PATS ARE TWEETERS!!!

OMG THE PATS ARE A BUNCH OF TWEETERS! THEY HAVE TO TWEET TO WIN! NICE JOB COACH BELITWEET! MAYBE YOU CAN SET UP YOUR TWITTER IN THE OPPOSING TEAM'S LOCKER ROOM NEXT TIME, BELITWEET! AND SOME WOMAN IN JERSEY TWEETED ON HER HUSBAND WITH HIM! TWEETING TWEETY TWEETERS! TWEETEEN AND ONE!!!!! GAHHHHHHHHH!

Ahh, I feel better now.

Translation: the Patriots are tweeting their draft picks on submit, which means the two minute lag between Chris Berman and Keyshawn Johnson shutting their stupid mouths up and the announcement of the pick is avoided! I can just watch @realpatriots when the Pats are on the clock, bypassing ESPN's self-fellative, unendingly annoying setup entirely. What the hell do I care whether Chris Berman is surprised by something? He'd be surprised to learn about Twitter! Why would his surprise at Sebastian Vollmer's selection mean anything at all to me?

On another note, the Pats are KILLING IT today. Through four picks, they get about an A-, all things considered. Traded their first-rounder twice and netted the #41 and two third-rounders from it. They'll likely turn some of those third-rounders into 2010 second-rounders.

Of today's four picks, S Patrick Chung and CB Darius Butler are high-profile super-athletic defensive backs, something this team hasn't had since, ugh, Tebucky Jones. (Let's never compare those guys to Tebucky again.) Either way, FINALLY, the defensive backfield's depth chart is full. I feel young again! If Terrence Wheatley and Jonathan Wilhite expand their roles appropriately in their second seasons, this is suddenly an area of strength. Best possible development of the day.

Outside linebacker is still a gaping hole shaped like Mike Vrabel, but that and fullback are the ONLY holes left on the team. And with four third-rounders tomorrow, I'd be stunned if they aren't both addressed within minutes of the opening bell.

Only one minor complaint: not crazy about letting Pat White go to the Dolphins. A team that loves trick plays like the Pats and uses them as frequently as they do could have really used a multi-positional Kordell Stewart/Seneca Wallace type weapon. But given that the reason to skip White is defense, I'm fine with it.

In summation, I'm happy. And presumably I'll be even happier tomorrow. Did I mention FOUR third-rounders?

Donaghy = Omar?

Is it just me, or does Stern come off exactly like smarmy Maury Levy in this one?

Of course, Omar is approximately 1000x cooler than Donaghy, but still, that can be chalked up to hollywood. Bubbles is about 1000x cooler than the average heroin addict too.

Far from a vague accusation, his statement is pretty damning. Here's the relevant piece:

"Referees A, F and G were officiating a playoff series between Teams 5 and 6 in May of 2002. It was the sixth game of a seven-game series, and a Team 5 victory that night would have ended the series. However, Tim learned from Referee A that Referees A and F wanted to extend the series to seven games. Tim knew referees A and F to be "company men," always acting in the interest of the NBA, and that night, it was in the NBA's interest to add another game to the series. Referees A and F heavily favored Team 6. Personal fouls [resulting in obviously injured players] were ignored even when they occurred in full view of the referees. Conversely, the referees called made-up fouls on Team 5 in order to give additional free throw opportunities for Team 6. Their foul-calling also led to the ejection of two Team 5 players. The referees' favoring of Team 6 led to that team's victory that night, and Team 6 came back from behind to win that series."

This, of course, was the Ralph Nader game.

Now, I don't actually expect anything real to come of this, and maybe it shouldn't. Donaghy is certainly a pretty reprehensible character. That said, the Nader game, and others, still fail the smell test, and I can't really be a full fan of the NBA until they convince me the officiating is on the up and up. Until then, my reaction to accusations like Donaghy's will be to believe them until proven otherwise.

Words (Briefly) Escape Me: Bruce Bowen Steps On Chris Paul's Junk

The NBA... where getting stomped in the Timbits happens!



