After more than two months of negotiations, lawyers for the league and Walsh finally agreed April 23 to terms that would allow him to talk with Goodell. They include an agreement by the Patriots not to sue Walsh and to pay his legal expenses and his airfare to New York from Hawaii, where he is now a golf pro.
NFL. The most anticipated sitdown since Tony Soprano broke bread with Phil Leotardo is set for this morning in New York, when former Patriots employee Matt Walsh and NFL commissioner Roger Goodell are expected to discuss Walsh’s role in Spygate.
Last week, Walsh, who worked for New England from 1997 through 2003, reportedly sent the NFL eight videotapes that showed the Patriots recording playcalling signals.
After months of negotiations, Walsh will meet with Goodell at the NFL offices in New York at 7:30 a.m., and the commissioner will hold a press conference immediately after the meeting. Afterward, Walsh will travel to Washington to meet with U.S. Senator Arlen Specter. Specter, a critic of the way the NFL has handled the affair, will also hold a press conference once his meeting with Walsh is done.
The league said the tapes were consistent with what it already knew, which drew the ire of Specter, who said it was “unfortunate” the league began a “‘nothing new’ spin before watching the tapes.”
The tapes turned over by Walsh included signals by coaches from 2000-02. However, a tape of the Rams’ walkthrough just prior to Super Bowl XXXVI — the so-called “smoking-gun” — was not among the tapes turned over to the league. In February, the Boston Herald reported that an unnamed Patriots employee illegally taped the St. Louis walkthrough before the 2002 Super Bowl. Walsh’s attorney, Michael Levy, has distanced his client from that story, saying Walsh has never claimed to have a tape of the walkthrough and was not the source for the report.
The entire affair came to light in the days after the 2007 season opener against the Jets, when a New England video assistant was caught illegally videotaping New York’s defensive signals. Patriots coach Bill Belichick was fined $500,000, while the team was fined $250,000 and forced to forfeit its 2008 first-round draft choice.
