or not isn't that important. It's also not about a title or a trophy that we won't get anyways. It's about exposing the Pats as frauds in the past and this dynasty goes down the drain. I want the truth, and if congress gets involved we may get the truth, it won't matter that Goodell doesn't want to dig it up, he will have no choice. So in that respect it does matter.

[btimsah]

He's trying to PROTECT THE NFL by destroying evidence of their cheating, as well as ignoring what more information does come out. The NFL's response to this newest allegation? The NFL says the Patriots have told them this allegation is false.

That's all they need. Yeah, I'm sure the Jets game was the first time. First time they do it and they get caught! What are the odds!? It's like Kobe with that girl in Colorado. You think that was his first time? NO.

Goodell needs to wake up. I hate college football now because of the BCS and referring. I don't want to add the NFL to that list. That would give me college basketball as the only good sport left. The NBA does the same thing with the Spurs.

[rammiser]

I feel sick like this game just happened yesterday. How many times do the Cheatriots have to get busted before the NFL does something real to them? Merrill Hodge said on ESPN that if this is true the Patriots championship should be stripped from them. For those of you saying just let go, well thats what the NFL and Patriots want you to do just let go. If no one makes this a big deal then the Patriots can just do whatever they want whenever they want. Lets see here 9-11 happened Patriots win. They get away with murder on our wr's and rb's coming out of the backfield. They hold our wr's so much that a new rule comes out about touching wr's past 5 yds. They have videoed teams and been caught twice for it. Now they may have taped our walk through and I'm sure already had a tape from the game earlier that year. This does matter and I refuse to let it go because it is pathetic that a team has benefitted from all this cheating and now everyone thinks they are so great. Just like Warner said that game impacted peoples lives. Think about it, if Martz wins that game no way the Rams decline the way they did and now way he is looked at as a bad coach. Warners career spiraled after that as well. If this is proven to be true justice must be served. I know we wont get our Superbowl ring but how about the Pats get a real fine and lose their 1st round pick for 5 years. Not to mention they should lose the 8th pick this year. The Rams are and were the better team and they were not cheaters. The Rams organization may not be the best but at least they have INTEGRITY unlike the entire Pats organization. I can not and will not honor that team in 2001 and I will not consider their 2007 undefeated season a great accomplishment. They are CHEATERS bottom line and they deserve no respect!

[AvengerRam]

It really is amazing how the league and the media refuses to see the Patcheatots for what they really are.

One example which, though minor, is quite troubling is the fact that Tom Brady has been listed as "probable" with a "shoulder injury" every week since the start of the 2005 season. Injury reports are mandatory, and teams can get fined for failing to provide an accurate report.

And yet... the league ignores, and the media chuckles, at this blatant disregard of a rule.

Does this violation impact anything? No.

But it does show the way the Belicheat thinks, and shows why a comprehensive investigation is needed.

[BigGameMN]

What gets me even more steamed about this is the fact the "investigation" was most likely nothing more then the NFL asking a member of the Patriots front office if this was true. The fact that the NFL, in trying to defend the charges, said that The Patriots "told them it wasn't true" is absurd. What can you really add to that? Oh how I hope that Specter holds hearings about this scandal and brings up that quote to Goodell. If the rumors are true and Walsh has evidence I really hope he has a copy our walkthrough and Specter plays it for Goodell right after bringing up that quote.

[evil disco man]

Originally Posted by AvengerRam

It really is amazing how the league and the media refuses to see the Patcheatots for what they really are.

One example which, though minor, is quite troubling is the fact that Tom Brady has been listed as "probable" with a "shoulder injury" every week since the start of the 2005 season. Injury reports are mandatory, and teams can get fined for failing to provide an accurate report.

And yet... the league ignores, and the media chuckles, at this blatant disregard of a rule.

Does this violation impact anything? No.

But it does show the way the Belicheat thinks, and shows why a comprehensive investigation is needed.

Yet another good example of how all the little things add up. This was Belichick's way of sticking his nose up at the NFL for enforcing stricter rules when it comes to reporting injuries. He'd rather not report injuries that can give the opponent that tidbit of knowledge and use it to their advantage, so now he puts about half of his squad on the injury list so you don't know which ones are for real.

:l

-jake-

[RamWraith]

Shadow over Patriots' integrity may reach into Rams' legacy
By Bernie Miklasz
ST. LOUIS POST-DISPATCH
Sunday, Feb. 03 2008

GLENDALE, ARIZ. — Only the New York Giants can apprehend them now. But if the
New England Patriots vanquish a 19th consecutive opponent to win the Super Bowl
and complete their perfect season, they'll be handed the Vince Lombardi Trophy.

