A day after NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell met with former Patriots video employee Matt Walsh and said he did not expect any further sanctions against the team or coach Bill Belichick over Spygate, Sen. Arlen Specter (R-Penn.) on Wednesday called for an independent investigation into the Patriots’ taping of opposing coaches’ signals which violated league rules.
Specter said at a news conference in Washington that he felt the league’s handling of the matter was inadequate and suggested that an investigation similar to the Mitchell Report on performance enhancing drugs in baseball should be undertaken.
“Everybody pooh-poohs it,” Specter said. “It’s ridiculous to make that kind of contention.”
Specter, the senior Republican on the Senate Judiciary Committee, suggested the NFL might lose its antitrust exemption over the matter.
The NFL issued the following statement: “We respectfully disagree with Senator Specter’s characterization of the investigation conducted by our office. We are following up after yesterday’s meeting with Matt Walsh.”
Specter cited the fact a Patriots attorney sat in on Walsh’s meeting with Goodell as proof the league’s investigation has not been impartial. The NFL has spoken to more than 50 people over the last eight months since the Spygate controversy began in Week 1, when a Pats employee was caught videotaping the Jets’ defensive signals.
Specter said Goodell’s decision to destroy notes and tapes confiscated during the initial investigation last fall was wrong.
“That sequence is incomprehensible,” Specter said. “It’s an insult to the intelligence of the people who follow it.”
Meanwhile, the Boston Herald issued a retraction and an apology Wednesday over a Feb. 2 story that said the Patriots had taped the Rams’ walkthrough a day before playing the Patriots in the 2002 Super Bowl. Patriots Owner Robert Kraft, who had considered suing the paper over the story, seemed satisfied with the retraction and apology.
“I must compliment the Boston Herald for doing what is unprecedented in terms of recognizing their error in a major way,” Kraft told The Associated Press. “I’m delighted with that, but I wish it never happened.”
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