DMN Blog: Jerry sticks up for (alleged) cheaters

Gryphon

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Jerry sticks up for (alleged) cheaters

Jerry was kind enough to chat with reporters for about 40 minutes today. He spent a decent amount of that time answering questions about the Spygate, an issue that a brave dude from the NFL Network kept hammering.

Understand that Jerry and New England owner Robert Kraft are tight. They've banded together as big-money, business-savvy owners on a lot of issues over the years. Kraft and his wife will join the Joneses at dinner tomorrow night to celebrate Jerry's birthday.

Jerry is about to replace Kraft as chairman of the NFL Network Committee, which is why I called the reporter brave. He's basically grilling his bosses on a controversial issue for the world to see.

Jerry interrupted the reporter's first Spygate question to say that the issue doesn't pop up in his mind when he thinks about the Patriots. OK, but how much of a competitive edge did those hidden cameras give the Pats as they built a dynasty?

"I don't think it impacted their success or caused them to have more success because of the things that were alleged," Jerry said. "I don't think it impacted that at all."

Wait a second. Alleged? They were caught cheating.

"But I'm just saying that we don't know then," Jerry said. "That would have to be alleged as far as those years. Would you agree with that? Having said that, I don’t think it would have impacted those teams.

"The first year I was on the competition committee, Don Shula, [Marty] Schottenheimer, [Tom] Flores, those were the guys that were on the competition committee. When I met with them in the spring, they said, 'Jerry, did you know that everybody in the league knew where y'all were going to run and whether you were going to pass or run.' We won the Super Bowl. And they said, 'Nobody could stop you, knowing where you were going and when you were going there. We had your signals from Day 1 going from the sidelines.'

"My point is I do not think that that impacted them winning over an opponent if that were the case, which it may have been advanced, but I don’t know that to be the case at all.

"The facts are I know how much the integrity is of Bob and his family. I know firsthand what it is. I've seen it operate. I've seen what character and integrity is. I think it does impact throughout the organization there."
 

stealth

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think it was just fluff that teams knew what we were going to do before we did it in the 90's?
 
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