Report: N.E. taped Rams before XXXVI

[cboy4]

ESPN.com news services

Updated: February 2, 2008, 3:20 PM ET

An unnamed source has claimed a New England Patriots employee secretly videotaped the St. Louis Rams' pregame walk-through the day before Super Bowl XXXVI, the Boston Herald reported Saturday.

According to the report, an unnamed source close to the team during the 2001 season said that following the Patriots' walk-through at the Louisiana Superdome, a member of the team's video staff stayed behind and taped the Rams' walk-through -- a non-contact, no-pads practice at reduced speed in which a team goes through its plays.

http://www.bostonherald.com/sports/football/patriots/view.bg?articleid=1070762&srvc=home&position=0

Former Patriots video assistant hints at team's spying history

By Mike Fish
ESPN.com

LAHAINA, Hawaii -- Matt Walsh worked seven years with the New England Patriots before being let go on Martin Luther King Day in 2003. He was on the New Orleans Superdome sidelines when the Pats kicked off their dominant run, upsetting the St. Louis Rams in the 2002 Super Bowl. He wasn't a chiseled athlete, but a go-getter who climbed his way up the team's support staff ladder -- first as a public relations intern, then as a video assistant and later, in his last year, a college scout.

Mostly, though, his years with New England were spent shooting football video.

He was the third, and last, employee on the video staff. In his words, he was Matt Estrella before Matt Estrella, a reference to the Patriots video assistant caught filming the Jets' defensive signals by league officials last September at halftime of a game against New York -- the violation that birthed "Spygate" and led, in part, to some of the heftiest penalties in league history. New England coach Bill Belichick was fined $500,000 -- the biggest fine ever for a coach -- and the team was docked its first-round draft choice this year.

And now, Walsh, 31, an assistant golf pro on Maui, might be positioned to further pull back the curtain on the Patriots' taping history, expose where and how they gained advantages and, perhaps even, turn over video proof.

If Sen. Arlen Specter, R-Pa., the top Republican on the Senate Judiciary Committee, is serious about calling a hearing to delve into the issue -- particularly the questions of why the NFL hastily destroyed all evidence, including tapes handed over by the Patriots, and what other as-yet-undisclosed material might be out there -- perhaps one of his first calls should be to Walsh, who in conversations with ESPN.com suggested he has information that could be damaging to both the league and the Patriots.

http://sports.espn.go.com/nfl/news/story?id=3226465

[RL3AO]

1. He "hints at it"

Gotta have more than that before jumping to conclusions.

[ticapnews]

2. *yawn*

[cboy4]

3. Oh you mean like Barry Bonds?

I agree.