Ruling out high deflation scenarios

Climate Audit ^ | Jul 3, 2015 | Steve McIntyre

[detective]

Further to my series of posts on Deflategate, reader chrimony observed that my statistical analysis had shown that it was possible that there had been no tampering, but had not excluded the possibility of tampering. This is a sensible observation, but raises the question of whether and how one could use the available statistical information to exclude tampering. This is analysis that ought to have been done in the Wells Report. I’ve done the analysis in this post and the results are sharper than I’d anticipated.

For Logo initialization, any manual deflation exceeding de minimis of say 0.1 psi can be excluded by observations. For Non-Logo initialization, statistical information rules out “high” deflation scenarios i.e. deflation by more than the inter-gauge bias of 0.38 psi plus uncertainty, including deflation levels of ~0.76 psi reported in Exponent’s deflation simulations. Remarkably, for Non-Logo initialization, the only manual deflation that is not precluded are amounts equal (within uncertainty) to the inter-gauge bias of ~0.38 psi. Precisely why Patriots would have deflated balls by an amount almost exactly equal to the bias between referee Anderson’s gauges is a bizarre coincidence, to say the least. I think that one can safely say that it is “more probable than not” that referee Anderson used the Logo gauge than that such an implausible coincidence

[detective]

The NFL upheld Brady's suspension today. But the article shows that it is scientifically impossible for the footballs to have been manually deflated. If you don't want to wade through all the science the quote below tells the story:

"Any manual deflation greater than ~0.1 psi or so would be inconsistent with observations. Exponent’s simulations did not show that such small deflation could be achieved, nor is there any sensible reason why anyone would bother trying to deflate footballs by ~0.1 psi."

[Leto]

Correct. But the haters will seize on the cell phone and ignore the Science.

If I were the Patriots, there would be a non game ball that is inflated to 12.5 psi, the ball would be taken to the field and displayed promently on the sideline. Then the psi taken at halftime this is done whenever the temps are < 50F.

All the above are with a cameraman shooting the entire process and projecting it to the big screen in the stadium.

[IncPen]

All the above are with a cameraman shooting the entire process and projecting it to the big screen in the stadium.

Obviously you've never been to a David Copperfield show...

[BatGuano]

You must be ignorant to think that any NFL team owner would condone an attempt such as you suggest to embarrass the NFL.

[Leto]

I understand full well that the NFL doesn’t want their witch hunt exposed.

[Captain Peter Blood]

I have a question that pertains to the text’s. Even if Brady destroyed his phone are not all those text messages available from his cell phone provider or are they strictly on the phone?