Some Empire

Today William C. Rhoden published in the New York Times one of those incredibly asinine sports columns that makes a big splashy claim in the headline that the facts it presents in the body of the article cannot even begin to support because reality is not of the writer's creation. Under the title "The Day the Patriots Empire Began to Crumble" Rhoden uses the "spy gate" incident from a few years ago when the Patriot's head coach Bill Belichick was caught in a long-term pattern of cheating by taping other teams' practices to foretell the demise of the three time Super Bowl Champion Patriots.

Normally unrestrained in heaping praise on his team, Ryan was careful with his remarks about Belichick and the Patriots. It was as if he wanted to play down the perception that a shift in power was taking place.

Too late. The shift has occurred: the Jets are in ascendancy and New England is in retrograde

One might think that the link under the highlighted phrase "a shift in power was taking place" would provide some evidence of this supposed "shift in power," but it doesn't. It just links to an article about "spy gate." And of course what is this "shift in power anyways?" Going into the game the Jets and Patriots had identical 9-2 records, so it certainly isn't a power shift that was yet evident on the field, the teams appeared equal going into the game. And of course Rhoden admits as much, arguing that the power shift "was set in motion...by a moral misstep" and "has nothing to do with one game, one season, injuries, or upheaval," which is another way of saying that Rhoden made it up, but let's let him try and make his argument.

The scandal, which came to be called Spygate, put New England and Belichick under a cloud, although by 2007, several teams had begun to suspect the Patriots were taping opposing coaches.

The Green Bay Packers caught New England in the act in 2006 but never took the complaint further. Belichick was thought to be taping opponents when Mangini was a member of the Patriots’ defensive staff under Belichick from 2000 to 2005.

The N.F.L. fined Belichick $500,000 and the team $250,000 and took away a first-round pick in the 2008 draft.

But the Patriots and Belichick lost more than money. New England lost some of its luster as a first-class organization. No one doubts Belichick’s coaching genius, but he lost a measure of respect for violating the sanctity of sportsmanship and the integrity of competition.

Is losing people's respect the same thing as losing a sports empire especially since that supposed sporting empire hasn't stopped winning and shows no signs of stopping now? It's an asinine argument. If you wanted to make the argument that people's perception of Bill Belichick has been forever diminished (I've never particularly liked him), that would be supported by the evidence, but sports empires are build on winning. In fact, that's Rhoden's ultimate conclusion

New England will not be defined by the spying fiasco. The Patriots don’t need to win another championship to validate themselves, nor does Belichick. He has three Super Bowl rings as validation.

But Spygate left a stain that will not be washed away by victories and even championships.

So instead of what Rhoden promised, the decline of a entire sporting empire, we only have the sullied reputation of the coach of that empire. And so as if to prove the idiocy of Rhoden's claimed power shift from the Patriots to the Jets, the Patriots in the words of Mike Tirico, the man who called the game and who grew up a Jets fan, "demolished and embarrassed the Jets" 45 - 3 tonight. The "same old Jets" lamented Tirico "got to the big game and didn't convert." One might also call these the same old Patriots. They are right where they've been every year since 2001, right in the thick of the playoff race. Some empire.