The question is, will the trophy be dusted for fingerprints?

Will the Patriots be accused (again) of stealing it?

You just never know with these guys. The Patriots could be to the NFL what
Barry Bonds is to Major League Baseball: a discredited champion. With Bonds, it
was a tarnished home-run title because of his suspected use of
performance-enhancing steroids. With the Patriots, it's a matter of
performance-enhancing surveillance.

Are you ready for "Spygate" the sequel?

According to a report in the Boston Herald, citing an

unnamed source, a member of the team's video department filmed the Rams' final
walkthrough before Super Bowl 36 in New Orleans. The next day, the Patriots
upset the Rams, 20-17.

The Patriots issued an official denial Saturday, calling the allegation
"absolutely false."

We could believe that except the Patriots damaged their credibility earlier
this season, in the original "Spygate," where the Patriots were caught using a
video camera to steal the New York Jets' signals. NFL commissioner Roger
Goodell fined coach Bill Belichick $500,000, fined the organization $250,000
and ordered a first-round draft choice forfeited.

Was that the only incident? The Patriots' previous three victims in close Super
Bowls — the Rams, Carolina and Philadelphia — surely had to wonder if they were
bamboozled by Belichick's dirty tricks.

Matt Walsh, a Patriots video assistant from 1996 through 2003, dropped this
hint to ESPN.com: "If I had a reason to want to go public, or tell a story, I
could have done it before (Spygate) it even broke. I could have said everything
rather than having (the Jets) bring it out."

After a four-day "investigation" following Spygate, Goodell penalized the
Patriots and declared the matter closed. He even ordered the confiscated
videotapes destroyed.

Goodell's rush to justice raised more questions than it answered.

As Walsh told ESPN.com, "If they're doing a thorough investigation ... they
didn't contact me, so draw your own conclusions."

This is why Sen. Arlen Specter, R-Pa., wants Goodell to explain before Congress
the disposing of evidence. Goodell will likely go into full Roger the Dodger
mode. After all, how devastating would it be to discover that the NFL's
three-time (or four-time) Super Bowl champions slimed their way to those rings
and trophies?

As is, we know that Belichick and his defensive players flouted the on-field
rules in Super Bowl 36 by holding Rams receivers with illegal downfield
contact, because they correctly assumed the refs wouldn't call many penalties
in the Super Bowl showcase.

Hey, the Rams screwed up enough times in that game to put the Patriots in
position to snatch the dramatic win. Coach Mike Martz didn't give Marshall
Faulk enough carries against the nickel-dime defenses, offensive right tackle
Rod Jones whiffed on a block that led to an interception returned for a
touchdown, and Ricky Proehl lost a fumble late in the first half to set the
Patriots up for a 14-3 lead.

That said, if the Patriots did secretly tape the Rams' walkthrough, then their
win should be contaminated by scandal.

But it won't be. This is the NFL.

In baseball, players merely suspected of cheating by using
performance-enhancing drugs are swiftly condemned, their reputations ruined. In
the NFL, cheaters roll on without much of a hitch. San Diego pass-rusher Shawne
Merriman was suspended for four games in 2006 after flunking a steroids test;
he was rewarded with a trip to the Pro Bowl. Patriots safety Rodney Harrison
was nabbed in a human-growth-hormone ring this season and received a four-game
suspension. There was little howling from outraged columnists, pundits, fans or
congressmen.

But think about this: If the Patriots cheated the Rams, the act carried beyond
the outcome of a game. If the Rams had won that Super Bowl, it's two in three
seasons. And two Super Bowl victories instead of one strengthens Pro Football
Hall of Fame credentials of Faulk, Kurt Warner, Isaac Bruce, Torry Holt and
Orlando Pace.

The Super Bowl loss also marked the starting point of Martz's deteriorating
relationship with Rams executives Jay Zygmunt and John Shaw. That upset had a
direct impact on Martz's fragile state of mind, and his future in St. Louis.

If the Rams were cheated in Super Bowl 36, they lost more than a game. They
were cheated out of their legacy, and lost their place in history.

[RamWraith]

How Long Have The New England Patriots Been Taping Signals? Here's The Evidence!

Saturday, February 2, 2008

Michael Vinciguerra

The following article comes from Mike Fish, an investigative reporter from ESPN, and helps confirm my beliefs about the New England Patriots' history of recording signals from other teams. The incident with the New York Jets earlier this season certainly wasn't the first. Rather, that incident just opened up the can of worms. I have a list of questions I'd love to ask Bill Belichick, though I doubt I'd get a meaningful response:

Why is there always a receiver open?
Why do the Patriots always come back in the 4th quarter?
Does anyone find it odd how they blew out teams in the first half of the year, but kept things close in the second half?
How come Randy Moss was so terrible on the Oakland Raiders, but dominated his position as a receiver on the Patriots?
Not only does Randy Moss dominate, but how does he just blow by defenders like they aren't even playing?
How come the Patriots get almost all the calls by the refs in their favor? (most notably the Ravens game)
Is it possible for a team to honestly be this good, or is there more to it than meets the eye?

