NFL's Patriots deliver blistering rebuttal on 'Deflategate' probe

By Steve Ginsburg May 14 (Reuters) - The New England Patriots on Thursday delivered a blistering rebuttal of the NFL investigation into how footballs were deflated below league standards in the AFC title game. In a website created to dispute the findings of the scandal known as "Deflategate," the Patriots said the conclusions in the report were "incomplete, incorrect and lack context." The NFL suspended star quarterback Tom Brady four games next season, fined the club a record $1 million, and forced the Patriots to relinquish two draft choices for purposely deflating footballs used in the team's 45-7 victory over the Indianapolis Colts that put it into the Super Bowl. Two days after independent investigator Ted Wells steadfastly defended the conclusions he reached implicating Brady and two Patriots employees in the plot were proper, the team disagreed. "There is no evidence that Tom Brady preferred footballs that were lower than 12.5 psi and no evidence anyone even thought that he did," according to the team's counterclaim, written by attorney Daniel Goldberg, who represented the club and was present during all interviews of team personnel conducted at Gillette Stadium. The Patriots also included a paper by Nobel Prize Laureate Roderick MacKinnon's "scientific conclusion" that challenges the Wells report's rejection of scientific explanations as to how the footballs could have naturally lost air pressure. Brady, a four-time Super Bowl champion and in many ways the face of the NFL, was expected to formally appeal his penalty later on Thursday. After Brady files his appeal, NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell will have a week to appoint an arbitrator in the case. Assuming he does not appoint himself, speculation is that he will tap former NFL executive Harold Henderson, who has handled several arbitrations for the league, including that of Adrian Peterson, the Minnesota Vikings running back charged with hitting his 4-year-old child with a switch. Wells said he believes a series of text messages by two Patriots employees implicated Brady, a three-time Super Bowl most valuable player. Wells' report identified the two Patriots employees, officials' locker room attendant Jim McNally and equipment assistant John Jastremski, as the ones who deflated the footballs. The Patriots suspended both indefinitely last week. "Texts acknowledged to be attempts at humor and exaggeration are nevertheless interpreted as a plot to improperly deflate footballs, even though none of them refer to any such plot," the Patriots rebuttal said, posted on Wellsreportcontext.com. Deflating the balls would likely allow Brady to grip the ball better, especially in the cold and wet conditions during the AFC title game in January. New England subsequently defeated the Seattle Seahawks 28-24 to win the Super Bowl. (Reporting by Steve Ginsburg in Washington; Editing by Alan Crosby)