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From Boomer Esiason in the Cincy paper this morning....

Quarterbacks have been doctoring the ball for years. ESPN is putting the narrative on this and everybody else is making a mountain out of a complete and utter molehill.

First....In my opinion, Boomer Esiason is a moron. I hear him do updates frequently on CBS Sports Radio and he's almost unlistenable. Never liked him, never will. He was a crappy quarterback and is worse as an announcer. Phil Simms is the only ex-qb I dislike more.

Second....There is a legal amount of "doctoring" a team can do to the ball. The team is allowed to mess with it so long as it remains in "game ready" condition as deemed by the referee. They are legally allowed to squeeze it, scuff it, and wipe it down. One thing they are NOT allowed to do is deflate it to less than minimum league specifications.

And if Boomer chooses to use the "everybody cheats" justification for cheating, well then shame on him.

Consider the spitballer in baseball. We know there's quite a bit of doctoring of baseballs going on. We're even a bit affectionate about some of the more creative cheaters. But when they get caught, they get caught. They are immediately ejected from the game. They also face fines and additional game suspensions. Why? Because they are doctoring equipment beyond what has been determined reasonable by league rules. The same applies, or at least should apply for the NFL.

If it's a dumb rule, then remove if from the rulebooks in your spring owner's meetings. But until then, violators should be penalized, regardless of what Boomer Esiason thinks.

We're even a bit affectionate about some of the more creative cheaters. But when they get caught, they get caught. They are immediately ejected from the game.

They haven't been caught yet. I don't think they can be, because I don't think the league can PROVE that they gave properly inflated balls to the Patriots.

They would have to have a sign-over to the Patriots, and a combined checking of the balls at that point, and they'd have to have some signature from the Patriots that they had checked the balls with the referees and the balls they received were at the proper inflation.

If they had such a document, we'd already know about it.