On January 25 2015 05:29 cLutZ wrote: LOL, the Pats just tried to pull out the "cold deflates things" defense on TV. Some media appear to thing they are correct...which is disturbing.
"Tried". Yeah they try so hard. I know you believe it.
Just saying random shit doesn't somehow make your opinion valid. We will have to see what NFL comes up with.
Some of you Pats fans are getting so fucking dumb with your try hard excuses.
Apply the formula and see if you get 2 PSI from the cold. Unlike you, some of us actually have at least a high school education.
I'm near damn sure someone with your lvl of intellect wouldn't even know what to do with that info. What a tool. Have you even read what you quoted? It explains it precisely. Way to shit in your own trousers.
a hypothesis is considered scientifically true (well, unfalsifiable, more accurately), if it can be confirmed multiple times experimentally. you drop the chemical into the beaker and get a kaboom. not a sizzle, or a spark, a kaboom. multiple times. your hypothesis is very probably correct! you get a kaboom, then a sizzle, then a spark, there's something wrong somewhere.
now we have a unique situation here when it comes to experimentation. we have two test groups, pats balls and colts balls. both were subjected to precisely the same conditions in precisely the same location for precisely the same amount of time. (this is something science can't do most of the time when trying to recreate original conditions precisely).
all balls were checked at both halftime and after the game was over.
patriots balls were deflated.
colts balls maintained their pressure.
so we have an experiment, so to speak, in conditions that cannot be matched by a laboratory (impossible to perfectly recreate the air temperature, pressure, humidity, wind speed and directions etc.), whose results were not repeated. in other words, if the atmosphere caused the pats balls to deflate, the colts balls should have by at least a similar amount.
they didn't. the difference in air pressure between the two sets of balls was quite marked. the experiments did not yield similar results. thus, the hypothesis that the drop in PSI is mostly or wholly attributable to the weather is either wrong, or there are unknown factors that need to be discovered and taken into account in order to explain why the colts balled handled the drop from 70 degrees to 49 just fine, and the patriots balls did not.
You are completely overlooking that there is no reason to believe that the Colts' footballs were subject to the same initial conditions as the Patriots'. By the rules, they could have been inflated a full PSI more to begin with. Furthermore, they may not have undergone the same breaking-in procedure as the Patriots' or may not have undergone them at the same time. In his last press conference, Belichick attested that the breaking-in procedure results in a temporary increase of around 1 PSI (which means that if they were officially weighed shortly after being broken, their pressure would have subsequently gone down). Together, these points can entirely account for the observed difference.
1) You don't break in balls on game day - that is done days in advance. Furthermore, then the replacement balls would also have lost pressure - they didn't.
2) If the Colts's balls were at the max PSI of 13.5 and the Pats's were at the lowest 12.5 you would expect the absolute PSI fall to be larger for the Colts's balls than the Pats's as:
P=(nRT)/V
Now, even if the Pats's PSI only fell 1 PSI (everyone reports 2, but let us give them the best possible case) you would expect the Colts's to fall >1 PSI, bringing them out of the legal range even if they had been fully inflated. Do to repeat myself: CLAIMING THAT THE WEATHER DID IT IS BULLSHIT.
Well what factual proof has the NFL come forth with about the balls? Bill is only making them come forward with what they have, and if they don't have video proof of someone tampering with the balls, then the only thing they can penalize them for is under-inflated balls, which as many in this thread have already stated, is $25k and loss of draft picks. If they're wrong and in fact someone did tamper with them, alright (which is what I believe) but now lets have the NFL show all their proof of who did it, how it's connected to X person, and if they don't have it, they can't very well suspend Belichick or Brady.
On January 25 2015 18:02 cLutZ wrote: Lynch is really confusing to me. He must have some money stream I don't know about, or is super thrifty, because I can't imagine 5 minutes of being an ass to reporters being worth 1% of my salary. For me that is like Christmas gifts for everyone but my girlfriend.
I said this to a friend last night: I'm 100% sure he is bankrupt within 5 years of being out of the league. He is fined so often for relatively large sums and doesn't seem to care.
