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How the New England Patriots became the NFL’s least-trusted team
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Belichick, for his part, claimed he had misunderstood the NFL rules. But that excuse struck other coaches as disingenuous. “The rules are very, very clear,” former Tennessee Titans Coach Jeff Fisher told the New York Times in 2008. “There is no need to be more specific or clarify any rules whatsoever.”
Whatever the cause — or the effect — some players allege the tactic may have tilted pivotal games in the Patriots’ favor. Among them is Hall of Fame running back Marshall Faulk, who played and lost against the Patriots in the 2002 Super Bowl. He says there’s no way the Patriots could have known about some of the plays they ran — but they seemed to. “I’ll never be over being cheated out of the Super Bowl,” he told CSNNE.com last year. “…We had some plays in the red zone that we hadn’t ran … And a couple of plays on third down that we walked through also … And they created a check for it. It’s just little things like that. It’s either the best coaching in the world when you come up with situations that you had never seen before. Or you’d seen it and knew what to do.”
Then, when confronted with the most recent allegations of deflating the footballs, Brady laughed. “Ridiculous,” he said on a radio show. “I think I’ve heard it all at this point.”
But this time, the NFL may disagree.“You have power over your mind – not outside events. Realize this, and you will find strength.”– Marcus Aurelius
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