Former Steelers Barrett Brooks' new allegations and the Patriots' legacy of Spygate

Former Steelers Barrett Brooks’ latest allegations

Just recently, former Steelers tackle Barrett Brooks came out with more allegations that the Patriots cheated in the 2004 AFC championship game in Big Ben’s rookie season. He claims the Patriots’ defense was calling out Steelers offensive plays before they happened. He claims Tedy Bruschi would call out draw draw draw just before Big Ben ran a draw play. He concluded he felt cheated out of a 2nd Superbowl ring which he feels they would have won in 2004 had the Patriots not been cheating.    

While you could make a case, it’s just sour grapes, and he was just making baseless accusations that it was poor play by the Steelers and four turnovers leading to 24 Patriots points which did them in. Perhaps that might be a valid point, but if the Patriots knew their defensive signals, then they knew what offensive plays to call to beat the Steelers defensive schemes.

If you read the ESPN article from 2015, Brooks's new allegations corroborates another Steelers player's accusations that the Patriots cheated. Hines Ward made the same accusations after the 2002 loss to the Patriots in the AFC Championship game. Ward said “their players were calling out some of our stuff.” While the official NFL investigation concluded the Patriots were stealing defensive signals, it never expanded into whether that included offensive signals too.