On January 25 2015 05:29 cLutZ wrote: LOL, the Pats just tried to pull out the "cold deflates things" defense on TV. Some media appear to thing they are correct...which is disturbing.
"Tried". Yeah they try so hard. I know you believe it.
Just saying random shit doesn't somehow make your opinion valid. We will have to see what NFL comes up with.
Some of you Pats fans are getting so fucking dumb with your try hard excuses.
Apply the formula and see if you get 2 PSI from the cold. Unlike you, some of us actually have at least a high school education.
I'm near damn sure someone with your lvl of intellect wouldn't even know what to do with that info. What a tool. Have you even read what you quoted? It explains it precisely. Way to shit in your own trousers.
a hypothesis is considered scientifically true (well, unfalsifiable, more accurately), if it can be confirmed multiple times experimentally. you drop the chemical into the beaker and get a kaboom. not a sizzle, or a spark, a kaboom. multiple times. your hypothesis is very probably correct! you get a kaboom, then a sizzle, then a spark, there's something wrong somewhere.
now we have a unique situation here when it comes to experimentation. we have two test groups, pats balls and colts balls. both were subjected to precisely the same conditions in precisely the same location for precisely the same amount of time. (this is something science can't do most of the time when trying to recreate original conditions precisely).
all balls were checked at both halftime and after the game was over.
patriots balls were deflated.
colts balls maintained their pressure.
so we have an experiment, so to speak, in conditions that cannot be matched by a laboratory (impossible to perfectly recreate the air temperature, pressure, humidity, wind speed and directions etc.), whose results were not repeated. in other words, if the atmosphere caused the pats balls to deflate, the colts balls should have by at least a similar amount.
they didn't. the difference in air pressure between the two sets of balls was quite marked. the experiments did not yield similar results. thus, the hypothesis that the drop in PSI is mostly or wholly attributable to the weather is either wrong, or there are unknown factors that need to be discovered and taken into account in order to explain why the colts balled handled the drop from 70 degrees to 49 just fine, and the patriots balls did not.
You are completely overlooking that there is no reason to believe that the Colts' footballs were subject to the same initial conditions as the Patriots'. By the rules, they could have been inflated a full PSI more to begin with. Furthermore, they may not have undergone the same breaking-in procedure as the Patriots' or may not have undergone them at the same time. In his last press conference, Belichick attested that the breaking-in procedure results in a temporary increase of around 1 PSI (which means that if they were officially weighed shortly after being broken, their pressure would have subsequently gone down). Together, these points can entirely account for the observed difference.
1) You don't break in balls on game day - that is done days in advance.
You're misunderstanding: the point applies if they break in balls on the day of the official measurement, not on game day. If the balls are measured and approved at a point when their pressure is are temporarily artificially high, then by game time, their pressure will already have dropped.
Furthermore, then the replacement balls would also have lost pressure - they didn't.
This depends on the assumption that the replacement balls balls were subject to the same conditions as the original game day balls. This is surely NOT the case when it comes to weather conditions (my understanding is that the replacement balls were stored separately, not exposed to the elements until they were brought out at halftime), and it's quite plausible that it's not the case when it comes to the temporary increase at the time of the original measurements, either. That increase, per Belichick, lasts for an hour or two. Since the replacement balls are measured after the main balls, it's to be expected that they have returned closer to equilibrium at the time of their measurement.
2) If the Colts's balls were at the max PSI of 13.5 and the Pats's were at the lowest 12.5 you would expect the absolute PSI fall to be larger for the Colts's balls than the Pats's as:
P=(nRT)/V
Now, even if the Pats's PSI only fell 1 PSI (everyone reports 2, but let us give them the best possible case) you would expect the Colts's to fall >1 PSI, bringing them out of the legal range even if they had been fully inflated.
