Merckx index said:
It's also been pointed out that if Brady misses the first four games (probably reduced to two after appeal), he will be fresher for the post-season, the games that really matter. They Pats do pretty well without Brady, remember the year he missed the entire season they went 11-5.
The only valid argument against the suspension I’ve seen is that other teams/players have broken rules and haven’t been penalized as much. I think the main problem is that the NFL has not specifically stated the penalties for various infractions ahead of time, leaving it up to precedent to decide. Imagine what bike racing would be if every time someone tested positive, the length of the suspension varied. That’s somewhat the way the NFL works, even with PEDs, let alone other kinds of cheating.
But the notion that Brady didn’t know, approve and basically instigate this is BS. The notion that the Colts balls were less deflated, as mentioned in one of Blutto’s links, is also BS. They were inflated to 0.5 PSI more than the Patriot balls at the beginning of the game, because that’s the way Luck wanted them. They lost an average 0.5 PSI after being outside in the first half, then being brought inside to be tested—vs. an average 1.2 PSI loss by the Pat’s balls. Because the Colts balls were still at the 12.5 minimum, at least with one of the gauges, no air was added to them, but they were completely legal in that they had all the air that they had at the start of the game.
There was a problem, not mentioned in any of the discussions I’ve seen (maybe Wells mentions it, I didn’t read his entire report), that the balls were tested indoors after being outside, which means how long a period elapses between when they were taken inside and when they were tested is critical. If you’re going to compare different balls, they should all be tested at the same temperature, which means they should either be tested outside, or inside after being allowed to equilibrate. But we know the balls did not equilibrate completely, because of the 0.5 PSI loss by the Colts balls. If they had recovered to the inside temperature, they should have read at the same pressure as at the start of the game.
However, if you look at the table in the report, which lists the half-time inflation values of the balls in what I’m pretty sure is the order they were tested, there is no indication of higher PSI values for the balls that were checked later. So apparently they were tested quickly relative to the time of equilibration, meaning that each ball was at about the same temperature when tested. Still, it’s a sloppy way of doing it.
....sloppy eh?....so to put this into a slightly different frame of reference, wondering how you would assess the validity of an outcome of a scientific/medical type study that used the same type of sloppy protocol/methodology.....because, as you stated, the methodology used here was quite sloppy...to the point of trying hard to figure what the point of this brouhaha really was....
...and...
"The shoddy reporting on the “scandal” has made matters worse. For instance, if you ask almost anyone which team – the New England Patriots or the Indianapolis Colts – played most of the game using under-inflated footballs, nearly everyone would say the Patriots. But the real answer is the Colts, who used footballs under the 12.5 psi minimum in both the first half and the second half."
...and...
"Few people also know what touched off the “incriminating” text messages between the two locker room attendants about football air pressure. It was an illegal act committed not by the Patriots but by NFL officials who over-inflated Patriot footballs for an important divisional game against the New York Jets on Oct. 16, 2014.
After the game, which the Patriots won 27-25, blocking a last-second field goal attempt by the Jets, Brady complained bitterly to John Jastremski, an equipment assistant responsible for preparing the game balls. When Jastremski tested the balls, he found them to be extremely over-inflated, beyond the legal upper limit of 13.5 psi.
“The refs *** us,” Jastremski wrote in a text message, “a few of them were at almost 16” psi. “They didnt recheck them after they put air in them.” In other words, NFL officials violated NFL rules regarding the proper inflation of footballs and it could have contributed to a Patriots loss to a hated rival."
...and...
"Since the Colts were alleging that the pressure of one Patriot football that had been intercepted before halftime weighed below the minimum level of 12.5 pounds per square inch, NFL officials rushed all 11 remaining Patriot game balls into the referees’ locker room and began testing them, finding the balls to be significantly below the 12.5 psi minimum where they were set before the game began. The referees then added air pressure to bring the balls back to legal standards.
After testing the Patriots’ balls, NFL officials turned to the Colts’ footballs, but only had time to test four before the 13.5-minute halftime break ended and the balls had to be returned to the sidelines for the second half.
Of the Colts’ four tested balls, all had lost air pressure when compared to the 13.0 psi that Colts’ quarterback Andrew Luck preferred but not as much as the Patriots’ balls had. However, Exponent scientists noted that much – and possibly all – of that discrepancy could be explained by the fact the Colts’ balls were tested toward the end of halftime.
Also, one of the four measurements was apparently taken down incorrectly, leaving only three reliable halftime tests on the Colts’ balls.
Further uncertainty was injected by the fact that the two gauges used by NFL officials at halftime recorded different measurements, off by a third to nearly one-half psi, and it wasn’t clear which gauge was used to test the balls before the game. According to Exponent, the lower of the two gauges – referred to in the report as the “non-logo gauge” – was the accurate gauge and was most likely used by referee Walt Anderson in his pre-game measurements.
Colts’ Underinflated Balls
Ironically, however, if the data from the accurate gauge is used, all three Colts’ balls were themselves underinflated, averaging 12.27 psi, thus below the 12.5 psi minimum, but nevertheless those balls were allowed back in the game for the second half.
At the end of the game, four balls from the Colts and four from the Patriots were tested again. Three of the four Colts’ balls were underinflated while none of the Pats’ balls were. In other words, while the Patriots’ footballs were deflated in the first half, the Colts’ balls were deflated in both the first half and second half.
Another possible factor why the Pats’ balls tested relatively lower in psi could have been the way the balls were prepared before the game. The Pats’ balls were rubbed down to remove any slickness while the Colts’ balls were left slicker or more water resistant. One of the findings by the Exponent scientists was that wetter balls recovered their psi more slowly than drier balls when brought into a climate-controlled environment.
It also turns out that an initial claim by an NFL official in a letter to the Patriots – that one of the Pats’ balls had been measured at 10.1 psi, 2.4 psi below the minimum, and that the Colts’ balls all met specifications – was false. The letter stated: “In fact, one of the game balls was inflated to 10.1 psi, far below the requirement of 12½ to 13½ psi. In contrast, each of the Colts’ game balls that was inspected met the requirements set forth above.”
In excusing these errors, Wells wrote that the NFL official who wrote the letter drafted it “based on communications with colleagues with first-hand knowledge of events that had taken place at Gillette Stadium. In fact, none of the Patriots game balls measured 10.1 psi when they were tested at halftime. We believe that there was an inadvertent error in communication of the results …"
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