More New England Cheating?

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J. Kapp 11
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Re: More New England Cheating?

Post by J. Kapp 11 »

VikingLord wrote: I've read a couple of sources now that are saying that even if the balls had been inflated in a sauna and brought outside into zero degree temps they could not have deflated to the degree observed in the balls used by the Patriots. It's a nice theory, but it's very testable and so far it's not holding air. The change in temp would have had to be far larger than possible under the circumstances of that game to result in the loss of pressure observed.

If that is true, then the "Who, me?" explanation falls apart, doesn't it? if the above is true, would you agree that the Patriots must have intentionally deflated the balls used by their offense?

I guess what I'm driving at is where is the line for those defending the Patriots here? If it is proven that PV=nRT doesn't explain what was observed, is that enough to indict Belichek and his team for cheating?
And I've seen reports of experiments where footballs DID drop a couple pounds in pressure with a 40-degree drop.

But even if we agreed that the ideal gas law is in place here (obviously we don't, but hear me out), it was 51 degrees at game time. So it looks like there's no way the deflation was due to temperature. I stand corrected.

I guess as we're seeing, somebody is being investigated for potentially doctoring the footballs. If there's no forensic evidence, the only way Brady, Belichick or whoever gets caught is if this alleged saboteur sings. Somehow, I get the feeling that's not going to happen.
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Re: More New England Cheating?

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cstelter wrote: Well, even if this data is not all that compelling-- there was a link to an article earlier i the thread, or perhaps in another that did some pretty decent math on the statistical likelihood that the Patriots could be an entire standard deviation below the norm of anyone else in fumbles per game from 2007-present while prior they were not. When I read that article I was unaware that Manning and Brady had lobbied for teams to supply their own balls for the games in 2006 so now that date seems a bit more significant.

Lots of circumstantial evidence.

However, unless Tom or his center or running back is sticking a needle in the valve for a second, it seems hard to believe the onus for the problem is not with the refs who fail to check compliance. Still, the math in that article has me pretty suspicious.

Here it is...(or one of them)

The New England Patriots Prevention of Fumbles is Nearly Impossible
Based on the assumption that fumbles per play follow a normal distribution, you’d expect to see, according to random fluctuation, the results that the Patriots have gotten over this period, once in 16,233.77 instances”.

Which in layman’s terms means that this result only being a coincidence, is like winning a raffle where you have a 0.0000616 probability to win. Which in other words, it’s very unlikely that it’s a coincidence.
I actually went back and researched 5 year periods for the entire NFL over the last 25 years. The Patriots ratio of 187 plays to 1 fumble is the BEST of ANY team in the NFL for ANY 5 year span of time over the last 25 years. Not was it just the best, it wasn’t close
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Re: More New England Cheating?

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Re: More New England Cheating?

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Mothman wrote: Some evidence or testimony clearly implicating them would be nice, as would greater transparency. What was the psi of the Colts footballs at halftime? What were the psi numbers for the footballs of both teams when tested before the game? To outward appearances, it certainly looks like the Patriots cheated and maybe they did but we don't even have some of the basic information that would allow us to make a determination. We know the balls were under-inflated at halftime. We don't yet know how they got that way or who was responsible.
I'd like to see the evidence too. I would not want to indict anyone or their character over just suspicion, no matter how great that suspicion is. To some degree I can understand the position of Robert Kraft on this. If the allegations are not backed up by hard evidence and not proven, then the Patriots have been dragged through the mud unnecessarily and, some might say, even unfairly on the eve of a very big moment for their players and fans. One would think the NFL would want to definitively eliminate any natural explanations for the ball pressure before proceeding to make any of this public. Common sense says there must be some pretty damning evidence we're not aware of for them to proceed on this, because the consequences for either side are going to be significant now. If the NFL can't prove this, they'd better start puckering up and get ready to kiss some Patriot behind.
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Re: More New England Cheating?

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VikingLord wrote: I'd like to see the evidence too. I would not want to indict anyone or their character over just suspicion, no matter how great that suspicion is. To some degree I can understand the position of Robert Kraft on this. If the allegations are not backed up by hard evidence and not proven, then the Patriots have been dragged through the mud unnecessarily and, some might say, even unfairly on the eve of a very big moment for their players and fans. One would think the NFL would want to definitively eliminate any natural explanations for the ball pressure before proceeding to make any of this public. Common sense says there must be some pretty damning evidence we're not aware of for them to proceed on this, because the consequences for either side are going to be significant now. If the NFL can't prove this, they'd better start puckering up and get ready to kiss some Patriot behind.
:lol: Well said, Edward.
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Re: More New England Cheating?

Post by Raptorman »

So how easy is it to tell if a football does not have enough air in it? Well Tarvaris Jackson did it in about 1 second, with one squeeze of the ball.

