I'm a die-hard Eagles fan. I still hold on to that 5% chance that they will get into the playoffs.

All they have to do is win their next five games, the Falcons lose two, and Cowboys lose one.

If they lose, well, I try not to think about that.

Am I the only one looking in this topic and wondering how we have so few people in the league?

On-topic: Any Pats loss is a good day.

Oh, does everyone else hate the Pats as much as me.

I considerably despise them, the lying cheating f**ckfaces.

Let me recap:

"Wooh! Going to the Supah Bowl! The Eagles!"

"Pats win 24-21."

A COUPLE OF YEARS LATER

"Pats are cheaters."

Maybe I hate them out of spite, maybe I-

No wait, it is spite.

^^Well in the 2000 NFC championship game the Vikings got their ass handed to them 41-0 by the Giants. The thing that always bugged me about it was that midway through the season Fassel made the famous "Playoff Promise" that the Giants would make the playoffs after they had put themselves in pretty bad position coming into week 9 or 10 iirc.

Well long story short they quickly beat a ton of teams and found their way into the playoffs as the #1 seed. But after that NFC championship game there was a lot of talk about them taping the Vikings practice and specifically their signals...this discussion went on for about two days in the sports media at a fevered pace...then it suddenly stopped and nobody mentioned it again.

The way the Pats thing was handled, and the way the NFL handles all perceived threats to its image has lead me to wonder if the Vikings weren't cheated the exact same way and the story swept under the rug (it's far from the first time it's happened in the NFL). Considering we were 2nd in yards per play and were 5th for points scored, it seemed pretty damn odd for us to magically get shut out in the biggest game we'd played all year as a strong offense like that.

The idea that they knew what plays we were calling made a lot of sense, especially given that nearly 20% of Culpepper's interceptions for the season were thrown in that one game against a slightly above average pass defense (they were ranked 9 or 10 iirc at the time)

I'm over the incident now, and I have no idea if it was true, but the patriots fiasco always reminded me of that, and very very few people remember it...but we die hard vikings Fans remember.

^^ ^^

The Vikings weren't cheated. Theu're just really good at losing in the NFC Championship game. I've seen it a few times. (Sorry. Just a Bears fan getting in a cheap shot.)

Honestly, that's the first of this possible video taping. I guess Fassell didn't tape the Ravens then. Come to think of it, you should thank the Giants for beating you ( cheating or otherwise). The Ravens would have put a hurting on the Vikings that year.

We may have been the underdogs against the Ravens, but we actually matched up well against them honestly.

In any case I'm not saying the NFL did nothing about, just that like always they protect their image by limiting the story. Smart business practice, but it still annoys the crap out of me. So in all honesty the Ravens kicking the crap out of them fits well.

There really is no way to tell at this point, it was an odd set of circumstances and it fits the MO of the league, hardly conclusive. But given some of the other stuff it makes me wonder and actually I wasn't too disturbed about it until after the the PATs fiasco came out and was promptly smoothed over quietly...or as quietly as they could.

There were a ton of former players who commentate for the league now that were pretty livid about it.  One of the great examples I'd use is Dan Marino.  I remember him being asked on the monday after it came out how big of an impact the tapes were and how much difference they made for the QB..on Monday his response was that it was massive and with that information a good QB could walk all over a defense and that this was a huge issue that was a real problem that needed to be handled.  On Thursday of that week his answer was more of "well it helps a little but the team still has to be good to make it matter" and suddenly it was something that the league should deal with off to the side and shouldn't have too much emphasis placed on it to take away from the rest of the league.

That was a big big turn around and something that always really bothered me about the PATs fiasco.  Especially when you combine it with the occasional news story like this.

Why am I not suprised in the least bit about anything in that article?