Patriots cheating more than Spygate suggests?

A recent article in The New York Times entitled In Cat and Mouse Game, Patriots Are Central Players hints strongly that the New England Patriots are cheating in many more ways than the Spygate scandal would suggest. It reports that the NFL's Competition Committee has not only heard accusations that the Patriots' coaches videotaped opposing coaches' signals, but also that New England "placed microphones on defensive players to steal quarterbacks' audible signals and manipulated clocks and coach-to-quarterback radio systems."

Yet, unlike the New York Jets, none of the 30 other NFL teams complained publicly about these other violations, and as a result there has been little media coverage about these additional allegations. But it's significant that league officials have been re-writing the league's confidential Game Operations Manual and that the changes concern rules that the Patriots have specifically and repeatedly been accused of violating. Note that the NFL re-worked many sections of the manual before the 2007 season, addressing video technology and stadium video locations, among other things. No doubt teams other than the Jets (Buffalo and Green Bay appear to have been among them) have in past years caught the Patriots engaging in illegal activities; it's just that the Jets were the first team to make their complaints public.

Even more tellingly, the 2007 edition of the Game Operations Manual included significant changes involving coach-to-QB radio systems, game clock operations and the placement of microphones. All of these changes appear to have been in response to complaints lodged by other teams against the Patriots.