Again, to be clear: the hypothesis here is that the Patriots' balls lost PSI for TWO reasons: 1) their having been measured at a point when they had an artificially high PSI after having just been broken in and 2) the weather conditions at the game, accounting for around 1 PSI each. The first of these may not apply to the Colts' balls, though the second does. This would explain how the Patriots' balls might have fallen ~2 PSI from a starting point of 12.5 PSI, while the Colts' fell only ~1 PSI from a starting point of 13.5 PSI. Now, on the other hand, supposing that the Patriots deliberately deflated the balls raises questions of its own:
1) Why would they deflate only the game day balls and not the replacements? In for a penny in for a pound, no? 2) Why would they run the risk of exposure and scandal to alter the balls in a way that is reportedly all but imperceptible? 3) Why has no direct evidence emerged of any such alteration?
I don't suggest that any of these questions are conclusive evidence that the Patriots did not deflate, but, to my mind, they add weight to the side of the natural explanation that Belichick offered. Furthermore, Brady's and Belichick's demeanor in their press conferences impressed me as sincere, and that carries some weight with me, as well. You're free to weigh the evidence differently from me and come to a different conclusion, but when you say:
Do to repeat myself: CLAIMING THAT THE WEATHER DID IT IS BULLSHIT.
it seems to me that you're going far beyond what the evidence warrants. Let's face it: the Patriots have much more scrutiny on them than any other team in the NFL as a result of their unprecedented success over the last 15 years. There's a widespread perception that they're cheaters, and that's been driving this story—yet the evidence really doesn't support that perception. They've been part of one scandal in all that time: "Spygate", which revolved around a relatively minor infraction of the rules, which Belichick claims to have misinterpreted... and now this, which is an ongoing investigation in which very little official information has come out—and the information that we do know can be explained by natural causes, as I've said. The least you can do is withhold judgment until the league releases the results of its investigation and we have a fuller picture of what happened. In the interest of disclosing my biases, I'm a Patriots fan. When this story first broke, I subscribed to the narrative that the Patriots had cheated, but, as more information emerged, I changed my mind, for the reasons I've given.
On January 26 2015 01:37 qrs wrote: The least you can do is withhold judgment until the league releases the results of its investigation and we have a fuller picture of what happened.
While you made plenty of good points that I want to thank you for, having this be the take-away from your post completely detracts the good points you made. There's no reason why the NFL should be unbiased with their investigation, and if history shows us they will probably not find any conclusive evidence that damns any one of their teams. The NFL's investigations into matters such as this show their incompetence or unwillingness to make themselves look bad.
I was under the distinct impression that the official measurement is done 2 hours before kickoff on game day - for ALL balls. They were then all measured again at halftime where the 12 deflated Patriots balls were replaced, and lastly a measurement at the end of the game where all 36 balls that had been used in the second quarter (Pats, Colts and Kicking) were all found to be legal. That is how it is described by the rulebook as well as by multiple media outlets - if you have a source stating they used another method, please link it. If you do not, and as the media has reported that the officials didn't screw up, the remaining conclusion is that it happened as describes above. Consequently, the only way the balls had an artificially high pressure is if the balls were stored in an extremely hot place (100+ F) at time of measurement which would have affected the other balls as well (which it didn't).
As for your questions: 1) Because the deflation occurred between measurement and kick-off at which point game-balls have been selected. Reserve-balls were only.put in play after they had been discovered and the refs were keeping an extra eye on the handling of the balls. Deflating the reserveballs would have been begging to get caught red handed. Furthermore it was by the half.obvious that they were going to win, so no need to run the risk of getting caught. 2) It depends on who you ask how imperceptible it is - ESPN has a segment with 3 balls where the two retired NFL players in a blinded trial correctly identified the properly inflated ball. Tom Brady has also previously stated to like balls at 12.5 PSI contrary to 13.5 PSI, so apparently he can feel the difference of 1 PSI - and this was apparently 2 PSI. 3) Outside of video-evidence from a random surveillance camera in the Patriots own den - what direct evidence is there to deflating balls outside of the actual 12 deflated balls? I have enough respect for the intelligence of the NE staff to expect them to have done this in a blind angle if the tampering was in fact intended.
Lastly, I have physics entirely in my side when I state that it is impossible for the weather to have caused the 2 PSI drop (or even 1 PSI drop). I have rejected the other half of your hypothesis as described above.
As stated earlier - I hope there is a reasonable explanation, I really do. However, what NE Pats have so far provided is not even remotely close to being reasonable let alone physically possible.
