Colts' General Manager Ryan Grigson is now public enemy no.1
Colts General Manager Ryan Grigson has declined to comment on Deflategate, but it’s now been confirmed that it was Grigson who asked the NFL to check the footballs that the Patriots’ offense was using during the AFC Championship Game.
NFL Executive V.P. of Football Operations Troy Vincent confirmed in an interview that will air on Showtime tonight that Grigson told the NFL in the second quarter of the AFC Championship Game that the Patriots might be tampering with the footballs.
On January 18, 2015, the Indianapolis Colts visited the New England Patriots in the AFC title game. With a first and 10 at the Colts 26, Patriots' QB Tom Brady threw a pass that was picked off by LB D'Qwell Jackson. The football was brought to the Colts' bench by Jackson for keepsake. Instead, it was confiscated by the NFL "Deflategate" sting operation team.
NFL PLAYER ARRESTS
DATE 2015-02-03
TEAM Colts
NAME D'Qwell Jackson
POS LB
CASE Arrested
CATEGORY Assault
DESCRIPTION Accused of hitting a pizza delivery driver over the head in a dispute over a parking space in Washington, D.C.
OUTCOME Resolution undetermined.
According to Chris Mortensen of ESPN, NFL teams can submit a list to the officials for things to look for prior to games. Most of these are formations that the teams like to line up in, unbalanced lines, trick plays, etc. The Indianapolis Colts list included under inflated footballs to look for. This was due to their November 16, 2014 home game with the New England Patriots where the Colts felt some footballs were "low on air."
The New England-Indianapolis rivalry from 2000-2010 between Tom Brady and Peyton Manning had the Patriots holding a 12-7 advantage. Both teams had won post season games against their arch rival. These were "must see" games that normally determined the AFC representative for the Super Bowl. Since Peyton Manning has moved to the Denver Broncos, the games have not been competitive. Scores like: 59-24, 43-22 and 42-20 don't look as bad as they really were. There must be a reason for such a disparity.
For Ryan Grigson, past history has shown us that the "squeaky wheel" does get the grease as evidenced by New York Jets' head coach, Eric Mangini's assertion concerning SPYGATE. This penalty resulted in heavy fines, lost draft picks, and the complete elimination of the Patriots ever being "America's team."
The 1973 movie, The Sting featured a famous card game between Henry Gondorff(Paul Newman)and Doyle Lonnegan(Robert Shaw). The winner take all match had each side trying to gain a competitive advantage.
Floyd(Lonnegan's handler): I KNOW I gave him four THREES. He had to make a SWITCH. We can't let him get away with that.
Doyle Lonnegan: What was I supposed to do - call him for cheating better than me, in front of the others?
The winning hand was worth 15 grand. Lonnegan kept quiet and took his losses. Ryan Grigson's team lost 45-7. He sang like a "canary."
There is no place to go but up for the NFL in 2015. The NFL can only hope the Deflategate investigation concludes with some semblance of closure. The Ray Rice, Adrian Peterson, Greg Hardy and Ray McDonald arrests are only a few of the scandals that dominated the 2014 conversation in the NFL. Roger Goodell - " I got it wrong and I'm sorry." Greg Jarrett, FoxNews:
The NFL has at its disposal the wealth, celebrity and power to change the way Americans treat women and children. Does it have the will?
114.4 million people watched one of the most exciting games in NFL history on Sunday. That's a good start.
Paul Murphy is a freelance writer from New Hampshire.
Follow me on Twitter at @_prmurphy
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