Former Rams head coach Mike Martz, a prominent figure in the ESPN investigation into the Patriots' alleged Deflategate and Spygate affairs, says that he still is unsure that the entirety of a statement attributed to him by the NFL was in his own words. Martz also said that he has lingering suspicions over the actions of New England staffers leading up to his Super Bowl XXXVI meeting with that team following the 2001 season.
Martz is adamant, however, that any cheating would not have been the difference in the game.
There has been rumors about New England illegally taping a Rams walkthrough for years. The Boston Herald retracted a report saying as much and the Patriots continue to vehemently deny the actions.
The ESPN report refers to an interview of former Patriots videographer Matt Walsh conducted by former Sen. Arlen Specter as part of his investigation into Spygate, in which Walsh told the congressman that three Patriots staffers remained at the Superdome setting up cameras and observed the Rams’ walkthrough, gleaning key insights into red zone formations and special teams wrinkles. Commissioner Roger Goodell, with pressure from Specter mounting, later called Martz seeking a written statement from him about his satisfaction with the league’s handling of the scandal.
Martz reiterated to me that he was in no way coerced to give the statement, and that he did so of his own volition in 2008, though he had some concerns about what went on at that time and he continued to have “suspicion” over time.
“I was happy to write the statement,” Martz, now out of coaching, told me in a phone interview from his home in Idaho. “It was good for the league and it was the right thing to do at the time and so I wrote it.”
Martz raised the possibility in the ESPN article -- when interviewed in July -- that the full statement attributed to him did not seem to be entirely in his own words and I asked him if, as he continued to consider that notion, if it still held.
“I can’t recall writing the last few lines of the statement,” Martz said. “I don’t recall writing anything about Matt Walsh. Could it have been I did it? Maybe. But I don’t think I would have written that. I couldn’t say with 100 percent certainty that I didn’t.”
Martz said leading up to the Super Bowl, and for a while afterward, he had no inkling of anything possibly shady and felt no need to be more secretive because he was facing the Patriots.
“I just never even considered it,” he said. “I just never thought anyone would be taping signs or anything like that.”
He said he got ready for that game like any other game and it was only some time later, as the Spygate scandal broke that he continued to hear “gossip and rumors” about possible cheating by the Patriots, including the lingering chatter about a videotaped walkthrough and “it makes you start to question what may have happened.”
“If the report is accurate and Patriots employees were allowed to watch our walkthrough,” Martz said, “then shame on the NFL, shame on NFL security, shame on our security. Then they didn’t do their job … I have my suspicions about it, but I’m not sure how you would really prove something like that now and there’s nothing you can do about it now and it’s not something I really worry about or think about.”
And, regardless of whether or not anything unusual took place, Martz was quick to point out -- “that’s not why we lost that game. Not at all. We lost that game because we committed three turnovers.”