The tone of reaction from folks who linked this video, appropriately, has not been outrage. It's been acceptance. The world apparently accepts that this is okay, and holds Bowen's behavior up, weakly, for ridicule.

There's been talk of late that David Stern's biggest failure as commissioner is what's happening in Seattle. Hard to argue against that choice based on the gravity of the end result. But at least that makes SENSE. Stern is employed ownership, and the Sonics situation, awful as it is, is nevertheless understandable based on Stern's job responsibilities. Wrong? Of course. Out of bounds? Not at all.

The classically dictatorial Stern's failure to discipline Bowen and curb his behavior, however... that is beyond comprehension for me. Stern is the biggest star-fucker of any sports commissioner in American history. Why does he allow his precioussssss superstars to be put at risk like this?

Back in the playoffs last year, I advocated banning Bruce Bowen for the balance of the playoffs, based not on the Game 4 incident in isolation but rather on Game 4 in the context of his body of work. I stand by that. I honestly believe that Bruce Bowen has accrued, at this point in his career, at least 30-40 regular season games' worth of unallocated suspensions. I also believe it would be justifiable, in the eyes of an omniscient and omnipotent God, to suspend Bowen for half of a regular season without pay.

In fact, how about this. Bowen just kicked a New Orleans Hornet in the beanbag. Bowen also seems to like being the face and voice of that unintentionally hilarious NBA Cares commercial. (The commercial wherein, miraculously, he resists the urge to kick those kids in their Achilles tendons while they're distracted by the story he's reading.) So why not have Mr. Charitable Contributions spend half a season rebuilding the Ninth Ward? Suspend him without pay, but then take the suspended salary away from the Spurs and allocate it to Habitat for Humanity. (The Spurs created this monster, so why let them keep the spoils?) That way any accusations made towards the controversial punishment will be shielded by 9/11-esque Katrina allusions! Gee, you know it's not fair, but I'd hate to take away from the rebuilding effort in New Orleans... there's so much left to be done... etc. etc.

A guy can dream, can't he? I put it to you that if the NBA really cared, they'd do exactly what I say.

The Mitchell Report List

(UPDATE: It's the report. And it's totally different from the list I linked below, which is missing one very important name: F.P. Santangelo. From what I've read so far, the list isn't exactly comprehensive.)

(SECOND UPDATE: The list is B.S. I'm crossing out everything I wrote until later.)

Well, it looks like this is the list. The official list will be announced soon; when it comes out, I'll stick a link in the comments.

General thoughts:

* It's not really satisfying as an ending. It doesn't really decide or reveal anything conclusive. Then again, neither did the Supreme Court shakedown that gave Bush the presidency. In much the same way, they've given us this list as if to say, "OK, can we please move on now?" Fine by me.

* It makes me awfully uneasy to examine this list of names. The McCarthyism parallels at play are pretty terrifying. Our participation implies approval of the methods and behavior, which I don't. Then again, I'm not going to hate Albert Pujols or Jason Varitek forever because of this.

* Weren't a lot of these names already known? Most of this stuff isn't news. Roger Clemens? Mark McGwire? Sammy Sosa? Andy Pettitte? The Giambi brothers? Barry Bonds? Miguel Tejada? Gary Sheffield? We knew this stuff already! They'd all been linked to abuse at one point or another. Even Albert Pujols was tied to some rumors, and he's the only really prominent current player to get named/nailed.

* Albert Belle? Get outta here. That's crazy talk.

* Bagwell's presence is the only one that's extremely disappointing. That's the "oh no, not him" entry for me. He was a just-barely-in Hall of Famer before this... but I guess that's over now. He was so underrated and anonymous as a hitter, the perfect player to defend as a "cause." It's a shame it turned out like this.

