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Sean Salisbury was rolling around on his back sucking Giants hind-tit like a good jellyfish on Sunday night. I was almost embarrassed for him. But not quite.

 

Usually I can deflect my annoyance with Salisbury, but Sunday night he was Theismann-esque.

 

http://sports.yahoo.com/nfl/news?slug=spygatecouldsparkespiona&prov=tsn&type=lgns

Spygate could spark espionage investigation

By Mike Florio - SportingNews


In football, success often arises from the ability to deceive the opponent. The zone blitz, the play-action pass, the draw play and the flea flicker, for example, are premised on tricking the other team.

Technically, it's lying. And although there is nothing wrong with lying in that specific context, coaches sometimes don't recognize or respect the line between permissible prevarication (thanks, Tiki) and moral misbehavior.

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So one of the overriding goals of football is to fool the opponent. And, in turn, to not be fooled.

This desire to know what the other team is doing can become an obsession for some coaches. As it relates to videotaping defensive coaching signals, New England Patriots coach Bill Belichick fell victim to the temptation of "all's fair in love and war," launching a high-tech effort to crack the other team's code.

Based on a Boston Herald report that Belichick's team secretly videotaped the St. Louis Rams' final walkthrough practice before Super Bowl 36, it could be that Belichick's obsession was far more intricate -- and nefarious.

As the media, the NFL and Congress commence the process of determining whether a video employee fired five years ago can prove the Patriots' video operation went far enough to potentially compromise the outcome of an NFL championship, a possibility exists that the federal government will launch an investigation into whether the Patriots took any action that violated the Economic Espionage Act.

Signed into law by President Bill Clinton in 1996, the Economic Espionage Act makes the theft of trade secrets a federal offense. Without getting into the nuts and bolts of the applicable legal mumbo-jumbo, 18 U.S.C. ? 1832 makes it a criminal act to steal, take, carry away or obtain by fraud or deception what 18 U.S.C ? 1839 defines as a "trade secret."

It's a broad definition, and, as a practical matter, the question of whether a pro football team's game plan constitutes a "trade secret" under this law is something that would be sorted out after a grand jury hands up indictments.

Belichick, ex-Patriots videographer Matt Walsh and employees throughout the Patriots' organization could be required to testify under oath. And like the investigation into the Valerie Plame situation, there could be prosecutions for perjury even if there ultimately is no actual prosecution for the theft of trade secrets.

And that's the most potentially damaging aspect of any investigation that might be launched by United States Attorneys in Louisiana (site of Super Bowl 36), Texas (Super Bowl 38) and/or Florida (Super Bowl 39).

It's not that Belichick or others might face up to 10 years in prison or that the organization might have to pay up to $5 million in fines. It's that such an investigation would provide an unwelcome vehicle for the truth to come out.

An internal NFL investigation with evidence that self-destructs or a dog-and-senator show for ESPN and/or C-SPAN won't necessarily result in the general public knowing the truth, whatever that truth might be. A criminal investigation commandeered by a federal investigator very well could do just that -- and anyone who tries to obstruct that effort might want to talk to Martha Stewart or Scooter Libby before doing so.

Let's be clear. I'm not saying that such an investigation should occur. But it certainly could.

If the NFL office does a thorough and transparent investigation that is forthcoming and complete, it could satisfy the congressmen and general public. NFL commissioner Roger Goodell's tactic in the first round of Spygate -- "everything is fine, and by the way we've destroyed the evidence" -- won't suffice anymore.

In the Michael Vick case, for example, the federal government got involved only after it became apparent that the local prosecutor either wasn't inclined to pursue a football icon or wasn't capable of conducting a proper investigation.

It is rumored that NFL officials worked behind the scenes to get the feds on the Vick case, and, if true, that makes the league's present predicament all the more ironic. Less than a year after Vick's dog-fighting case sullied the reputation of the league's highest-profile player, the NFL's image could be filleted by a federal case.

Goodell must do more to persuade the general public -- and perhaps more important, the feds -- that a sufficient investigation has occurred and appropriate action has been taken.

 

Maybe they'll use it as bulletin board material when they go up against Congress.