I don't think we are going to see any evidence to the prove that the Patriots let air out of balls. I would be willing to bet that next year with footballs at the proper inflation Brady's numbers come back down and the Patriots start fumbling the ball like normal teams do.
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Re: More New England Cheating?

Post by Raptorman »

And now for some humor.


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Re: More New England Cheating?

Post by Just Me »

As long as we are posting about humor:



:wink:
I've told people a million times not to exaggerate!
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Re: More New England Cheating?

Post by Demi »

http://profootballtalk.nbcsports.com/20 ... e-counted/
Dean Blandino: Nate Solder’s AFC Championship TD shouldn’t have counted
The Patriots’ use of offensive linemen as eligible receivers and running back Shane Vereen as an ineligible receiver has created confusion for defenses and officials in the playoffs.

That confusion led to a touchdown that shouldn’t have counted in the AFC Championship game. Tom Brady threw a touchdown pass to tackle Nate Solder during that game on a play that NFL vice president of officiating Dean Blandino should have been flagged as an illegal substitution.

“There was an issue on that play where on the previous play, [Cameron] Fleming had reported as an eligible player,” Blandino said, via CSNNE.com. “And on the Solder touchdown he went back to playing an ineligible position. That’s illegal. That’s an illegal substitution. So that’s something we discussed with the crew. Bill [Belichick] was made aware of it. So we’re going to be looking for that, make sure we follow the proper mechanics so that doesn’t happen again.”
You can't tell me there isn't an issue here, and it won't be addressed. Looks like the NFL has already let Seahawks know they'll be prepared to deal with it. Something that hasn't been an issue since the rule was written...
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Re: More New England Cheating?

Post by Mothman »

More on deflategate from Ian Rapoport:

More details on the investigation of Patriots' deflated footballs

According the video at the link above, only one football was 2 PSI under the required level of inflation. 3 or 4 were about 1 PSI under and the rest were just a tick under.

It's phrased this way in the accompanying article:
Eleven of the 12 footballs used in the first half were judged by the officials to be under the minimum of 12.5 PSI, but just one was two pounds under. Many of them were just a few ticks under the minimum.
I was led to all of that from this article on Yahoo:

http://sports.yahoo.com/blogs/nfl-shutd ... 14858.html
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Re: More New England Cheating?

Post by cstelter »

I wonder if it is possible to tweak the rubber in the needle valve just enough so that under enough pressure, just a bit of air can escape, otherwise is just fine. Balls could read perfect at the start of a game but as the game progresses, each time a runningback or wr fall on top of the ball, just a bit is able to be forced out. So as a half progresses, the balls become more friendly, but only for NE. Some moreso than others. And unless you tear the ball apart one would never find a cause...

I keep thinking about those reported skewed stats on fumbles that started right around the time as the new ball rules for who provides them. I think there is some meat to this.
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Re: More New England Cheating?

Post by cstelter »

Mothman wrote: I don't see that much and I don't find most of it very convincing but I understand why YMMV. :) If I recall correctly even in the article about fumbles, they pointed out that there were other possible explanations and that the statistical evidence was far from conclusive.
Here is the only bit I could find:
article wrote: Could the Patriots be so good that they just defy the numbers? As my friend theorized: Perhaps they’ve invented a revolutionary in-house way to protect the ball, or perhaps they’ve intentionally stocked their skill positions with players who don’t have a propensity to fumble. Or perhaps still, they call plays which intentionally result in a lower percentage of fumbles. Or maybe its just that they play with deflated footballs on offense. It could be any combination of the above.

But regardless of what, specifically, is causing these numbers, the fact remains: this is an extremely abnormal occurrence and is NOT simply random fluctuation.
I agree it's far from conclusive that they are doctoring the balls, but it's nearly a slam dunk that *something* uncommon is going on with the Patriots.

So to me, that unexplained anomaly plus the evidence of flat balls at half time during the AFCC game combine to provide 'lot's of circumstantial evidence'. Quite often the simplest solution is the right one. Here the simplest explanation for the anomalous data might just be that they found a way to doctor the balls starting in 2007 which not so coincidentally was the first year they provided their own balls. I can't think of any simpler explanations and none of the explanations floated above seem as simple as the ball doctoring explanation.

But like you-- I can see how YMMV...
Mothman wrote: Well, there's obviously some reason to be suspicious but it's pretty hard to believe they've been doing this for 7 years and nobody noticed or called them out on it until now.
I don't find it as difficult to believe as you. Unless there is an interception or fumble recovery, few opposing team members would have access to the balls. The ref's who handle the ball and place it are really the only ones who might be in a position to alert anyone or even become suspicious. How many indiviuals are we talking about-- maybe 3 refs for maybe 30 touches each a game? Maybe 6-8 times a year? If they actively test the ball ahead of time or have the pervading sense that all is right-- I can easily see themselves shrugging off a few times when they might think, hmmm. *this* one feels a bit flat today. In fact 7 years might be about right for suspicions to accumulate and bubble over.
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Re: More New England Cheating?

