Shattuck: National state of envy

The Boston Herald ^ | 05-13-15 | Tom Shattuck

[calvincaspian]

There can no longer be any doubt — “Deflategate” is not about football. It is about a national affliction — one of the seven deadly sins: Envy. “Envy: the feeling of wanting to have what someone else has.” Exactly. And it’s made unhinged haters out of a lot of you outside New England. Tom Brady took a helicopter to Salem State University. “Arrogant!” detractors from across the country shouted. Collectively, Americans have not been so fixated on a helicopter image since the fall of Saigon.

[calvincaspian]

Now clear your Google search history of terms like “psi,” “helicopter regulations” and “Gisele Bundchen lingerie” — and start living your life again.

[Canedawg]

They cheated (again!) and got caught.

[FamiliarFace]

Seems like you are interested in promoting only Tom Shattuck’s work here. Wonder why.

[freebilly]

EVERY team in the NFL has a roster filled with steroid abusers. No one can get as big and fast as the players are now just by lifting weights and diet alone. The league should be focusing on PED use and deflated balls of a different kind. The league needs to get serious about attacking the real cheaters in the NFL, and they’re on every team....

[C. Edmund Wright]

Just out of curiosity, why do you say the OP is only interested in featuring Shattuck’s work?

[C. Edmund Wright]

I have only a little problem with the deflating of the balls - what irritates me is Brady’s stupidity in how to handle it. On day one he could have/should have just said something like “yeah, I like them inflated on the low side, so I push our equipment people to go as low as they can’ - or something like that - and boom, no real controversy.

And no, I don’t think this is 20-20 hindsight - I think this should have been evident from the start. I agree there is a lot of jealousy and envy among those celebrating this suspension, but the Pats as an organization are insanely secretive and defensive.

[FamiliarFace]

Click on his name. That’s the only thing he posts about. Seems like he’s looking for more clicks to his articles.

[FamiliarFace]

After clicking on his name, go to the “in forum” link. It’s all Shattuck, nothing else. Seems like a self-promoter to me. I don’t think Free Republic should be used for that purpose.

[sauropod]

This guy is a bozo.

2 minutes I’ll never get back.

[C. Edmund Wright]

gotcha....what I did click on was the link, and the Boston publication did have Shattuck’s name in the official header.....

[C. Edmund Wright]

gotcha....what I did click on was the link, and the Boston publication did have Shattuck’s name in the official header.....

[MortMan]

There can no longer be any doubt — “Deflategate” is not about football. It is about a national affliction — one of the seven deadly sins: Envy.

Gee, and here I thought it was about enforcing the actual rules of the game...

[FamiliarFace]

Yep, that’s what he’s hoping for. “Look at how many people are reading my article, boss!”

Seems like some people are using FR as a publicity tool. Can they be reprimanded for this?

[C. Edmund Wright]

Maybe, but I don’t have a problem with it personally. Every pundit and columnist and commentator we like and respect - was at some point in their career a shameless self promoter.

Jim Rob probably doesn’t agree, and that’s certainly his right.

[Leto]

Not really it is the NFl in CYA mode for a sting on a time + their horrible process for something that never was a big deal and was exploded by former longtime Jets executive now with the NFL who have an ax to grind with the PAtriots whom they despise.

This will become clear when Brady sues the NFL for defamation after his appeal is heard.

[MortMan]

Not really it is the NFl in CYA mode for a sting on a time + their horrible process for something that never was a big deal and was exploded by former longtime Jets executive now with the NFL who have an ax to grind with the PAtriots whom they despise.

That's an excuse. If the team was caught breaking the rules, then punishment is warranted.

If it's truly not a big deal, then rescind the rule.

[FamiliarFace]

If the guy posted his stuff along with other things and comments, it wouldn’t bother me, but if he’s using FR for the only purpose of promoting himself, then I think he’s misusing the forum.

Hey, how funny is that? A guy who wants to break the rules to suit his purposes applauds another guy who got caught doing the same thing!

[C. Edmund Wright]

I don’t think anyone is “applauding” anything - I also think it’s naive to think that any commentator, any actor or actress, musician, comic, or any journalist you’ve ever heard of didn’t aggressively self promote. Of course they did......

[FamiliarFace]

Hey Shattuck, calvincaspian, or whatever name you choose to go by, the reason people don’t like the Patriots is because of the cheating, not because of the winning. People like winners, not losers. People don’t like cheaters, which the Pats have been shown to be...twice so far.

When Lance Armstrong won the Tour de France so many times, we all thought he was great! Everybody liked him! Once we realized he was a cheater, the opinion of him turned sour. That’s the same as what has happened here.

It’s not envy, but you don’t have the guts to admit it. What a shame that you willingly close your eyes to the truth.

