Commentary: Airing out grievances with Patriots

Tom Brady is right; this week’s report asserting that he “was at least generally aware” of a plot to deflate footballs for the AFC championship did nothing to tarnish January’s Super Bowl victory.

Not at all.

That shining moment in sports history stands today as it will forever: Ball Shrinkers 28, Crotch Grabbers 24.

That’s not tarnished; it’s everything else that Brady has ever done that has been cast adrift on a sea of suspicion. By the time Brady’s New England Patriots survived the brain-cramping Seahawks in Super Bowl 49, the NFL had gotten its act together on a certain protocol, which I cannot quote directly but I think now goes something like this:

Hey, once we officially measure the air pressure in the game balls, pregame, how about we DON’T LET ANYONE TAKE THEM TO THE BATHROOM!

In the 243 pages of the much-anticipated Deflategate report commissioned by the league and prepared by the law firm of Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison, somehow not included are the words: Tom Brady is a cheating, conniving liar.

But there’s this:

“Tom (stinks). I’m going to make the next ball a (expletive) balloon.”

That’s one of the texts sent between officials locker room attendant Jim “The Deflator” McNally and Patriots assistant equipment man John Jastremski, discussing the quarterback’s preference for footballs of minimal inflation.

It’s a toss-up at this point as to which is stupider, texting this kind of nefarious information, or calling oneself “The Deflator.” C’mon, even “The Fixer” is better than that. How about “The Guy You’re Probably Looking For Because He Was Up To No Good?”

Apparently genius isn’t confined to the coaching offices in Foxborough.

Anyway, when the Indianapolis Colts intercepted a Brady pass in the first half of the AFC title game Jan. 18, they noticed the ball seemed under-inflated. At halftime, the officials measured 11 balls the Patriots were using and all were below the minimum 12.5 PSI while the four Colts balls they measured before running out of time (there was a second half to play) were all within the permitted range (12.5 to 13.5).

To conclude that no atmospheric factors or other potential causational forces were in play (other than McNally taking them to a bathroom on the way to the field and letting the air out of them), the law firm consulted a Princeton physicist and an engineering firm named Exponent.

Having found no other plausible explanation, and here I’ll quote from the Wells report, “Exponent was asked to investigate how quickly an individual can partially deflate 13 footballs in a ball bag using a sports ball inflation needle, if that individual is reasonably experienced in performing that task. Based on a series of simulations, Exponent determined that the air pressure in 13 footballs could be readily released using a needle in well under one minute and 40 seconds (the time McNally spent in the bathroom).

“With minimal training (a single practice run), it is possible for an individual using a standard sports ball inflation needle to perform the following in approximately 60-70 seconds: open a door and enter a room, close the door, open a zippered bag containing 13 footballs, insert the needle into all footballs releasing a small amount of air from each, close and zipper the bag containing the footballs, and leave the room through the door, closing the door behind him.”

You could reasonably conclude, it says here, that McNally made many a convenient bathroom stop over the years in New England, and the edge the Patriots got with footballs that were just a little easier to throw and catch might have decided a lot of football games that ended up a lot closer than the AFC title game in question, which they won 45-3.

You could further reasonably resolve to take a closer look at the research of one Warren Sharp, whose report showing that the Patriots fumble with amazing infrequency has been trashed by statistical analysts on a variety of levels. It is a fact, however, that in the past 10 seasons, the Patriots have been among the league’s best at not fumbling (tied for fifth or better), but I guess you shouldn’t necessarily conclude that’s because they’re taking air out of the ball.

I guess.

Though Brady said at the Super Bowl that he was “very comfortable” that nobody in the organization did anything illegal with the footballs for the title game, the authors of the Wells report sound very comfortable with the notion that at least two people did, and that Brady not only knew about it, but demanded it and paid for it in cash and merchandise to The Deflator.

The report further concluded that while coach Bill Belichick and owner Robert Kraft bore no culpability, the organization’s level of cooperation with the investigators was sketchy at best.

Maybe you’ve heard this isn’t New England’s first appearance on Scandal.

Brady should get a four-game suspension, and the franchise should lose its No. 1 pick in the 2016 draft.

Before the coin toss, the referee should say, “Gentlemen, this is the football. It’s the only one. Don’t lose it.”