So to sum up: Bill Belichick is a martyred hero because he got caught cheating; Eric Mangini is a treacherous reprobate because he thought that loyalty to his current employer should trump obligations to a former boss blatantly cheating; and NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell is a law-and-order tough guy who just won’t tolerate rule-breaking. Bullshit on all three counts
Any reasonable person can dispense with the first two myths: Belichick’s not a martyr but a cheat who has tainted not only his reputation (did he pick up the cheating between Cleveland and New England?) but his players’ (amazing how Tom Brady can spot the open man in a blitz, some have noted, almost as if he knew what the play was); assuming that he did indeed rat out Little Bill, Mangini’s credentials as a hero are debatable, but there’s some irony in people saying both that he should have betrayed Belichick when he was a lowly assistant (thus ending his coaching career prematurely) and also that he will never coach again because he betrayed Belichick (breaking the NFL coach’s gangsta omerta code — and for which the rest of the coaching fraternity might have sent a warning shot of retribution when Ravens Coach Brian Billick accused the Jets defensive players of yelling “I’ve got it” as they rounded third base). (One wonders the thought process regarding the betrayal crowd: “Didn’t he learn from Belichick that there are things you just don’t do to win?”)
And Gooddell? In a way you have to forgive Belichick if he was surprised at the outcry about videotaping opposing coaches. Despite his posture as a law-and-order type, it’s pretty clear that neither Gooddell nor other league officials particularly care about this (or any?) brand of cheating. The NFL is to professional football what the health insurance industry is to keeping people healthy: The bottom line is the bottom line and if as a happy side-effect there’s good football or people get health care, well that’s fine too.
The fact is that there are two sets of rules in the NFL, the ones about which the league cares and the ones about which they don’t. To wit: It’s illegal to have contact with free agents before a certain time in the off-season, it’s illegal to have physical contact in OTA practices in the off-season and coaches are required to wear a certain kind of clothing on the side-lines. And yet every year free agents sign within minutes of the free agency period opening, people hit hard in OTAs and Little Bill dresses like a homeless person during games.
So if Gooddell and the NFL really don’t care about Belichick — and whomever else — cheating why will the Pats lose their first round pick next year?
Because the Patriots got caught. It became a public issue and thus one that could threaten the cash flow. This gets the NFL’s attention. And how did Gooddell react? Did they conduct a thorough investigation? Raid the Pats headquarters and seize tapes, notes, etc.? Is there any evidence to show that they did anything beyond summoning Little Bill for a talk with the principal? No. Gooddell wanted the issue over and done with as quickly as possible. A quick high profile punishment and then back to business as usual. What exactly did the Patriots do? Only Little Bill and his troops know. Gooddell apparently is satisfied that the Belicheney, more obsessed with controlling information than the White House, told him the whole truth. Why? Because the Pats coach would not tell a lie?
A week after the crime and punishment, someone pointed out to the commissioner that maybe the Patriots shouldn’t be allowed to keep their years’ worth of ill-gotten scouting. New England was ordered to turn over all tapes and notes taken from them. Gooddell is confident that the Pats handed over the whole kit and kaboodle because, well, Belichick said so. And if we can’t trust him who can we trust? (One can almost hear the laughter at Pats HQ: How many copies did the league office want?)
Other allegations have arisen — that the Pats have their defensive players mic’d so they can pick up their opponents’ offensive play-calling — and the NFL is hard at work investigating … kind of like OJ is determined to find the real killers. Prediction: The only way we ever hear any more about those allegations is when a microphone falls out of a Pat pad on television. Instead the NFL is hard at work trying to find out who leaked the Patriots’ tape. The leak was a greater crime than the cheating, as it gave the scandal more legs, risking the golden goose.
September 25th, 2007
This whole thing falls into several familiar patterns.
All fallen New England sports figures are martyred heroes, Rob. As a New Yorker you should be familiar with this. In Massachusetts the concept extends to Democrats as well. In New York, I think it covers most New Yorkers. Remember Bernie Goetz? He renamed his company Vigilante Electronics and is apparently doing fine between runs for mayor.
To those who drank the Kool-Aid, Paris Hilton’s drunk driving and thumbing her nose at the court was acceptable. Go figure.
In the Martha Stewart, Watergate, and Lewinsky episodes the cover-up was worse then the crime. In this case I wasn’t aware the NFL had rules about “telling on each other” but they act like first graders in lots of other ways, so it isn’t so surprising they are upset that someone “told”. It’s a fraternity of childish millionaires who make money playing games, right?
I think what happened here was, as I predicted, it began to look like a squabble between former colleagues, and people began to ask, why are high-powered binoculars legal and videotape illegal?
The Washington Post headline summed it up: “Though His Methods Were Illegal, Patriots’ Belichick Has Done Nothing More Than Carry On a Long Tradition”.
“When NFL teams in the late 1950s were required to send copies of their coaches’ practice films to their opponents in the days leading up to the game. [Chicago Bears owner George] Halas hired two cameramen to record the practice: one who shot in perfect focus for the Bears and one who purposely twisted the lens to blur the players and the field. The Bears sent the blurry film to their prospective opponents. And when the films arrived and the coaches invariably called to complain, Halas always feigned disgust. ‘Oh that no-good cameraman we got, I’m going to fire him. All our films are terrible; I can’t see a thing’” he was said to have muttered into the phone.