DanMargarita.com

Perhaps you’ve heard that the Pats are being sued by two lawyers (nobody gets sued by two bakers), a former St. Louis Rams player, some Rams fans, and maybe an actual ram for $100 million. The plaintiffs allege that the Patriots videotaped the Rams walk-through the day before the Super Bowl, and thus cheated the players and fans out of tens of millions of dollars. Just how much are the Rams charging for tickets, anyway?

I’ve seen one of the lawyers involved in a TV interview and frankly, he looks like a spokesman for the WWE. If he substituted the word wrestling for the word “football” it would not have looked out pf place. I fully expected to see someone creep up behind him and hit him with a metal chair. In other words, the man seems to be mainly trying to generate publicity for himself.

This is not the first time the Patriots are alleged to have committed a videotaping violation (in a non-Paris Hilton manner), of course. Football fans are quite aware that the team was caught taping the New York Jet’s defensive coaches giving signals during the two team’s game the first week of the season. In no way am I defending that practice which was wrong, stupid and needless, as their subsequent seventeen consecutive wins would seem to attest to. Perhaps someone misunderstood coach Bill Belichick’s instructions.

“I meant ‘tape the game on your VCR!’”

The Patriots denied taping the Rams’ walk-through but thank to the Jets game foolishness, the Pats have left themselves open to being questioned on all of their ensuing success. When you’re so far superior to your opponent, you don’t need to cheat. Do you think the Romans needed to peek into the Christian’s locker room before the match to steal any signals?

Mind you, I can personally attest that such tactics are nothing new. Regular readers of this space may recall that my father, Bob Margarita, played for the Chicago Bears from 1944-46. Over the years he has regaled us (as nearly every father does) with stories, including one about the time the Bears were practicing at Wrigley Field, the site of their home games. They noticed two men with binoculars stationed at one of the houses across the street. Since the glasses were focused on the field and not on the YWCA building across the street, the Bears management sent one of the trainers across the street to investigate. After being gone an inordinate amount of time, the trainer finally returned, unmistakably three sheets to the wind.

“Oh, you don’t have to worry about them. They’re great guys!” the trainer proclaimed about the other team’s scouts who had distracted him with liquor from fulfilling his mission.

Thus, I have decided that since we live in such a litigious society, I will settle my lifelong sports disappointments by lawsuit. First up, I plan to sue Woburn (Ma.) Little League. It’s clear to me now that they must have cheated when they handily defeated my Stoneham National Little League All-Star team in 1974. Sure, we made fun of their pitcher while he warmed up for having a buzz-cut which in 1974, NO kid had. We weren’t laughing later when he pitched a two-hitter, striking me out three times. Clearly, this large young man, sporting such an un-hip haircut for the times, was at least 35-years-old.

Since no one else has jumped on it yet, I will sue the former East Germany and other Eastern Bloc countries for the medals that their “women’s” teams racked up in the 1970’s They were surely into steroids or something similar well before the West since their super-muscular women’s teams sported more facial hair than our men’s teams. Menopause, you say? Not likely. Let’s see how far your grandmother throws the shot put. Perhaps it should’ve been a tip-off that our women’s teams wore sports bras while the East German women wore protective cups.

This case may get settled out of court, as many cases do. Perhaps the plaintiffs will settle for what would seem like an appropriate award…a case of sour grapes.