Throughout Thursday’s 90-minute edition of Pro Football Talk on NBCSN, we’ve been playing and reacting to clips from the Wednesday press conferences conducted by Patriots coach Bill Belichick and Patriots quarterback Tom Brady. And it’s given me a chance to better collect my random, scattered, and/or inarticulate thoughts regarding the situation.
Here’s something that occurred to me out of the blue while hearing Belichick repeatedly say that he doesn’t “have an explanation” for what happened.
Um, he’s the head coach of the team. It’s three days after learning that 16 percent of the air in 11 of 12 footballs used by his team had somehow disappeared within 90 minutes, and Belichick doesn’t have an explanation? He’s the head coach of team. If he doesn’t have an explanation, he needs to get one.
In hindsight, it was arguably the most bizarre moment of the day -- although Brady mentioning ISIS in any context and for any reason may still trump that. Something caused a significant change to Belichick’s team’s footballs, and Belichick didn’t immediately demand answers?
If whatever happened to the balls was creating a disadvantage for the Patriots, you can bet the ant farm that Belichick already would know exactly what occurred. But with a dynamic that made the balls easier for Brady to grip and to throw, Belichick is content to shrug and to say, essentially, “Sh-t happens.”
It’s not good enough. Not only is ignorance no excuse for violations committed by the people he has hired, ignorance three days after the issue was flagged is unacceptable.