Angry Fans Sign Petition To Ban Patriots From Super Bowl For 'Deflategate'
BOSTON (CBS) -- The New England Patriots are over the "DeflateGate" controversy, shifting their focus to a much more important event: Super Bowl XLIX.
But there are a lot of people who are still pretty upset over the matter, and don't think the Patriots should have their spot in Sunday's big game against the Seattle Seahawks.
Even though the Patriots have not been found guilty of anything, more than 62,000 fans have signed an online petition in hopes of removing the Patriots from the Super Bowl. From the petition's webpage:
To maintain the legitimacy of this year's NFL Championship the Patriots should be immediately disqualified and the two teams they beat to advance should be allowed to continue with the playoff process. The AFC championship should be replayed to determine a rightful representative for the AFC in this year's Super Bowl.
Scott Latshaw, a Baltimore resident, started the petition, and thinks New England's AFC Divisional Round win over the Ravens is also tainted. He'd like to see the NFL replay the AFC title game between the Ravens and Colts.
"I think what's going on right now, the heroes we have and are presenting to the world, they're sort of getting a free pass when it comes to all this stuff," Latshaw told The Sporting News. "It's absolutely horrible. We have an opportunity here to do something right, get this right, whether it means postponing the Super Bowl so we can get this investigation done to see if they were cheating for both the games.
"Maybe there's a money trail or something like that. (Brad Johnson) down in Tampa Bay paid the ball boy all the time. I'm pretty sure the exact same thing was happening up in New England."
He compared the situation to the Chicago Black Sox scandal in 1919.
"They can't go through with this multibillion-dollar event and have it tainted like that," says Latshaw. "This is the (Chicago) Black Sox all over again."
The petition had 25,000 signatures after the first 24 hours, and Latshaw hopes to get up to 75,000.
But with four days before Super Bowl XLIX, and Patriots owner Robert Kraft basically scolding commissioner Roger Goodell on Monday because of the NFL's handling of the matter, don't expect anything to come from this petition.
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