For the Sox, this is pretty friggin bad. Not "Albert Pujols" bad... Big Papi and Manny Ramirez escaped a public shaming, and that's the most important development of the list. But it sure looks like Mitchell didn't let conflicts of interest get in the way. Look at how many Sox and former Sox got nailed. Prominent players like Johnny Damon, Mo Vaughn, Jason Varitek, Trot Nixon, Nomar Garciaparra. Minor or one-time players like Rich Garces, Paxton Crawford, Carl Everett, Dante Bichette, Wil Cordero, Manny Alexander, Jeremy Giambi, Julian Tavarez, and Jose Offerman.

And the big upset: there's way more Sox on this list than Yankees. The worst the Yanks get is confirmation of what we already knew about Andy Pettitte, Roger Clemens and Jason Giambi. And even then, all the names except Pettitte (Giambi, Clemens, Gary Sheffield, Kyle Farnsworth) can be dismissed since they were mercenaries... they're not True Yankees. Not one Yankee on that list has had his public perception and reputation changed or damaged as much as Varitek has.

I'm sad that Varitek's on the list. But frankly he could stand to be taken down a peg or two anyway. All that Captain Courageous shit is way overblown. He's a great catcher, a great handler of pitchers, and a great leader, but his reputation has exceeded his performance ever since signing that contract. If anything, that reputation of his ought to help him resist and overcome the shitstorm that the Boston media is about to drop in his lap. I bet they cut him a break, because he's Jason Varitek, team captain and hard-nosed hero to so many.

What I find surprising is how unsurprising the Sox violators are. Privately, I figured Mo would turn up on the list. Nomar too, although I wouldn't be taking it so well if I hadn't read Seth Mnookin's tell-all Feeding the Monster last year and found out what a dick Nomar actually is. Nixon's injury history makes him a no-brainer. And I'm disappointed to see Damon and Varitek on the list, but their career-long resilience in the face of deeply physical play is at least partially explained here. You can look at what we know about them, slide steroids in there, and say ohhhhhh.

But even then, we can think less of these guys, but there isn't any important history to revise. You want to put an asterisk next to Varitek's shitty batting average, or Nixon's 28 HRs in 2003? Take 'em, be my guest. Doesn't change anything.

By the way, that reaction of mine is exactly why the asterisk thing is so stupid. Nobody wants to roll back the unremarkable performances. They just want to undo the symbolic ones, the magical ones that made us feel so good. We came to find out our joyous feelings were false, and we want to lash out. McGwire, Sosa, Bonds, Pujols, even Brady Anderson and Bret Boone, they all get asterisks. But who gives a shit about Carl Everett, right? That's where the Bonds defenders are spot-on. If you take away the 73 HRs, you are required to remove everything else, which you just can't do.

Anyway, in closing, let us all pour it on the ground for our beloved Rich Garces. El Guapo's the one that really hurts. Say it ain't so, tons-of-fun!

Pats-Ravens

Briefly:

* I feel as if the Pats just won a playoff game. What an ending. I'm still wired. I think I got shin splints from jumping in the air so much after the two-minute warning.

* I'm also terrified that they're going to lose. Clearly that's relative (how terrified can you be at 12-0) but they've dropped two turdbuckets in a row and now face a team that's actually playing well. If this defense can't stop Kyle Boller and Willis McGahee, what will they do against good players like the Steelers have??? Oh noes...

* The Ravens have little to be ashamed of. (Bart Scott kinda does, but the damage had been done by then.) If I were them, I'd feel cheated... by my coaches. They did their jobs, and then Rex Ryan got cute with the timeouts. It's hard enough to beat the Pats when it's just the refs handing them the game... they don't need any help from the coaches.

(Two gamesmanship timeouts cost two teams their games on the same weekend. That's nuts.)

* Patriots WRs and TEs... this one was on you. Get your heads (and hands) out of your asses, please. Thank you.

* I had zero respect for Brian Billick this morning. But tonight, I have five respects for him. (Hopefully this video will survive the night...)



* In conclusion, have a totally off-topic nugget of joy!

More Stuff About "Cheating"

You'll note by those double-quotes that the backlash has inspired a change of heart in me.

