Now that former Pats employee and Hawaii resident Matt Walsh has pulled the pin on the grenade and is holding the thing in his hand with the lever pressed against the steel, he is suddenly public enemy No. 1 of Patriots nation.

Maybe it’s a good thing for him that he lives a long, long way from Boston.

Already, we’re being flooded with e-mails from readers who have caught an inconsistency between Friday’s article in the New York Times and the three-plus-year-old item from the Providence Journal announcing Walsh’s marriage.

The Times says that Walsh worked for the Patriots until 2003.  The Journal says that he left in January 2002.  (The Journal article also paints a courtship story that conjures images of Kramer and his pint-sized pal Mickey fighting over the two girls whose names they’d gotten confused.)    

If the dates in the Journal are accurate, then Walsh would have left the Patriots before Super Bowl XXVI, which was played on February 3, 2002.  He also wouldn’t have been with the team on February 1 or 2, during which final preparations (such as walk-through practices) are made.

It’s a key point, and it will go directly to Walsh’s overall credibility, if he claims to know about things that happened after he had left the team’s employ.

And it’s possible that Walsh merely is a disgruntled employee with an axe to grind.  It’ll therefore be important to know whether he left willingly, or whether he was fired.  Was he then unable to find other work in the NFL, or did he simply choose to work for a team in NFL Europe because he thought it would be fun to live overseas during the tense months after 9/11?

Walsh, we believe, will soon regret saying anything on the record to the Times.  His words paint a sufficiently ominous tone to prompt those who support the team to begin to try to discredit him.  In this specific case, then, showing the sword will likely have the same net effect as using it.

UPDATE:  Walsh’s online bio at his current place of employment says that he worked for the Pats from 1996 through 2003.