The Patriots raised the bar on the normal Friday afternoon news dump, calling a 2:30 p.m. ET press conference on the Saturday before the Super Bowl.
And after making reporters wait 35 minutes, it was coach Bill Belichick taking the podium, to tell reporters, “I believe 100 percent we have followed every rule to the letter.”
Belichick detailed their process for preparing balls for game day, and he said their process of getting balls ready raised the air pressure by one pound per square inch. He then talked about putting his quarterbacks through a series of tests to see if they could tell the difference in balls at different air pressure.
He insisted the balls weren’t prepared in a heated room, or treated in any unique way.
There was a lot of scientific bluster from Belichick, none of which explained why 11 of his 12 balls weren’t in compliance but all 12 of the Colts’ were.
He even quoted the movie My Cousin Vinny, saying he was “no Mona Lisa Vito,” in terms of ball knowledge compared to Marisa Tomei’s character’s mechanical knowledge.
“I’m embarrassed to talk about the amount of time I’ve put into this, relative to the challenge in front of us,” Belichick said.
In many ways, we all are.
But it’s hard to tell after this press conference that we’re any closer to knowing what happened.