National Football League

Why are some Deflategate text messages being ignored?

Published May. 13, 2015 11:33 a.m. ET

foxsports

By Steve DelVecchio

The text messages that were exchanged between two New England Patriots employees are the closest thing to a smoking gun that Ted Wells discovered in his lengthy Deflategate investigation. If those conversations are so important, why are some of the details in the messages being ignored?

A lot of the text messages that officials locker room attendant Jim McNally and equipment assistant John Jastremski sent back and forth are open to interpretation. After extensive research and numerous interviews, Wells felt confident that McNally and Jastremski were discussing the act of illegally letting air out of game balls.

But why has no one mentioned the text messages that reference game balls being inflated to 16 PSI?

On Oct. 17, the morning after the Patriots defeated the New York Jets, McNally and Jastremski exchanged several text messages that seemed to indicate Tom Brady was upset over footballs being over-inflated.

“I checked some of the balls this morn…” Jastremski wrote to McNally. “The refs f—ed us…a few of them were almost at 16. They didn’t recheck (them) after they put air in them.”

McNally then responded by saying “F– Tom…16 is nothing…wait till next Sunday,” which was obviously sarcasm and McNally’s way of joking that he’s going to screw Brady, who has openly admitted he likes a softer ball.

Before he mentioned the 16 PSI issue to McNally, Jastremski also texted his fiancee about it.

“Ugh…Tom was right,” he wrote. “I just measured some of the balls. They supposed to be 13 lbs… They were like 16. Felt like bricks.”

It’s certainly possible that McNally or Jastremski or someone else has let air out of game balls after they were inspected by officials at some point, but it seems fairly obvious what happened the night the Patriots played the Jets.

Remember how Aaron Rodgers admitted that he likes to turn in footballs that are over-inflated to see if the officials will let air out of them? In all likelihood, the Patriots turned in balls that were under-inflated before their game against the Jets, and the officials put more air in them after measuring the PSI. Since Jastremski was discussing the balls being severely over-inflated the next morning, that means McNally — aka the “Deflator” — obviously was unable to let air out of them after the officials inspected them.

Of course, you could argue that the portion of the conversation where Yastremski mentioned balls being over-inflated by officials was all a lie. That would be convenient.

What’s the point? The NFL rules clearly state that game balls are supposed to be inflated to within 12.5-13.5 PSI. If that’s the case, should officials — like the one who thought he remembered which gauge he used but Wells told him he was wrong — be over-inflating them by 2.5 pounds? If gripping a ball that is roughly 1-1.5 PSI underinflated (here are the numbers) is an advantage, wouldn’t gripping one that is 2.5 PSI overinflated be a serious disadvantage?

Let me guess, Jastremski’s mention of balls that were at 16 PSI is all part of his master plan to cover up the crime, right?

Am I saying the Patriots didn’t deflate game balls before the AFC Championship Game? No. Am I saying someone needs to address why an official allegedly over-inflated a team’s game balls by 2.5 pounds? Yes. For whatever reason, Wells chose not to look into that.

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