Easterbrook

A quick word about Gregg Easterbrook, who in addition to his work for the venerable New Republic magazine, contributes to ESPN.com.

Easterbrook has dubbed the Patriots-Colts game this week (week nine) as a battle of good vs. evil - and it's obvious which team is playing which role.

It's easy to caricature the Patriots and Belichick as evil given the tidal wave of bad, uninformed press over the past few months. Here are a few interesting nuggets that Easterbrook fails to mention in his piece. I can't believe anyone dares to call this man a "journalist."

- During the 2005 season, Colts GM Bill Polian was in the press box at Gillette Stadium and. When Patriots' backup quarterback Doug Flutie scrambled on the last play, Polian shouted "Break his leg." Obviously, it's the Patriots who are bad sports for "running up the score" and "having no class

- This courtesy of Yahoo! Sports' Michael Silver: "According to a report on FOX's pre-game show by Jay Glazer, Polian became upset before the game that loudspeakers had been set up too close to the field and began arguing with a New York Jets operations employee. At one point, Glazer reported, Polian grabbed the employee by the lapels of his suit jacket and jacked him up against the wall of a tunnel underneath the stands."

- After the 2003 AFC title game game between the Patriots and Colts, Polian forced a rule change - known as the "Ty Law Rule" - that prohibited defensive backs from making contact after five yards. So Belichick is evil for violating the rules, but the Colts are good sports when they try to change the rules to their advantage. Of course, the Colts used the proper channel for their supposed grievance and used it to obtain an advantage, but no one seems to point out how the Colts, just as anyone, try to retain advantages.

- Finally, and this is just a rumor, but Polian is rumored to have turned up the heat in the 2006 AFC title game, causing numerous Patriots players - including starters - to cramp and miss much of the game. I find this to be what it is - a rumor - and even if it were true, the Colts played in the same conditions and it's not an excuse for losing the game. Still, though, I've heard quite a few rumors reported as facts when it comes to the Patriots and their head coach.

The bottom line is this: Gregg Easterbrook is biased. What's horrible about the situation, though, is that he presents himself as an unbiased champion of the integrity of the NFL.

He's obviously a liberal, too, and probably believes in a bunch of conspiracy theories - that would explain how he grasps at straws and stretches the truth about the Patriots. He writes in his pathetic "Good vs. Evil" piece:

"The team's star, Tom Brady, is a smirking sybarite who dates actresses and supermodels but whose public charity appearances are infrequent. That constant smirk on Brady's face reminds one of Dick Cheney; people who smirk are fairly broadcasting the message, "I'm hiding something." The Patriots seem especially creepy at this point because we still don't know whether they have told the full truth about the cheating scandal -- or even whether they really have stopped cheating. They say they have, but their word is not exactly gold at this juncture. Ladies and gentlemen, representing Evil, the New England Patriots."

So Tom Brady is a liar because Gregg Easterbrook doesn't like his smile. Also, in this loaded paragraph, Easterbrook calls Brady out for not being charitable, for being complicit in the video taping incident, and essentially for being a douche bag like Dick Cheney. Now that is quality journalism. The words about Brady are so obscenely inappropriate; it's stupider than me saying that Gregg Easterbrook has that Joseph Stalin hair-do, so he must be a communist, hate America, and take pride and joy in the death of millions. The words "non sequitur" come to mind.

And to Bill Simmons -- you're a homer and you did a pathetic job of defending the Patriots. You ought to be ashamed. I wouldn't have to write on this blog if you did your job.


More to come in defense of Bill.