The Pittsburgh Steelers complained about the New England Patriots for headsets going out on Thursday night, even though the Patriots likely had nothing to do with it and it affected them too, and for movements before the snap by New England's defense, although it appears no rules were broken.
Paranoia is a strong force. And Patriots' opponents are being swept up in the current.
However, the constant talk about the Patriots' shenanigans casts a shadow over the franchise. To Bill Belichick, who talked to the Patriots' media corps on Friday morning, it takes away the four-time Super Bowl champions' accomplishments. Belichick referenced media reports this week, presumably an ESPN story filled with anonymous sources that centered around eight-year-old spygate, and an SI.com story about how opponents are suspicous of the Patriots. Belichick said about the constant and mostly unfounded talk of suspicious activities, "It's not right."
“But I’d just say on, kind of tying this in with a couple things from last week, or earlier in the week, I just think overall it’s kinda sad, really, to see some stories written that obviously have an agenda to them with misinformation and anonymous type comments," Belichick said, according to Patriots.com. "Writing about warm drinks and trash cans and stuff like that. I mean it’s just, I think it’s a sad commentary and it’s really a very, it’s gone to a pretty low level. It’s sunk pretty deep. First of all I would say that our program here is built on competition and trying to improve every day and trying to work hard. And it’s not built on excuses. And we just try to go to work and improve and find a way to get better.
“This organization has won a lot of games, but particularly in reference to the great teams from ’01, ’03, ’04, back in there and all the great players that played that played on those teams: Ty Law, [Lawyer] Milloy, Otis Smith, Rodney Harrison, [Tedy] Bruschi, [Larry] Izzo, [Willie] McGinest, [Mike] Vrabel. [Anthony] Pleasant, [Richard] Seymour, Matt Light, [Joe] Andruzzi, Steve Neal, [Deion] Branch, Troy Brown, [Tom] Brady, Antowain Smith, Kevin Faulk, Corey Dillon, Lonie Paxton, [Adam] Vinatieri. To take away from what those guys accomplished, what those teams accomplished. How good they were. How many great players we had. How well they played in big games. How they consistently showed up and made big plays and game winning plays. It’s not right. Those guys were great players, and many more. Those are a few of them. And great teams.
“I’m not going to get into a back and forth on it, but that’s the way I feel about it.”
Belichick is fighting an uphill battle. People like conspiracy theories more than they like logic, and to many people the Patriots are the villain in their favorite movie that plays every Sunday in the fall. It's good for the NFL — every good story needs a bad guy — but it must be annoying to the Patriots.
Belichick also discussed the latest issue, which was the headset malfunction in the season opener on Thursday night. The Patriots dealt with the same thing, Belichick said. They had malfunctions, including late in the game. He said after the game that they almost changed out Tom Brady's helmet because of the issues. But, the Patriots had prepared because headset malfunctions are common (as an aside, why is this such an issue for the multi-billion dollar NFL to figure out?).
"You know, we … it’s not an uncommon problem," Belichick said, according to the Patriots' site. "We ended up having to signal some of our plays offensively and we couldn’t get them in. But that’s … we look at it as something you have to be ready for every week. And we practice it. So … home, away, I don’t really think there is any common denominator on that." So instead of defaulting to conspiracy theories and making excuses, the Patriots prepared for the issue that came up for both teams on Thursday. Hmm.
No comments:
Post a Comment