Alan Greenwood
Published: Monday, February 18, 2008

NFL never-was joins wannabes in lawsuit against Patriots

A clown named Willie Gary is achieving the 15-minutes of fame he couldn't achieve in his truncated National Football League career by suing the Patriots for allegedly "cheating" to win Super Bowl XXXVI, in which he slipped onto and off of the field long enough to be spotted by the stats crew, if no one else.

He also is seeking the sort of fortune that he could not possibly be earning in his robust Arena Football League career. That's right; Gary has been an AFL lifer since rising from the St. Louis Rams practice squad in Week 10 of the 2001 season, appearing in six games, recording one tackle.

Presumably, NFL Films sent Gary a copy of his lone NFL tackle to warm him on those cold nights when he wistfully dreams of what might have been.

Gary joined a gaggle of fools, some holding law degrees, in a $100 million lawsuit, naming Patriots owner Robert Kraft and coach Bill Belichick, claiming that is what they owe the Rams players and all the fans who attended the game which, the suit says, the Pats stole through video taping the Rams' pre-game walkthrough.

Gary wants he and his former Rams teammates each to receive another $25,000, bringing them all to a winner's share of $150,000. He also wants them all to receive $125,000 which, he says, is what a Super Bowl championship ring could haul in on eBay.

Seriously. There's a courthouse in New Orleans, site of the game, where this lawsuit rests. Presumably a real, honest-to-goodness judge will have to consider it.

If they were suing Belchick for being a neurotic fool whose obsessive-compulsive behavior has permanently sullied his reputation they might have something. As it stands, Gary and his fellow litigants should hope the judge who draws their case has a robust sense of humor.

So, we have something else for which to thank Sen. Arlen Specter (Gasbag-Pennsylvania). His silliness on Capitol Hill has inspired a group of greedy nitwits to come together as one and waste a federal court's time.

Actually, we must stop referring to Specter as the Gasbag from Pennsylvania; that business card should read, "A. Specter (Gasbag-Comcast)."

As a Philadelphia Daily News scribe named Will Bunch pointed out last week, the real motivation for Specter's haunting the NFL over Spygate may well have lots more to do with rubbing his benefactors' shoulders than crusading for truth, justice and honest football. Bunch says that Specter, since 1989, has received $153,000 in contributions from Comcast employees and family members.

That is topped only by contributions from a Philadelphia law firm named Blank Rome, whose employees and family members have contributed $358,000 to Specter.

The fact that Blank Rome also does some heavy Washington lobbying for Comcast is, of course, mere coincidence.

Ditto for the fact that Comcast and the NFL have been in a battle over rights fees for the NFL Network, for which Comcast charges its costumers a premium that satellite customers do not pay.

Surely a United States Senator of Specter's standing wouldn't be harassing someone with whom his major contributors are engaged in a financial war.

Right. And Willie Gary is just a humble little AFL safety who wants to set the record straight on the Super Bowl he got paid $125,000 to watch from one of the house's best seats.

Which circles us back to that infamous Rams walk-through, supposedly taped by an ex-Patriots stooge named Matt Walsh, who himself is achieving several minutes of fame in an otherwise forgettable existence. Few folks have offered much of an explanation as to whether taping a walk-through one day before the Super Bowl, then showing it to your team, can miraculously turn a heavy underdog into a winner.

Let us consider the opinions of two men who are in a far better position to make this judgment than just another guy watching the game on TV.

"Personally, I don't think it had any effect on the game," former Rams coach Dick Vermeil told the Associated Press. "That stuff's been going on forever and I don't think you gain from it."

Vermeil had, of course, left the Rams by that time. Offensive lineman Adam Timmerman, however, played for the 2001 NFC champs.

"We don't do anything earth-shattering," the 12-year NFL veteran told the New York Times. "We're pretty watered down in that walk-through. What they would actually learn, I don't know how beneficial that would be. The things they would learn from that film would be marginal."

Apparently, at least one man who actually worked up a sweat that day for the Rams won't be joining Gary in his lawsuit.

Alan Greenwood can be reached at 594-6427 or e-mail at agreenwood@nashuatelegraph.com.

Ouch! Burned!

pearlizumi, are you moonlighting as a writer for the Nashua Telegraph?

Sorry for once I had nothing to do with this, but he might be on to something there. :D