Yesterday, I battered the Patriots for the whole videotaping fiasco.  I was more interested in piling on than in defending them, since they don't really deserve much defense for pulling this crap.  The whole thing is embarrassing, stupid, and (worst of all) totally unnecessary.  And as a group, the people running the team are pretty much arrogant, despicable, thoroughly unlikable individuals.  So I feel little need to defend their honor.  On that count, I'm not particularly concerned about how severely they're punished.

It's the perception issues that bother me.  Everyone's having their fun at the Patriots' expense.  There's a lot of misinformation out there, now that the backlash has spiraled so far out of control.  We're now fully engaged in echo-chamber absolutism: someone said "cheating," and everyone flipped out.  When someone tells me it's cheating, I react by saying it should never ever be allowed, no matter what the cheating actually entailed.  That way, I don't have to consider shades of grey!

Enough.

I'm all for punishing rule-breakers, Belichick included.  Any of our six readers will know that I'm as guilty of outraged righteousness as anybody.  But you have to be a moron, a Nazi, or Crazy Jeff in full-throttle rage mode to claim that this somehow explains or negates the Patriots' success.  No.  Rotten as it was to break the rules, it is mostly ignorant and entirely without merit to chalk up the success of the franchise to espionage.

I have a lot to say about this.  (Six posts in one!)

It doesn't appear to have affected Sunday's game
Let's look at what actually happened.  Someone on the coaching staff, certainly at Belichick's command, videotaped the opposing coaches' hand signals against league rules.  That video would later be synced up with video of the play, which would expose what the hand signals represented.  The information gleaned from that sync would allow Belichick, Brady et al to counterpunch by calling audibles, thus increasing the chances of success on a particular play...

...in the subsequent matchup.  That sync-up was not happening in real time.  Nor were they broadcasting into the coaches' box or anything, as far as I can tell.  Plus, the guy was caught in the first quarter, well before the Patriots did any significant damage.  I have a hard time believing anyone can argue that they affected the game.  There goes the forfeit argument.

The notion that they were just using their own preferred angle for postmortem analysis (containing the exact same information as any other overhead video from the game), thereby flipping off the NFL and what they would see as unnecessary, draconian rules, makes far more sense than Belichick cheating so stupidly and obviously.  Not saying it's impossible, just saying the many cries of "it doesn't make any sense" with reference to one of the smartest men ever employed in the NFL is too telling.  (Lehr, the arrogance factor is indeed there, but I don't think that's a sufficient explanation.)

Anyway, once you realize how unlikely it is that they cheated in the middle of any game, the word "cheating" no longer seems appropriate.  And the whole proceeding takes on the form of a witch hunt.  Or, you know, a fabricated scandal.

They aren't the only ones trying to figure out signals
They're just the ones who got caught, and who broke league rules to do it.  Read the remarks from Charley Casserly last winter about the Dolphins' attempts to decode signs.  The Dolphins synced up audio (all of it obtained legally) to the plays in order to determine the same information.  Is that not in the same ballpark as what the Pats did illegally?

Also consider Casserly's story about a team that apparently bugged a lineman in order to catch audio of the opposing quarterback.  So one extra camera on the sideline is a capital crime, but bugging is no big deal?  Yeah, that's consistent.

Lots of teams are trying to do the same exact thing, legally or otherwise.  Nobody should be acting like the Patriots are alone in this.  To hold up Belichick as the one guy who did this is either naive or disingenuous.  They're only alone in being stupid enough to get caught.

Who would be so dumb as to continue using the same signs?
So, the Pats apparently have a reputation for stealing signs.  The league's worst-kept secret, it turns out.  Everyone knows the Pats will be pulling this shit on them.

If it's so commonly known, why would anyone go up against New England without brand-new signals?  They do want to win, don't they?

Why would they not change things up anyway, even without the allegations?  Anyone silly enough to assume their signs wouldn't be stolen deserves to lose.  If baseball teams can change things up frequently and still function, so can football teams.  Sorry, Coach, but you were given a brain as a child, and I expect you to use it.  Sign-stealing should give you a temporary edge, not a permanent one.

