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The New England Patriots dropped their 11th game of the season last Sunday, but the amount of air in some of the game balls raised eyebrows.
On Friday, six-time Super Bowl winning coach Bill Belichick confirmed that the kicking balls in the 27-17 loss to the defending champion Kansas City Chiefs had not been properly inflated. The underinflated footballs brought back memories of the 2015 Deflagate scandal.
At its core, the scandal suggested that the Patriots engaged in an illegal process to lower the inflation of game balls in an effort to provide quarterback Tom Brady with footballs that had a softer grip. The NFL sanctioned an inflation check during halftime of the 2014 AFC Championship Game and proceeded to spend millions of dollars on an investigation that lasted multiple years.
However, Belichick made it clear that the Patriots did not have anything to do with the status of last week's kicking balls. "But we don’t have anything to do with it," Belichick said. "Were we aware of it? Yeah, definitely."
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New England Patriots head coach Bill Belichick looks on from the sideline during the game against the Kansas City Chiefs at Gillette Stadium on December 17, 2023, in Foxborough, Massachusetts (Maddie Meyer/Getty Images)
Both teams kickers had a shaky first half, which some viewed as a red flag. The Chiefs' normally reliable kicker Harrison Butker missed a midrange field goal in the first quarter, while Patriots kicker Chad Ryland's 41-yarder was no good.
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"We were aware of it in the first
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