New England Patriots coach Bill Belichick firmly denies any involvement in the videotaping allegations that are tied to the Cincinnati Bengals.
Reports surfaced on Monday that the Patriots’ production crew was in the press box during the Bengals’ matchup with the Cleveland Browns in Week 14. They were there to record a feature for Patriots.com, but allegations arose that they were recording the Bengals’ sideline also. The Athletic Boston reported that there were eight minutes of footage focused in on Cincinnati’s sideline, and it’s under investigation currently with the NFL.
The Patriots released a statement on Monday, saying that they were willing to cooperate fully with the NFL in the investigation. Bill Belichick claimed to have no involvement with the allegations during an interview with WEEI on Monday.
He doubled down on that notion during a conference call with the Bengals’ media on Tuesday morning.
“Again, I have no involvement in this or knowledge of it,” Belichick said. “I really don’t have any idea what exactly is going on. I can tell you that we’ve never as a coaching staff — I personally have never used any video footage at all, anything that those production people have done other than what’s shown on public television or something like that.
“We don’t have anything to do with what they do, so I really don’t have much knowledge of the situation at all.”
Belichick sternly denies that anyone on his coaching staff has any involvement in this allegation.
“We’re competitive and we’ll try to be competitive in every area,” Belichick said. “But we don’t knowingly, intentionally want to do anything that’s across the line.
“But since that’s [Spygate] happened, I’d say we’ve tried to keep a good distance behind the line and not maybe take it as far as we would might have in the past. But it’s never really fundamentally changed there.”
Belichick and the Patriots faced consequences after the Spygate situation, resulting in fines and getting docked a first-round pick. This time, Belichick says that ‘he didn’t have anything at all to do with this’.
The investigation is still underway, and the Patriots will prepare to play the Bengals in their Week 15 matchup.
[vertical-gallery id=74890]