Ballghazi? Deflategate? This is the real scandal
Let me state for the record, up front: I believe Tom Brady and Bill Belichick when they say “I did not have sexual relations with that woman.”
(YouTube)
I’m sorry, different scandal.
It seems ludicrous to me they would deflate the footballs so I believe them when I say they didn’t do it.
And I have to use the full word — footballs — because just saying “balls” has too strong a sexual connotation to it. And all the best double entendres have been used already. We’ve been sniggering all week about this. Making jokes about who handles Tom Brady’s balls before and during the game. Let’s be real clear about this: Tom Brady wears a cup to protect his balls, his testicles, so it would be real hard for anyone to fondle his balls for the two hours before, and during, the game. And of course his wife Gisele Bundchen handles his balls when Tom isn’t suited up.
(YouTube
It is understandable though that so many people believe the Belichick-led Patriots have been cheating since they were caught cheating before with the “spygate.” So it’s natural to assume the coach cheated again by having balls deflated.
And let’s face it: the footballs’ air pressure had nothing to do with the 45-7 beat down they delivered on Indianapolis. The balls in the first half were found to be under-inflated and the balls in the second half — when the Patriots scored 28 points and the Colts didn’t score a damn thing — the balls were properly inflated. The Colts truly could not handle their balls in the game.
The league will investigate, there’s no doubt they had officials studying everything the Patriots were doing on the sidelines anyway, considering Bill Belichick’s crafty reputation. Once their investigation is completed, if it isn’t finished already, it will indicate the Patriots did nothing illegal by league rules and bylaws.
(YouTube)
We won’t hear about it until after Super Bowl XLIX (that’s 49 if you’re trying to figure it out) — long after — because it’s producing a lot of great publicity for the game. People are already saying this will be the dullest Super Bowl; most people hate the Patriots the way most baseball fans hate the Boston Red Sox, L.A. Dodgers and New York Yankees. And Seattle with Richard Sherman, most people just say, “eh.” The fan base interested in who wins this game is so small any publicity is good publicity, black eye or not — and let me tell you: Roger Goodell and the NFL know black eyes.
The league did release a preliminary report and when you boil down the mountain of pages to what really matters, this is what it says: “The evidence thus far supports the conclusion that footballs that were under-inflated were used by the Patriots in the first half, the footballs were properly inflated for the second half and confirmed at the conclusion of the game to have remained properly inflated.”
The investigation is ongoing dot-dot-dot …
••• •••• ••••• •••• ••••
(YouTube)
There’s a different scandal in all this. And it’s been lost in all the hoopla over Ballghazi, or deflategate, whatever you want to call this most recent “gate.” Here’s the real scandal: HOW THE HELL DID THE GREEN BAY PACKERS ALLOW THE SEATTLE SEAHAWKS TO WIN?
Sorry for the bolded all caps. Every Packers fan, every Cheesehead, throughout the land is still screaming this question at their televisions a week after that NFC championship game. They could be watching NCIS; New Orleans or Archer or American Idol and just blurt out, for no apparent reason, “HOW THE HELL DID THE GREEN BAY PACKERS ALLOW THE SEATTLE SEAHAWKS TO WIN?”
It’s mainly a rhetorical question, we already know the answer, but dammit! They had it won, being 12 points ahead with less than five minutes left in the game! Yeah Aaron Rodgers, you should be fucking embarrassed to show your face in public! Goddammit! If the coaches are sending in shit plays then just call your own, goddammit!
(YouTube)
To be fair to the Seattle Seahawks, they turned out to be the better team that day because they A) Have an outstanding defense and B) didn’t give up, even when it seemed likely they were about to lose the game. They were the better team because they didn’t take their foot off the gas at the end — like them goddam fucking Packers.
Sorry for the obscenities. The publishers and BPE hierarchy are probably more than a little dismayed, but I’ve been a Packer fan since the Pack started winning championships under Vince Lombardi. So I am more than a little miffed.
Going to the Super Bowl is a tough enough task as it is. Ask any of the Ravens. Rarely does a team get a chance to repeat these days, due to parity. So many teams are capable of winning conference championships — with the possible exception of the Indianapolis Colts — getting through a 16-game regular season with enough wins to make the playoffs is hard and then winning two or three playoff games — making it to the Super Bowl is hard.
The last time Green Bay fans were so pissed off at their Packers — and it really is their Packers; the fans actually own the team — was in Super Bowl XXXII. I SPIT in the general direction of Green Bay and Denver. The Packers could have repeated in 1997-98.
(Tim Forkes)
It was here, in Sunny Sandy Eggo, where the Packers had their most glaring embarrassment. They were 11-point favorites, everyone and his sister in the press was trying to make the best of it for the John Elway-led Denver Broncos. Elway and the Broncos had already lost three Super Bowls and why wouldn’t 1998 be any different from 1987, 1988 and 1990? Or 1978 for that matter, when Craig Morton was the starting QB for the Broncos in Super Bowl XII, and Roger Staubach and the Dallas Cowboys won it all.
In January 1998 the Pack had a better quarterback (Brett Favre), a better offense and a marginally better defense. Everything pointed to the Packers repeating as Super Bowl champions … until we saw them at their hotel the day before the BIG GAME. They just had that attitude of believing their own hype, the win was in the bag. There they were, the day before the game, diddy-boppin’ into the hotel lobby like they were just a bunch of cats on vacation and all they had to do on game day was show up with the their shoes shined and voila! Instant Super Bowl win. I turned to my brother Carl and said, “They’re gonna lose …”
Them goddam fuckin’ Packers.
I said that very day, January 25, 1998, I was going to become a Chargers fan. No way would I EVER become a Broncos fan, not after that Super Bowl game and I wouldn’t even joke about being a Vikings or Bears fan (SPIT-SPIT) … What’s a Packers fan to do?
They did win Super Bowl XLV in January 2011, beating the Pittsburgh Steelers 31-25.
But it’s the Green Bay Packers who could have been in Phoenix right now, taking in all the hoopla and hype of Super Bowl Week and then playing the BIG GAME a week from today, February 1 at University of Phoenix Stadium, in nearby Glendale, Arizona. Can’t say they should be the team going to the Super Bowl because they lost the NFC Championship game to the Seahawks so Seattle is the team that should be in Arizona right now.
You’re probably thinking, especially if you’re one of my family living in the Denver area: “Get over it! That was 17 years ago already!” and “Jeez, the game’s over, the Packers season is over, time to move on.”
No, not a chance. This is NFL football and nothing is more sacred in this country than that — except for the possible exception of greed. We never get over losing the championship games.
Goddam fucking Packers (SPIT).
Tim Forkes started as a writer on a small alternative college newspaper in Milwaukee called the Crazy Shepherd. Writing about entertainment issues, he had the opportunity to speak with many people in show business, from the very famous to the people struggling to find an audience. In 1992 Tim moved to San Diego, CA and pursued other interests, but remained a freelance writer. Upon arrival in Southern California he was struck by how the business of government and business was so intertwined, far more so than he had witnessed in Wisconsin. His interest in entertainment began to wane and the business of politics took its place. He had always been interested in politics, his mother had been a Democratic Party official in Milwaukee, WI, so he sat down to dinner with many of Wisconsin’s greatest political names of the 20th Century: William Proxmire and Clem Zablocki chief among them. As a Marine Corps veteran, Tim has a great interest in veteran affairs, primarily as they relate to the men and women serving and their families. As far as Tim is concerned, the military-industrial complex has enough support. How the men and women who serve are treated is reprehensible, while in the military and especially once they become veterans. Tim would like to help change that reality.