Time for the embittered Rules Nazis to come out of hiding
There's another group out there saying the Pats knowingly broke a rule and deserve to be punished.  The rule is there for a reason, there's no excuse for disobedience, etc.

I would ask these hall-monitor wannabes if they've ever driven 56 miles per hour.  Throwing stones from glass houses and whatnot.

I would ask these brilliantly nuanced thinkers to the number of dirty hits and uncalled holding penalties that take place over the course of a football game.  The sum total of uncalled penalty yardage that unassessed by NFL referees since the dawn of man would probably stretch to Neptune.  Never mind the other calls that teams have gotten away with.

Finally, I would ask them to put a number on how many NFL players have smoked weed in the last calendar year.  Good luck enforcing that.  If you took away a draft pick for every player caught with weed, the draft wouldn't happen until 2021.

In short, show me an honest football team that hasn't bent a single rule on any level, and I'll show you twenty illegal acts they performed this past weekend alone.  There's no high road to be taken by any team out there... it's thirty-two low roads.  As in life, you have to decide where to draw a line.

And that's the true problem, isn't it?  Not that a rule was broken, but that a line was crossed.  Keying a car and pissing on that car's tires are both acts of vandalism, but only one of them crosses a line.  Belichick didn't care for the line.  Right and wrong don't enter into it this time.

The "fall" of an otherwise perfect franchise
This is a joke, right?

The New-England-does-things-the-right-way stuff is hogwash.  And that's not news, either.  Bill Belichick is an arrogant scumbag.  Scott Pioli is also an arrogant scumbag; ask Deion Branch, Adam Vinatieri and Asante Samuel about him.  Bob Kraft... arrogant scumbag.  Lots of the players, too, as Human Growth Harrison has reminded us.  Anything the mainstream says about the Pats as a symbol of truth, justice, etc. is unadulterated bullcrap.

This revelation, then, doesn't contradict the team's pristine public image.  It contradicts a bunch of known, proven bullcrap.  They were always capable of something like this.  THEY ARE... WHAT WE THOUGHT THEY WERE!  IF YOU WANNA CROWN THEM, CROWN THEIR ASS!!!

I hate to go here...
...but I have no choice but to wonder what the real motivations are behind all this moral outrage.

Everyone hates the Pats.  They win all the time.  They've benefited from luck breaks more than once.  They've been pumped up as the embodiment of what's right about football: hard work, teamwork, brains, guile, blah blah blah.  People hate that shit.  Everyone's been chomping at the bit to tear them down; now they've got their excuse to attack.

I can empathize with that.  If this were baseball, and I found out the Yankees had a camera set up in center field relaying signs to the dugout, I'd undoubtedly be more bullshit than anyone.  But I'm sure you've already guessed what my #1 motivation for being so bullshit would be.

People have the right to be angry, but as soon as you go past Belichick simply being overcompetitive, greedy, classless and unethical, and start implicating the entire franchise's success because of this one thing, that's when you've started attacking the Pats for your own private reasons.  Ask yourself what your reaction would have been if the Bears were caught doing the same exact thing.  If it's any different, your reasons are personal, and you lose.  If you insist it would be the same, then I sincerely hope you're as honest with yourself as you think you are.

(As for the other side of that coin, I bet you doubt I'd defend another team as voraciously as I'm defending my own.  I might not defend them as thoroughly, but I don't know that I'd be out for blood in the same way.  So suck it.)

Last thing
Look, I'm ashamed of all this.  I'm not asking for sympathy or pity or whatever.  I've copped to my biases.  If the taping affected the game in progress in any way, I'd want to see some forfeits.

But having spent most of the last day thinking about the situation, that really doesn't look like the case.  So I really don't see what the big deal is.  Until we see some proof that they used their camera to steal signals in real time, what they did was break a league regulation that had no bearing on the game's outcome, but gives them a slight edge in the film room (assuming their opponents aren't complete idiots).  Is that really worth a big, nasty scandal?  And would it have gotten to this point if it were anybody else?  I think not.

Let the punishment fit the crime, and give the moral absolutism a rest.