On January 25 2015 18:02 cLutZ wrote: Lynch is really confusing to me. He must have some money stream I don't know about, or is super thrifty, because I can't imagine 5 minutes of being an ass to reporters being worth 1% of my salary. For me that is like Christmas gifts for everyone but my girlfriend.
He's not being an ass. He has severe anxiety. I can't understand it myself considering his job but when you watch the interviews it's pretty clear he's incredibly uncomfortable.
The guy is about to cry. If people watched more than the snippits and actually payed attention it would be pretty obvious.
They should really figure out how to help him instead of just fining him...
For a league that focuses so much on fighting the good fight against issues like bullying, they sure don't seem to care when it happens to their own players.
He just can't handle the media, there's no reason to force him to do it. Sherman talks enough for the entire league.
I've asked in the past why Lynch doesn't just go get a diagnosis of anxiety and get a lawyer and the NFLPA to make his case. It's ridiculous to put a man through that when there are other options. I'm sure there is a room where he could have one on one questions with reporters and have a transcript released to the media afterwards or something. (that took 2 seconds to come up with, I'm sure there's other options too)
On January 25 2015 18:02 cLutZ wrote: Lynch is really confusing to me. He must have some money stream I don't know about, or is super thrifty, because I can't imagine 5 minutes of being an ass to reporters being worth 1% of my salary. For me that is like Christmas gifts for everyone but my girlfriend.
He's not being an ass. He has severe anxiety. I can't understand it myself considering his job but when you watch the interviews it's pretty clear he's incredibly uncomfortable.
The guy is about to cry. If people watched more than the snippits and actually payed attention it would be pretty obvious.
They should really figure out how to help him instead of just fining him...
This is what I don't really get. Is it so hard to believe that being publicly interviewed can make an individual extremely anxious, regardless of that person's aptitude in other areas? People use Marshawn's status as a tier 1 NFL running back as evidence that he couldn't possibly be nervous or bothered by the cameras, mics, and bright lights, and just assume he's being a dick.
Another example is poor Jim Tomsula. He sweats buckets and talks in circles in interviews, yet he seems like such a cool guy from what (little) I've seen and heard from him in random sideline video clips. Reports are generally that he is great at his job and his d-linemen loved playing for him. Watching his interviews however he comes off like some fat guy they randomly pulled in from the stands, and people are attacking him before he even gets a shot to prove himself. I'm not saying he's going to do a good job or anything, but at least let him fail before crucifying him.
Having said that, a big piece of a head coach's job is managing the press and handling the torrents of random drama so that his team doesn't have to. If something like deflategate happens or if Aldon Smith decides to give a gun show again, given what he's showed us about his media skills the team may just collapse instantly. I really can't imagine Jim going doing what Belichick did yesterday night.
Having ten mics and five cameras shoved in your face while people grill you with questions is an unnatural thing. Many athletes find ways to cope and handle it well but for whatever reason some can't.
On January 26 2015 02:31 Ghostcom wrote: I was under the distinct impression that the official measurement is done 2 hours before kickoff on game day - for ALL balls.
I don't have any reason to think you're wrong about that, but what Coach Belichick said (here's a transcript of his press conference) was that "[the] preparation process continues right up until the footballs are given to the officials prior to the game". In other words, he's saying that typically the balls have been roughed up just before they're given to the officials to measure. Edit: to be clear: when I distinguished between "game day" and "measurement day" above, I didn't know what day they measured it on, and I was accepting your assumption that balls are broken in well before the game. After you pressed the point, I looked it up, and it seems that you're right that the balls are measured on game day, in which case it's your assumption that balls are done being broken in days before the game that Belichick contradicts.
I have physics entirely in my side when I state that it is impossible for the weather to have caused the 2 PSI drop (or even 1 PSI drop).
I honestly don't know. You do seem to be right that the temperature decrease alone, if it was from approximately 70 degrees Fahrenheit to 50 degrees Fahrenheit, would be expected to cause a decrease of only around .5 PSI, but there are other factors to the weather conditions—barometric pressure, for instance—that might affect it as well. And there are so many other things we don't know, such as EXACTLY[/i] what pressure differences were found, and what the variance was like, and whether the same gauges were used before and during the game, etc. that it just seems premature to me to assume from the little we actually know about the case that a pressure difference was found that could only be accounted for through cheating.
