In the 2007 season, a scandal had occurred with the NFL mostly centered around the New England Patriots. When the Patriots played the New York Jets, several Jet's coaches were suspicious of the Patriots videotaping the defensive signals. This of course was against the rules and later the New York Jets had reported a complaint to the NFL about the Patriots. The NFL started doing research into the matter and found out that there is a large amount of evidence that the New England Patriots had indeed videotaped New York's defensive signals. Also other accusations were made against the Patriots.
Also a old coach who was in charge of film for the Patriots in 2001 and 2002 accused the Patriots of videotaping the St. Louis Ram's practice before the Super Bowl. Although later he withdrew his accusations, the Patriots still had to face the consequences. Bill Belicheck was fined for 250,000 dollars and the Patriots were fined 500,000 dollars. Although the claims against the Patriots were partially controversial the scandal still remains to stain the organization's reputation. Roger Goodell, the NFL manager said," that even though this scandal took place; it doesn't show any reflection of how good the players, coaches, and trainers worked to make the New England Patriots a top contender."
This scandal hurt the Patriots majorly. They lost a first-round pick, and they lost the respect of many fans and many organizations around the league. This really tainted some previous seasons which included Super Bowl runs. In recent years, they have started to regain the respect that they lost. Hopefully this will not ever happen again.
ReplyDeleteThe scandal hurt the patriots but they were able to recover. The patriots had such a solid program at the time it did not have as big of an affect as it would on a less good team for example the redskins. Also can it be called a scandal still he was seen taking footage of there practice be several witnesses.
ReplyDeleteThis sounds like a major problem. The Patriots defensive coach should have never done that. Even though this upset lost many fans most of them have regained their confidence in the Patriots. In future cases the team should be penalized, but the Patriots got lucky this time and I think they learned their lesson.
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