[Leto]

"That's an excuse. If the team was caught breaking the rules, then punishment is warranted. If it's truly not a big deal, then rescind the rule." This is the point they weren't "caught" doing anything. The report for those of us (mostly) Patriot fans show a league paying big $$$ and getting the report they wanted with not much in the way of evidence. I will address a few things here, first the shoddy science used to 'prove' the balls had been tampered with. I will be using post (mine and others from a Patriots fans website. First This was a sting, Dean Blandino lied about this: " Not sure how this has not gotten mainstream traction yet but surely will be a cornerstone of Pats case: http://boston.cbslocal.com/2015/05/...iciating-vp-lied-about-deflategate-knowledge/ At a pre-Super Bowl press conference, Blandino tried to say that nobody from the league was aware of any issues with the footballs prior to the game. “Then there was an issue that was brought up during the first half,” Blandino said on Jan. 29 in Phoenix. “A football came into question and then the decisions was made to test them at halftime and now.” When hit with a follow-up question from the New York Post about allegations that the NFL conducted a “sting operation” in order to catch the Patriots red-handed, Blandino again flatly denied any prior knowledge to anything about football inflation levels. “I don’t know where [the idea of a sting] came from,” Blandino told the Post. “This was a problem that came up in the first half.”​ And yet in The Gospel According to Ted: At this point, I understand that folks’ eyeballs might immediately gloss over with boredom upon seeing yet another excerpt from the Wells report. But this is important, as it relates to the email sent by Colts GM Ryan Grigson and Colts equipment manager Sean Sullivan. This message was sent to NFL senior VP of football operations David Gardi and director of football operations Mike Kensil. Kensil forwarded Grigson’s email without comment to James Daniel, Director of Game Operations at he NFL, who in turn forwarded it to other Game Operations personnel who would be at the game as an ‘FYI.’ Kensil also forwarded Grigson’s email to Dean Blandino and Alberto Riveron, both senior members of the NFL Officiating Department, with the message ‘see below.’ Both Riveron and Blandino decided that they would raise the issue with Walt Anderson, who had been assigned as the referee for the game. On Saturday, the day before the AFC Championship Game, “Blandino reminded Anderson to ensure that proper protocols concerning the footballs were followed.”​ So this is a high ranking NFL official in CHARGE OF OFFICIATING who outright lied to the media about a sting. Not a good look. Oh this is also the saint who partied on the Cowboy bus (he almost looks as slimy and date rapey as Grigson). Good luck with that one in court, boys." Then there was the statements by Jim Kensil to the Patriots eq mgr at halftime, first understand that Kensil's father was the Jets President and Jimmy boy worked for the Jets for 28 years including when Belicheck walked out of them: "The entire incident began when the Colts intercepted a ball in the first half of the AFC championship game and found it to have low pressure. After the Colts informed the league, all 11 of the Patriots’ balls were inspected and found to be below the allowable level. Patriots sources are steadfast—and their belief was conveyed to the league, according to a source—that Mike Kensil, the NFL’s VP of game operations, walked up to Patriots equipment manager Dave Schoenfeld on the sideline after halftime and said, “We weighed the balls. You are in big f------ trouble.” New England and Kraft thought this incident, and others, showed bias by the league and would be explored in the Wells report. But the Patriots’ theories (including another in which they believed the Colts deflated the intercepted ball) were tossed aside, with the report simply calling the sideline interaction a difference in recollection." http://www.si.com/nfl/2015/05/11/robert-kraft-roger-goodell-deflategate-wells-report IT seems like a sting with an agenda. BTW Goodell is also an ex Jets employee. Now to the "process" to ensure the balls are meeting NFL specs: "Because there wasn't a coherent process in place we cannot know that any balls in the game were or weren't tampered with. 1) It is clear that the gauges used by the nfl were cheap and not calibrated. When the allowable PSI range is 1 PSI having gauges that varied by ~.4 psi, is a total joke. 2) No process to record ball Pressure, in this case Anderson said he "remembered" the unrecorded PSI of the balls used by the Patriots and Colts that were submitted, that would be 48 balls, this of course is nonsense. 3) Wells took Anderson's recollection of the PSI of 48 footballs at face value but not his recollection of which guage he used, yeah no agenda there boys and girls. No set of initial conditions for the balls, no baseline. Are balls being kept at 72 F, coming in from the bus at 47 F. Here is a video from the 2013 season showing the pregame ball acceptance process http://mmqb.si.com/2015/01/22/deflategate-video-how-nfl-officials-check-game-ball-pressure/ IF the PSI of the balls have to be within 1 PSI and this is CRITICAL to the Integrity of the game does the process documented in the video look adequate? The inadequate process and correcting it should have been the focus of the Wells report not smearing the Greatest QB in the history of the NFL. But that wasn't the report that Wells was paid to deliver. So it wasn't the focus of the report. The range for ball PSI should be increased to a reasonable level, say 11 to 15 psi with proper process and measuring equipment in place combined with NFL supervision of the balls at all times no team personnel involved at all. Remember Brady went 50-64 in the 2nd half of the Colts game and during the SB, it is fair to say he is comfortable with balls inflated to 12.5 psi." Pro football Talk tweets on information from an interview with the former head of officials: ProFootballTalk ‏@ProFootballTalk 6m6 minutes ago On PFT Live, @RefereeJimD says that officials did not know that balls set to 12.5 PSI at kickoff would drop lower than that on a cold day. ProFootballTalk ‏@ProFootballTalk 11m11 minutes ago On PFT Live, former NFL official and supervisor of officials @RefereeJimD on football inflation: "It has never been an exact science." Wells also didn't take the balls being rain soaked into account. There was a driving rain throughout the day in NE, The firm the NFL hired "simulated this by spritzing the ballwith a spray bottle every 15 minutes them toweling the ball dry.... what a joke. The people at Headsmart LAbs who the week the story broke did a real simulation they found that the ball being wet like these game balls were, caused an additional > 7 psi loss IOW if Anderson's recollection was correct that the Patriots balls were inflated to 12.5 psi then the measurements at halftime were what one would expect for the conditions on game day. http://www.headsmartlabs.com/ As I said I cannot wait until Wells, Kensil, Goodell, Blandino, Grigson and other submit to discovery in a defamation lawsuit filed by Brady.