As for your questions: 1) Because the deflation occurred between measurement and kick-off at which point game-balls have been selected. Reserve-balls were only.put in play after they had been discovered and the refs were keeping an extra eye on the handling of the balls. Deflating the reserveballs would have been begging to get caught red handed. Furthermore it was by the half.obvious that they were going to win, so no need to run the risk of getting caught.
I wasn't sure when and where you were assuming that the balls were deflated. If we're talking about deflating them on the sideline during the game, then yes, I agree with you that the question of why they didn't do it to the reserve balls too isn't very strong. On the other hand, that makes some of the other questions stronger, such as why they would take such a risk for such a small advantage, and why there's apparently no eyewitness or video evidence of them doing it (the sidelines are taped throughout the game, after all).
2) It depends on who you ask how imperceptible it is - ESPN has a segment with 3 balls where the two retired NFL players in a blinded trial correctly identified the properly inflated ball. Tom Brady has also previously stated to like balls at 12.5 PSI contrary to 13.5 PSI, so apparently he can feel the difference of 1 PSI - and this was apparently 2 PSI.
What were the pressure differences in that trial? Was it double-blind? Were they able to consistently identify the balls correctly? It's hard to know how much weight to give that study without knowing a bit more about it.
3) Outside of video-evidence from a random surveillance camera in the Patriots own den - what direct evidence is there to deflating balls outside of the actual 12 deflated balls? I have enough respect for the intelligence of the NE staff to expect them to have done this in a blind angle if the tampering was in fact intended.
Video evidence is one kind. The sidelines are taped throughout the game, from several angles, I believe. I'd expect that it would be difficult to entirely hide something from the cameras, without them even catching something being hidden. I could be wrong.
Another kind of evidence is simple testimony, by, say, the ball-boy who did the tampering, does not have limitless loyalty to the Patriots, and was not expecting to face an investigation—or by anyone who was privy to this tampering. Nobody seems to have come forward.
On January 26 2015 01:37 qrs wrote: The least you can do is withhold judgment until the league releases the results of its investigation and we have a fuller picture of what happened.
While you made plenty of good points that I want to thank you for, having this be the take-away from your post completely detracts the good points you made. There's no reason why the NFL should be unbiased with their investigation, and if history shows us they will probably not find any conclusive evidence that damns any one of their teams. The NFL's investigations into matters such as this show their incompetence or unwillingness to make themselves look bad.
Even if you disagree with the last point, I don't see why it should nullify the others, but in any case, I didn't mean that anyone is bound to accept the NFL's conclusions, but that the NFL's report will hopefully tell us more about the basic facts that have a bearing on the case, such as:
Exactly what PSI pressure the balls were measured at, both the first time and the second time, for both the Patriots and the Colts.
Exactly what the procedure was for each team in terms of when they gave the officials the balls to measure, and what happened to the balls afterward.
Who the NFL interviewed about this, what questions they asked, and what the answers were.
etc.
It seems to me that a lot of these facts are likely to have a direct bearing on the case. Right now we know practically nothing except that balls were found to be underinflated at gametime. I don't know what to believe about basic things, such as the exact pressure difference that needs to be accounted for, the extent to which weather conditions can affect a game, whether the difference between 11 PSI and 12.5 PSI is noticeable to a quarterback, how easy it would be to tamper on the sidelines without being glimpsed by a single camera, etc. I think it's quite premature to draw firm conclusions on this basis, especially to condemn somebody.
On January 26 2015 02:31 Ghostcom wrote: Lastly, I have physics entirely in my side when I state that it is impossible for the weather to have caused the 2 PSI drop (or even 1 PSI drop). I have rejected the other half of your hypothesis as described above.
As stated earlier - I hope there is a reasonable explanation, I really do. However, what NE Pats have so far provided is not even remotely close to being reasonable let alone physically possible.