We all know the New England Patriots cheated. The most important question, however, that must be asked now is how long they were cheating? In an effort to save and support the New England Patriots in having a perfect season, the NFL and Roger Goodell burned the evidence.

Does anyone see a similar scenario here? This is the same situation as the steroid scandal in baseball. Both the MLB and NFL knew about the "cheating" going on within their sports, but didn't do anything to stop it because these players and teams were racking in cash and ratings for their sports. However, now that the government has stepped in and started investigating, the NFL and MLB has to come clean and make it appear as if they had no idea steroids were in baseball or the NFL was in support of a perfect Patriots team. All these players in baseball were crushing home runs thanks to some extra help (steroids). All I'm suggesting is the Patriots have become as dominant as they are thanks to some extra help too. Anyway, here's the article which may land the Patriots and the NFL in serious trouble:

Matt Walsh worked seven years with the New England Patriots before being let go on Martin Luther King Day in 2003. He was on the New Orleans Superdome sidelines when the Pats kicked off their dominant run, upsetting the St. Louis Rams in the 2002 Super Bowl. He wasn't a chiseled athlete, but a go-getter who climbed his way up the team's support staff ladder -- first as a public relations intern, then as a video assistant and later, in his last year, a college scout.

Mostly, though, his years with New England were spent shooting football video. He was the third, and last, employee on the video staff. In his words, he was Matt Estrella before Matt Estrella, a reference to the Patriots video assistant caught filming the Jets' defensive signals by league officials last September at halftime of a game against New York -- the violation that birthed "Spygate" and led, in part, to some of the heftiest penalties in league history. New England coach Bill Belichick was fined $500,000 -- the biggest fine ever for a coach  and the team was docked its first-round draft choice this year.

And now, Walsh, 31, an assistant golf pro on Maui, might be positioned to further pull back the curtain on the Patriots' taping history, expose where and how they gained advantages and, perhaps even, turn over video proof. If Sen. Arlen Specter, R-Pa., the top Republican on the Senate Judiciary Committee, is serious about calling a hearing to delve into the issue -- particularly the questions of why the NFL hastily destroyed all evidence, including tapes handed over by the Patriots, and what other as-yet-undisclosed material might be out there -- perhaps one of his first calls should be to Walsh, who in conversations with ESPN.com suggested he has information that could be damaging to both the league and the Patriots. In a New York Times story on Friday and again at a news conference later in the day, Specter expressed frustration with a lack of response from the NFL to his Nov. 15 letter inquiring about the league's investigation. He said NFL commissioner Roger Goodell would eventually be called before the committee to address, among other things, the destruction of the tapes. NFL officials and Patriots employees possibly could be brought before the committee to testify. Walsh told ESPN.com that, in the wake of the cheating scandal that broke early in the season, he has never been contacted by NFL officials to inquire about his insight into the Patriots' illegal taping practices, which he says date back to his time with the franchise. Nor, he said, has there been any communication with the Patriots.

"If they're doing a thorough investigation -- they didn't contact me," Walsh told ESPN.com. "So draw your own conclusions. Maybe they felt they didn't need to. Maybe the league feels they got satisfactory answers from everything the Patriots sent them." Goodell said at his annual address to the media at the Super Bowl on Friday that the tapes turned over by the Patriots date back only to 2006, well after Walsh had left the organization. Does Walsh know anything that might be of interest to that inquiry? He won't say, but he hasn't dodged the suggestion that he does. On a number of occasions in interviews with ESPN and ESPN.com in recent weeks, he has hinted about evidence and information he might be able to provide.

"No, the league has never called me," he said. "Neither have the Patriots. And really, I would be surprised if they did. Then all of a sudden -- I don't know how much the league or Patriots know about my stance or how I feel about things -- for them to put in a call to me, what are they going to say? Are they going to try and threaten me? Or say, don't talk about it? Then, they are putting themselves out there and looking bad as far as if I turn around and say, 'Hey, guess what, the league called me and said [we're] gonna take away your pension if you say anything about this.'"
Later, Walsh said his reference to a pension meant his 401k retirement plan. Walsh suggested he could have blown the whistle long ago, if he'd been so inclined. "If I had a reason to want to go public or tell a story, I could have done it before this even broke," he said. "I could have said everything rather than having [Eric] Mangini be the one to bring it out." It is widely assumed that Mangini, the Jets head coach and former Patriots assistant under Belichick, was responsible for exposing the Patriots' spying tactics earlier this season.

