Cheaters Never Prosper...Well They Kinda Do

Cheating.  Dictionary.com defines cheating as: 'To violate rules deliberately, as in a game'

The Patriots cheated.  The thing that got lost in Spygate was the explanation that Belichick gave for the 'mistake'.  So astounding.  Billy Bud and the Pats brushed it off as a mistake; a 'missinterpretation of the rules'.  I don't even know where to begin on that.

Nevermind that the league breafs every team on the rules.  Nevermind they specifically mentioned to all the teams that you couldn't videotape the other sideliness.  Forget all that.  Actually don't.  There is no confusion there.  They never thought they would get caught.  Once they did, we heard things like: 'it didn't give that big an advantage anyway'.  Right.  I won't calim to know what it did or didn't do.  I will tell you that I wouldn't go to so much trouble if it didn't benefit me in some way.

This one scandal is just the tip of the iceberg though.  Some of the following is anecdotal.  I know that.  I know that I haven't run a Congressional investigation (altough that is coming based on the NFL saying: 'OK case closed, let's burn the evidence!' and the Pats cheating for the their first Super Bowl over the Rams.  Just punish them all day and twice on Sundays please).  Regardless, here is a quick hits list of the ways in which the Pats cheat...at least the list I could think of without doing any research...

-There seem to be an inordinate amount of reports about the qb/coach headsets going out in New England.  No one can prove anything.  But it happens up there constantly.  Weird huh?  I know it happened in the Redskins game, the Jets game, and against the Eagles.  I would bet that it happened more than that as well.  No paper trail.  Just a little hard to believe that the technologically advance NFL (they are zooming into tenths of an inch to see if a guy was in or out of bounds and we can't get walkie talkies going?  I bought a pair of WTs for my roomate and I.  We use them.  If we are withhin 8 blocks of each other, they work.  Strange how they don't in Foxborough.  Maybe it's all the new fans of the team)

-Rodney Harrison.  HGH.  Yay dad!

-The injury report.   Mike 'Cut Block' Shanahan also does this which ruins fantasy teams everywhere, but Belichick lies everyweek on his injury report. He won't disclose things.  He will keep a guy off the report and then have him sit because he's injured (Laurence Maroney this year for example).  This violates rules.  They know the rules.  Therefore...ummm...CHEATANDO (en espanol)

-Do a google search for 'Patriots Cheating'.  You get 311,000 hits.  There has to be something that I haven't thought of in there.  311,000!!!!!!

-This one isn't cheating, it's just kinda dirty: The Pats have been known to bring in former players from the team they are playing that week who got released.  They have no intention of playing the guy or giving him a roster spot with any perminence.  They basically bring him in to talk about the other team's playbook.  This violates a lot of the NFLPA's principles but no rules.  It's allowed though.  It's just really classy...like a port-a-potty

This is a long way of saying that it's good when cheaters get caught and don't get the thing they were cheating for.  It's good that this Patriots team will be the answer to a great trivia question in 10 years.  It's not great that I have to see those jackasses from the '72 Dolphins again.  Did you know they were undefeated?  I hadn't heard that.