The NFL’s investigation of DeflateGate still is underway, but that hasn’t stopped the entire country from weighing in with its two cents.
Most of these hot takes haven’t been too kind to the New England Patriots, and the opinion of a man with not-so-great memories of the team certainly was no exception.
Former Carolina Panthers general manager Marty Hurney — who now hosts a radio show on Charlotte’s ESPN affiliate — had some harsh words for the team that handed his organization a 32-29 loss in Super Bowl XXXVIII.
“There isn’t a day that goes by since (that game) that I haven’t questioned … that there were some things done that might have been beyond the rules that may have given them a three-point advantage,” Hurney said on his show Thursday.
Hurney went on to insinuate that the Patriots — who would be implicated in Spygate years later — might have videotaped Carolina’s practices.
“There are people who swear to me that the Patriots taped our practice down in Houston during Super Bowl week,” Hurney said. “I can’t prove it. I don’t know. And I hate talking like this because I feel like a bad loser, but it just gnaws at you and this latest incident brings it back up.”
Hurney’s Panthers weren’t exactly a moral beacon during the 2003 season, as a report surfaced after the Super Bowl that several Panthers players bought steroids from a South Carolina physician. The former GM admitted fault in his players’ actions but insisted the Patriots’ problems run deeper than their latest alleged infraction.
“To me, this isn’t about deflating balls; it’s about a continuing culture of alleged cheating, and to me, everybody’s talking about Bill Belichick and Tom Brady,” Hurney said. “When is Robert Kraft going to come up and explain why, if they are found guilty of this, why do these things keep happening in this organization?”
Thumbnail photo via Twitter/@NBCSports