No, you don't have physics entirely on your side. (Full disclosure, I am a Pats fan). Aside from all the random physicists and chemists posting calculations showing that the temperature differences could have caused around a 1PSI drop and Belichick's own experimental results showing a 1.5PSI drop from temperature and elements, we have these guys (http://www.headsmartlabs.com/) who ran their own tests:
1. These guys have connections to U of Pitt and CMU, so they probably aren't Pats fans (can't confirm this). 2. PDF summary is available on their homepage. 3. They simulated both the temperature change only (but 75F to 50F, versus roughly 70F to 50F for the game), and the effect of the rain, on 12 brand new NFL footballs. 4. They found that the temperature caused a 1.1PSI drop, and the dampness caused an additional 0.7PSI drop. 5. The balls averaged a 1.8PSI drop, with a high drop of 1.95PSI.
This experiment shows at least that the Pats version of events is scientifically plausible. The big gotcha so far is how the Colts balls managed to stay in proper PSI range but the Pats didn't. We need to wait for the NFL report to decide this, however. Important facts are missing:
1. The timing of the testing post-game. The Pats balls were found deflated at half-time, which is 12 minutes long, not enough for the balls to warm up again in the locker room. If, after the game, the refs waited until they were changed and showered after (likely, as they came into the locker room cold and soaking wet) and finished their usual maintenance responsibilities first, it could have been half an hour or more until the balls were tested again, long enough for them to warm up and plump up again. This scenario would also explain why the Pats balls tested okay the second time. 2. The exact amount of PSI drop found in the Pats footballs at half-time. Unfortunately, this will never be confirmed, as I doubt these figures were written down, and these balls were actually reinflated and sent out for reuse after half-time.
Alternatively, if the refs were smart and the balls were in fact tested promptly after the game, this should lead to some concerns about the Colts footballs. If an independent experiment supports a finding that the elements should have caused a PSI drop of at around 1.8, and the Colts footballs tested within spec, that means that without special tricks the Colts balls should have began at least at 14.3 PSI (12.5 + 1.8). Since they tested within spec before the game, in this scenario the Colts must have used some tricks (inflating with 50F air?) to coax their balls to test within spec for a postgame PSI test that they potentially knew was coming.
Regardless of how the Colts footballs passed the test, the Pats story does in fact check out scientifically, according to this as of yet singular independent experiment. Hopefully, someone reputable or working for the NFL will reproduce or disprove the experiment and we can all enjoy poisoning our brains more with speculation about this idiotic mess.
This whole football deflation thing is the easiest problem in the world to solve. Both teams use the same 12 balls. Done.
The more contentious point: Patriots organization got caught cheating again. Doesn't mean they are the only ones doing it. Like the Bounty case with the Saints, they need a serious punishment to deter other organizations from doing it. Not because it is as bad as targeting players for injury, but because there is now a worry about a culture of cheating in Football's gold standard for franchises.
On January 26 2015 04:36 Craze wrote: This whole football deflation thing is the easiest problem in the world to solve. Both teams use the same 12 balls. Done.
The more contentious point: Patriots organization got caught cheating again. Doesn't mean they are the only ones doing it. Like the Bounty case with the Saints, they need a serious punishment to deter other organizations from doing it. Not because it is as bad as targeting players for injury, but because there is now a worry about a culture of cheating in Football's gold standard for franchises.
Anything said above went right over your head. Must be a blissful life you are living lol
On January 25 2015 18:02 cLutZ wrote: Lynch is really confusing to me. He must have some money stream I don't know about, or is super thrifty, because I can't imagine 5 minutes of being an ass to reporters being worth 1% of my salary. For me that is like Christmas gifts for everyone but my girlfriend.
I said this to a friend last night: I'm 100% sure he is bankrupt within 5 years of being out of the league. He is fined so often for relatively large sums and doesn't seem to care.
EDIT: $131,050 this year. Wow.
Yet people still say stuff like this... As for deflate-gate my money is that they filled the ball with overly hot air, which from what I gather isn't technically against the rules, even if it's clearly against the spirit of the rule.
People thinking it was just coincidence are being silly imho.
Seahawks are finally going to play offense the first quarter/half. no head starts for the Superbowl.
EPT
