Enjoy the Schadenfreude

This is for you, haters.

You’ll always have Spygate.

The memo came out in 2006 and was sent to all NFL franchises. I’m sure the League sent the memo to all 32 teams not because all teams were doing it – videotaping opponents signals – but because they didn’t want the Patriots to feel bad for being singled out. It’s like when the kindergarten teacher scolds the whole class when it’s really just that hyperactive jerk Carson. Wait-What? 2006. That was after New England had already won three Super Bowls, wasn’t it? It was. Oh, but the Patriots taped the Rams walkthrough before Super Bowl XXXVI!

Um, yeah, it turned out that story was a total fabrication.

I’m not saying Spygate itself didn’t happen. Nobody – including Bill Belichick – denies what happened. Bill simply didn’t think he was doing anything wrong. As he recently noted, he was doing it out in the open, in front of 80,000 people.

And I get it that you’re peeved the NFL destroyed the tapes and said, “Move along, nothing to see here.” Yeah. The one thing we know is that when somebody says there’s nothing to see here, well, there’s definitely something to see here. There’s that pesky matter of proof of course. But we know what we know. The brain was built to identify anomalies as threats. The Patriots have been too good for too long for there not to be something fishy going on, something that threatens our very existence on this planet (and the space ark is way behind schedule). I mean, actually accomplishing what the Patriots with Bill Belichick and Tom Brady have been able to accomplish is incomprehensible, isn’t it? 

Six Super Bowls in fourteen years. 

It’s unprecedented at the very least.

So, it’s okay Raiders, Colts, Steelers, Ravens, Rams, Panthers and Eagles fans. Keep telling yourselves that you and your teams were cheated out of a Lombardi Trophy. We all need some rationalization for the cruel and arbitrary events of this unsympathetic and godless universe we live in. Your team wasn’t beaten fair and square. You don’t need to act like good sports. The Patriots cheated! You are totally entitled to your boorish dickishness. Everyone’s totally cool with it.

No, really.

Totally. Cool.

And I can see why you think those four offensive linemen/eligible ineligibles formation is cheating. Smart people are asshats, am I right? Like knowing all the rules is so important. If you’re so smart why don’t you go on “Jeopardy!” and qualify for their tournament of champions and leave football to real men? Football is about large, fast, barely literate men colliding with each other at high speed within a fairly loose moral/social construct. Some brain injuries may be involved. Should we really be asking these guys to be able to recognize a perfectly legal offensive formation in 7 to 10 seconds while the referee is yelling “Don’t cover #34?” That’s not why we watch football!

Yeah, I know it’s been seven years between Spygate and Deception-Gate/Deflate-Gate/Blount-Gate but it’s still okay to refer to a culture of cheating when talking about the Patriots. There’s a pattern of behavior here, people! Can’t you see it? Well then maybe you’re in Robert Kraft’s hip pocket just like the Commissioner!

I feel badly for you because we can already see where the whole Deflate-Gate thing is going, with The Commish noting in his presser in the desert that the League isn’t even sure the Patriots did anything wrong. And his spirited defense of the integrity of the game was great if a little confusing. I’m really not sure what he meant we he said it didn’t matter if an advantage was gained. (I thought neither team having an unfair advantage was key to the integrity of the game but I guess I was wrong.) Then lead zebra Dean Blandino lets it drop the league has no record of the PSI  of the Patriots game balls. Kind of hard to prove Tom Brady ordered an equipment manager to deflate 11 of 12 footballs by 2.0 PSI when you don’t have any record those footballs were 12.5 PSI to begin with. Not that the equipment manager didn’t have plenty of time to deflate those footballs. He could’ve deflated 11 footballs and still have had plenty of time to take a leak. Still, you know what’s going to happen a couple of weeks from now.

No evidence of wrongdoing on the part of the Patriots.

You’ll know the truth, though.

I wouldn’t worry about Roger Goodell apologizing to Robert Kraft, though, so at the very least you won’t have to suffer that indignity.

Look, we all need someone to hate. Maybe you hate black people. Or Muslims. Or Koreans. Or hipsters (that would be me). Or maybe you hate women. Or gays. Or the Jews. I could go on but just in terms of the relative corrosive impact on society, I’d much rather you hated the Patriots. If you wish to personify that hatred in the person of Bill Belichick, well, I just think you’d better hope your fantasy of cornering Belichick in a dark alley never comes true.

There’s no way you’re leaving that alley alive.

It’s not like he’s going to fight fair because, you know, cheater.

In your heart you know I’m right about that.

If the Patriots do lose this Sunday you can wipe the guacamole off your chin, grab a pillow off the couch and pretend you’re Russell Wilson. In between hip-shimmying runs around the couch you can stop and think back to all the sex you had in college. Or you can pretend the Colts or Ravens would’ve beaten the Seahawks if only they hadn’t been swindled out of their chance by those cheating cheaters from Cheaterton, the New England Patriots. A Patriots’ loss does call into question just how good they are at cheating, of course, but you know it would be worth it. I mean, Russell Wilson looks like a guy who had a shit ton of sex in college.

And if the Patriots win you’ll have one more reason to hate the Patriots. I can easily imagine the post-game trophy ceremony awash in boos; the crowd booing Roger Goodell, booing Robert Kraft, booing Bill Belichick and booing Tom Brady.

I’m sure you’ll enjoy that.

I know I will.