We're just one game into the NFL season, and there are already new cheating allegations mounted against the Patriots. Football is back, ladies and gentlemen!
In the first quarter of Thursday night's Patriots-Steelers game, which the Pats won 28-21, NBC sideline reporter Michele Tafoya reported that the Steelers coaches' headsets weren't working because the Patriots' local radio broadcast was loudly bleeding into their radio signal.
According to the Equity Rule in the NFL rule book, when one team's headsets aren't working, the other team must stop using theirs until the problem is fixed. The Steelers, however, said that as soon as NFL officials went over to tell the Patriots' sideline that this rule was going into effect, the Steelers' headsets began working again.
The NFL quickly took the blame for the incident, citing the inclement weather in Foxborough and the league's headset technology, which is provided to both teams:
In the first quarter of tonight's game, the Pittsburgh coaches experienced interference in their headsets caused by a stadium power infrastructure issue, which was exacerbated by the inclement weather. The coaches' communications equipment, including the headsets, is provided by the NFL for both clubs use on game day. Once the power issue was addressed, the equipment functioned properly with no additional issues.
After the game, however, a fuming Steelers head coach Mike Tomlin suggested outright that this sort of thing seemed to always happen in New England. This is all especially notable because ESPN on Tuesday published a mammoth investigative report suggesting that the cheating conducted by the Patriots during Spygate was far worse than previously understood and that visiting teams all had stories of foul play in Foxborough.
Tomlin is steamed: “We were listening to the Patriots radio broadcast for the majority of the first half.”
— Andrew Siciliano (@AndrewSiciliano) September 11, 2015 Tomlin, asked about the headsets going out: “That’s always the case.” “Here?” “Yes. I said what I said."
— Andrew Siciliano (@AndrewSiciliano) September 11, 2015 Whoa. From the Steelers website - they claim the headset issue was pretty intentional pic.twitter.com/sCvvZqY4Sq
— Kenny Ducey (@KennyDucey) September 11, 2015Join the conversation about this story »
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