- Nov 30, 2005
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KT prolly only knows Jerry Rice from Dancing with the Stars.
That's the guy they suspended this year, right?
KT
KT prolly only knows Jerry Rice from Dancing with the Stars.
Yes, Jerry Rice doesn't know shit about what a football is supposed to be inflated to, who does he think he is? How does Jerry Rice get to be an authority on football? lol
This all feels like an epic Belichick troll move to let Tom get up there and talk about his balls and how he prefers they feel in his hands for 30 minutes. It could be one of the best press conferences in recent history.
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I disagree. If you're stupid enough to get caught, then you deserve what you get. For example, in baseball it's common practice for the catcher to put pine tar on his shin guards and wipe some on the ball when throwing it back to the pitcher. How often is this caught? Never because teams don't do it all the time and are smart about it. Yet the Pats are blatant about it, doing it every game until someone calls them on it. It's the equivalent of the Pineda moron (Yankees pitcher) putting pine tar on his neck, in a nationally televised game, thinking no one would notice. Well someone did notice, and he got busted. The Pats are morons for cheating that blatantly. They probably wouldn't get called in the regular season on it, but in the playoffs you better be on your P's and Q's. Which means not obviously deflating 11 out of 12 balls like fucking idiots.
Yes, Jerry Rice doesn't know shit about what a football is supposed to be inflated to, who does he think he is? How does Jerry Rice get to be an authority on football? lol
Spitballs were banned because putting foreign substances on the ball damages them. There were pitchers that were grandfathered when the new rule was made, and allowed to continue throwing spitballs. Lookup "last legal spitball".
Spitballs were banned because putting foreign substances on the ball damages them. There were pitchers that were grandfathered when the new rule was made, and allowed to continue throwing spitballs. Lookup "last legal spitball".
All of that trickery put bats to sleep. It was also, in a word, disgusting. When the league finally cracked down on the spitball after the 1920 season, you could tick off two major reasons: jump-start offenses, and clean up one of the most unsanitary practices any sport had ever practiced or has since.
The clinching argument, though, came August 16, 1920. Facing Cleveland in a dimly lit game, Yankees righty Carl Mays fired a spitball wildly toward the plate. Indians shortstop Ray Chapman couldnt pick up the ball until it was too late. The pitch struck him in the head, and killed him, making him one of only two players to ever die of an injury suffered during a major league game. Long before MLB made batting helmets mandatory, it banned doctored pitches and made umpires replace dirty balls regularly during a game, doing more to alter the game than perhaps any other rule change of the past 100 years.
Yes, Jerry Rice doesn't know shit about what a football is supposed to be inflated to, who does he think he is? How does Jerry Rice get to be an authority on football? lol
You know who else had light balls and won a lot?
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Part of me wants to say "Look, Aaron Rodgers and a bunch of other plays have all noted they like balls that are over or under inflated!". I've been a life-long Patriots fan, literally, I was born after week 1 of the 1981 season and I've never missed a game. When I was little my dad would pull me out of my crib, and one of my earliest memories is of watching the Patriots face the Cowboys and my dad saying "pay attention,this may be the only game they win all year" as my best friend and I sat there watching. He was right. The Patriots to me are more than just a sports team; their rise coincided with me going away to college, going out into the world, starting my career. That's what it really means to be a fan of a team, it's not just a sport anymore, it's a part of your life; something you take solace in when you're feeling down, and something that gets you pumped up even more when you're things are going well. I remember in 2003 or so I hit a rough patch and saying to myself "well, at least I saw the Pats win some super bowls", and it genuinely made me feel a little bit better.
After Spygate I was a bit leery of just how different what the Pats were doing from the rest of the league; I remember Jimmy Johnson saying the Cowboys had done similar stuff over the years. You don't want to believe what your team did was so bad, I mean sports can be such a big part of someone's life, you don't want to be rooting (along with your friends) for a team that's shady or cheating.
But this time, my first thought "Why are they doing this? How are they getting caught again??" It sounds stupid, but it hurts in a way. This is a team that I associate with my friends, my dad that I still talk to after almost every game, and just my life in general. When stuff like this keeps happening it doesn't just mean a team cheated, it means a whole group of people that passionately support the team have in a way been robbed. I'm not just annoyed, I'm genuinely bummed out. The super bowl is coming up, this should be one of my happiest times of the year, and for the first time in my life I'm actually not sure how excited I am to watch the next Patriots game.