Several members of New England's staff came to the Jets with Mangini when he took the head job in New York, including assistant coaches Brian Daboll and Jay Mandoleso and video director Steve Scarnecchia, a former Patriot video assistant. The Jets' staff, under orders from team management, refused comment for this story. "Obviously, Mangini knew what was going on and it had been going on for a while," Walsh said. "They tried to catch them doing it last year and weren't able to. So they were just waiting for them to throw the camera up this year on the sideline. But afterwards, I get the impression the league said to them, 'Hey, kind of back down from this; let us take care of it,' because Mangini probably could have come out and said more, made more of a deal out of it if he wanted to."

Walsh said that when he worked with the Patriots, a very limited number of people within the organization were privy to details about the team's video practices, notably video director Jimmy Dee and Ernie Adams, Belichick's prep school friend and right-hand man. Walsh said that during his tenure in New England, no taping was done without Dee's knowledge. As for the prospect of Adams sharing insight into the suspicious practices, Walsh said: "You've got a better chance of him telling you who killed JFK than anything about New England. There are lots of stories there. He told me stories of things they used to do in Cleveland [where Adams assisted Belichick with the Browns]."

Asked Friday at his Super Bowl news conference about the New York Times story that indicated Specter's interest and identified Walsh as a person who might have inside knowledge about the Patriots' operations, Belichick said, "It's a league matter. I don't know anything about it." Despite suggestions that he could be a player in expanding the Spygate probe, Walsh repeatedly has refused to provide ESPN.com with any evidence of wrongdoing by the Patriots. He also has refused to confirm that he has tapes in his possession. Walsh said he is fearful of possible legal action against him by either the league or Patriots if he details what he knows. He refused to provide evidence of potential wrongdoing unless ESPN agreed to pay his legal fees related to his involvement in the story, as well as an indemnification agreement that would cover any damages found against him in court. ESPN denied his requests.

On Friday, Walsh told ESPN he is uncertain whether he would voluntarily meet with a Senate committee, if asked. Previously, however, he expressed a willingness to tell league officials what he knows if they should call. "I wouldn't lie to them about anything, and especially because I don't know what they have," Walsh said. "I don't know what evidence they have. So there is no reason for me to lie to anybody, anyways. It is one thing for me to say, 'Hey, look, just not gonna talk about it.' It is not like a felony or crime or something where I got to go on a stand in court and swear on a Bible or something. It is the kind of thing where for me, personally, it could potentially do more harm to talk about it than not talk about it. "But if the league contacted me and said, 'Did you do this? Did you do that? …' Maybe they have evidence I did, so I am not going to say, 'No, I didn't.'" Like others trying to break into the NFL, Walsh came to the Patriots fresh out of college with little experience and a world of ambition. He graduated from Springfield College, class of 1998, with a degree in sports management. He didn't play college football; and though he claims to have spent parts of two seasons on the golf team, the college's sports information office has no record of him in its files. He began his time with the NFL by working on the Patriots' game-day press box staff during his college years. Those connections led Walsh to an internship in the franchise's public relations department during the first semester of his senior year at Springfield. In an effort to get ahead with the team, Walsh told ESPN.com, he offered to help out in the scouting department, which was then headed by Bobby Grier, after his day shift in Page Ranking ended. Walsh found himself without a full-time job after graduation. He was working as a lifeguard on Cape Cod when the Patriots called just days before the start of camp and offered him a job as a video assistant, even though he had no expertise or training in that area. In the winter of 2002-03, Walsh said he was fired by Patriots vice president for player personnel Scott Pioli, and then spent a year on the video staff of the Cologne Centurions in now-defunct NFL Europe. Walsh says he was frustrated with the monotony of the scouting job in New England -- he focused on the few football-playing colleges in western New York -- and that may have been a factor in his dismissal. He suggested it likely got back to the Patriots that he had made overtures about video jobs with other teams. He eventually landed a series of assistant golf pro jobs at private clubs in New England and Arizona.

He can be found these days on the staff at the Ka'anapali Golf Resort in Lahaina, Hawaii, a 36-hole layout that caters to tourists visiting the high-end hotels and resort condos that line the long stretch of beach overlooking the Pacific Ocean. As he spoke with ESPN.com on a recent morning, he strode around the course confidently, talking up guests between an occasional golf lesson.
Walsh described himself as a guy who makes friends easily, and who is adroit at working deals. When he worked video for the Patriots, he said, he often finagled a round of golf at