Former Patriots offensive coordinator Josh McDaniels has managed to maintain a good relationship with his former boss, Patriots coach Bill Belichick.
Until now.
Jay Glazer of FOX reports that McDaniels met with his staff on Friday to explain the circumstances surrounding Spygate II, which supposedly arose from the one-time-only videotaping of a 49ers’ walk-through practice by a rogue video operator, Steve Scarnecchia. And McDaniels distinguished the situation from the original Spygate, which arose apparently from years of videotaping of in-game defensive coaching signals.
“That was practiced, that was coached, that was worked on,” McDaniels said in reference to the Patriots’ past practices, per Glazer.
McDaniels also warned his staff to keep their mouths shut. “If this gets out, there are jobs on the line,” McDaniels told the staff, per Glazer.
So why did it get out? It possibly had something to do with the fact that, after the 59-14 loss to the Raiders, McDaniels took the staff to owner Pat Bowlen and lambasted them, according to Glazer.
Glazer also reports that there are “raised eyebrows” in the facility, based on the perception that McDaniels threw Scarnecchia under the bus. Which implies that there’s a belief within the organization that, while McDaniels and Scarnecchia didn’t get their stories together after the fact, they possibly got their stories together before the fact.
Indeed, the sense remains that, even though McDaniels claims he didn’t watch the tape and that Scarnecchia acted alone, Scarnecchia was the Dawson and/or Downey in this situation, and McDaniels ordered the Code Red. (Hat tip to FNIA producer Joe Gesue for that one.)