Cheating Patriots coach faces more scrutiny

Ex-Patriots Assistant Sends the N.F.L. Eight Tapes

By GREG BISHOP
Published: May 8, 2008
A former New England Patriots employee has sent the N.F.L. eight videotapes showing the team recorded play-calling signals by coaches of five opponents in six games between the 2000 and 2002 seasons, in violation of league rules.

But the group of tapes does not include video of the St. Louis Rams’ walk-through practice the day before the 2002 Super Bowl. The employee, Matt Walsh, had been linked to such a tape by news media speculation.

Walsh emerged as a pivotal figure in the spying controversy that enveloped the Patriots last season after they were caught taping Jets defensive signals in the season opener.

Walsh, who worked for the Patriots from 1997 to 2003, agreed to turn over the tapes and other evidence by Thursday under an agreement reached last month between lawyers for the N.F.L. and Walsh. The agreement indemnifies Walsh from all future legal fees.

Walsh’s tapes show that the Patriots recorded the signals of offensive and defensive coaches in regular-season games against the Miami Dolphins, the Buffalo Bills, the Cleveland Browns and the San Diego Chargers and against the Pittsburgh Steelers in the 2002 American Football Conference championship game. In that game, the tape has been edited to show Steelers coaches signaling plays, followed by two different camera angles of the actual plays that were called.

 

It's over. Goodell will meet with Walsh, then hold a press conference saying so.

 

And then he will destroy every bit of evidence that he gets his hands on.

 

And the hits just keep on coming...

http://sports.espn.go.com/nfl/columns/story?columnist=fish_mike&id=3387401

By Mike Fish
ESPN.com

From Day 1 of the Spygate saga in September, the controversy over New England's illicit videotaping practices has centered on the Patriots' efforts to steal their opponents' defensive signals. But the tapes delivered via FedEx to NFL headquarters in New York on Thursday morning also include evidence of an effort by New England to steal offensive signals, which would broaden the extent of the team's surveillance operation.

NFL commissioner Roger Goodell and staff members began viewing the eight tapes within hours of their long-awaited delivery, in anticipation of Tuesday's scheduled interview with former Patriots video assistant Matt Walsh. As part of an indemnification pact reached last month with the league, Walsh agreed to turn over any videotapes or related materials he had from his tenure with the team.

 

1). It's much ado about nothing.
2). It's a witch hunt.
3). Everyone else is doing it.

 

Methinks they need to ask for audio tapes now.

 

But if Walsh wasn't the source for the Boston Herald's Rams walkthrough story, and if that guy is still out there, I wouldn't shut the door completely. I would leave a small crack on the off chance that person might finally come forward with that tape.

 

Thing I don't get is why this exonerates the Pats? Who says the walk-through wasn't taped and then handed over to BB or someone else and no copy ever made? This is coming from a Pats fan, too. I just don't understand why Walsh not producing the tape means the practice wasn't taped.

 

This is a joke. It's no longer funny.
Specter wants back in - somebody must be spiking his chemo again.

 

Because the NFL wants this thing to go away. Even some of the teams that were "cheated" are trying to get it to go away because they think that is what's best for the league.

 

The NFL is trying to find the rug big enough to sweep this under.

 

A Decade of Sins Deserves a Year's Time Out
by HARVEY ARATON
Published: May 9, 2008
What an extensive video library Bill Belichick turns out to have produced. Eight more spy tapes sent to N.F.L. headquarters for Commissioner Roger Goodell’s viewing pleasure by a former student in the New England Patriots’ film noir studies program. Who knows how many more taped over or discarded over the last eight years? Now that the “totality of conduct” for which Belichick was cited by Goodell has officially expanded to the length of his tenure in New England, shouldn’t he be further punished as a serial offender, a con man who not only broke the rules but established secretly taping opponents as standard operating procedure?

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/05/09/sports/football/09araton.html?_r=1&ref=sports&oref=slogin