Post by Mothman »

cstelter wrote:agree it's far from conclusive that they are doctoring the balls, but it's nearly a slam dunk that *something* uncommon is going on with the Patriots.

So to me, that unexplained anomaly plus the evidence of flat balls at half time during the AFCC game combine to provide 'lot's of circumstantial evidence'. Quite often the simplest solution is the right one. Here the simplest explanation for the anomalous data might just be that they found a way to doctor the balls starting in 2007 which not so coincidentally was the first year they provided their own balls. I can't think of any simpler explanations and none of the explanations floated above seem as simple as the ball doctoring explanation.

But like you-- I can see how YMMV...
... and if "ball doctoring" is the explanation, the question then becomes what were they doing and was it illegal? If it was illegal, and so different from what everyone else was doing that it gave them a tremendous edge in securing the football, how did it go unnoticed by every team they played for 7 years?
I don't find it as difficult to believe as you. Unless there is an interception or fumble recovery, few opposing team members would have access to the balls. The ref's who handle the ball and place it are really the only ones who might be in a position to alert anyone or even become suspicious. How many indiviuals are we talking about-- maybe 3 refs for maybe 30 touches each a game? Maybe 6-8 times a year? If they actively test the ball ahead of time or have the pervading sense that all is right-- I can easily see themselves shrugging off a few times when they might think, hmmm. *this* one feels a bit flat today. In fact 7 years might be about right for suspicions to accumulate and bubble over.
I just can't buy it. The Patriots threw 80 interceptions and lost over 50 fumbles in the regular season over that period of time (and undoubtedly committed some postseason turnovers as well). We're talking about a minimum of 130 times opposing players touched Patriots footballs and obviously a far greater number of touches for officials over an extended period of time. What could the Pats have possibly done to the football that would provide them with a substantial enough advantage to account for the fumble differential while also remaining undetectable for all that time? I don't believe for a second that an unnoticeable difference in PSI could even begin to account for that difference on it's own and if the balls were deflated enough to make them that much easier to carry and hang on to, I suspect it would be noticeable enough that they would have been caught a long time ago.

Maybe they were using slightly under-inflated footballs and that combined with other factors to produce such an impressive result but at this point, it's not even clear that they illegally modified the PSI of footballs in the AFC Championship, much less for the last 7 seasons.

Considering their sustained success over a long period of time, I think it's worth considering the possibility that they simply do a much better job. For example, the analysis at the link you posted above shows that, since 2010, the Pats are well above the next closest team (the Texans) with a rate of 187 offensive plays per fumble. The Texans rate is 140 offensive plays per fumble. That's a difference of 47 plays but the difference between the Texans plays per fumble and the lowest-ranked team over that period, the Eagles, is substantial. The Eagles fumbled an average of once every 76 plays. If we can accept that Houston can be 64 plays better than Philly in this regard, why can't we accept that NE could be 47 plays better than Houston, when it's clearly possible for such a margin to exist?

I'm not sure I trust this analysis anyway. The author gives us year-by-year stats for the Patriots offensive plays per fumble prior to 2010 but then groups everything together after 2010. That's a red flag to me. Why did he suddenly start grouping seasons?

If they're prospering by doctoring balls, you would think that would give them an advantage every year (and that's the implication of the analysis, correct?) yet in 2013 they ranked in the upper third of the league in fumbles. After looking at NFL.com's stats, I don't even know where the author of the analysis got some of his numbers. For example, he says that since 2010 the Pats have a fumble rate of 187 offensive plays per fumble. However, according to NFL.com they ran 5470 plays from scrimmage in that period and fumbled 73 times. That's a rate of one fumble every 75 plays. If we only count fumbles lost (they lost 30 from 2010 through 2014), we end up with one fumble lost every 182 plays from scrimmage. Mayeb he included postseason stats and only counted fumbles lost to arrive at 187. that's justa guess but if that is what he did, if he only counted fumbles lost, I think that undermines his point anyway.

As an interesting footnote to this discussion, the 2014 Vikings fumbled less than the 2014 Patriots. I didn't realize it but the Vikes had both the fewest fumbles in the league last year (11) and the fewest lost (just 2). They lost one fumble every 490.5 plays!
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Re: More New England Cheating?

Post by PurpleMustReign »

cstelter wrote:

I like that line of thinking. It just doesn't make sense that they just now deflated the balls. They knew they were a better team than Indy, they had no real reason to cheat.
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Re: More New England Cheating?

Post by PurpleMustReign »

Mothman wrote:As an interesting footnote to this discussion, the 2014 Vikings fumbled less than the 2014 Patriots. I didn't realize it but the Vikes had both the fewest fumbles in the league last year (11) and the fewest lost (just 2). They lost one fumble every 490.5 plays!
someone pointed that out at the end of the season, in one of the threads. I wonder what the record is for lost fumbles... I can't imagine it was much less than that (you can't physically get much less than that).
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