#deflategate

Case Closed -- Catlettsburg Elementary 5th-grader Jayveion Morgan of Sevierville, Tennessee won 1st place in his school's science fair for scientifically proving Tom Brady's innocence in Deflategate.

Happy Superb Owl Sunday!

What Everyone Needs to Know Q&A: This Sunday, the New England Patriots will take on the Atlanta Falcons in Super Bowl LI. As quarterback Tom Brady warms up for his seventh Super Bowl with the Patriots, we reflect on the 2015 “Deflategate” scandal and want to know:

Why should we care about sports ethics?

As scandals like “Deflategate” remind us, questions about ethical issues in sports are pervasive. This is perhaps the best reason why we ought to give sports ethics serious thought. In fact, we find ethical problems in everything from doping scandals to debates over college athletics, to arguments over whether modern competitive athletics overemphasizes win­ning, to the requirements of gender equity in sports…

We also need to pay attention to the ethics of sport due to their intellectual complexity. There is always more than one side to the story, and a surface understanding of the scandal or debate at hand is never adequate. For example, many of us have the intuition that the use of performance-enhancing drugs (PEDs) in athletics is a form of cheating. Perhaps it is if rules prohibit their use. But why shouldn’t the rules permit use of PEDs such as anabolic steroids? Are the alleged ben­efits provided by such drugs any different in principle from advantages gained by techniques that are permitted, such as specialized weight training, the use of hyperbaric chambers to raise oxygen-carrying capacity, or the use of performance-enhancing equipment, such as improved golf clubs and balls, fiberglass poles for vaulting, or specialized running shoes? If everyone had access to performance-enhancing drugs, what would be wrong with using them?

Third, sports have become a central element in our culture, for good or ill (a question we also will examine). Indeed, they captivate people worldwide, involving millions as partici­pants, spectators, or simply observers. Youth sports alone are central to the lives not only of the children who play but also the adults and parents who organize leagues and transport players from contest to contest. Then at every level beyond that, the number of lives touched builds and builds when we take into account players, employees of the teams and athletic organizations, and the countless fans.

Finally, by examining such concepts as fairness, equity, jus­tice, and virtue in the context of sports, we may generate in­sights into their nature that clarify issues in other areas such as social policy and education. Sports ethics, rather than being the mere application of very general ethical principles, may help us to formulate better principles of ethics in other contexts.

[Page xiii-xv, The Ethics of Sport: What Everyone Needs to Know by Robert L. Simon]

So, I was at a party with my cousin (not a Pats fan) tells me that recently during the half of a game, I cannot remember who he said was playing but it was up north in 20 degree weather, the refs checked the game balls. Found that they were deflated to below league standards. They call up whomever they need to call up and the response was basically, “Yeah, it’s 20 below there of course the balls are deflated. Don’t worry about it.”