In response to the recent disclosure that former Pats video employee Matt Walsh doesn’t have (and presumably never had) in his possession a tape of the Rams’ walk-through practice prior to Super Bowl XXXVI, a couple of former players expressed relief.

“I didn’t even know about a walkthrough,” linebacker Willie McGinest said.  “We couldn’t win any games with any cameras on the field.  It’s just players giving everything they got, playing hard.  Whatever Matt Walsh does, I never really knew the guy, I never seen him when he was here.  I never get involved in that.

“I just know the Super Bowls we won, it was all through hard work.  A camera can’t defend, or tackle, or throw a pass, or kick a field goal, or do any of that.  I know what it took to win every game, one game at a time.  It’s definitely hard work and dedication.”

With all due respect, Willie’s being a little naive here.  If there had been a tape of the walk-through (which assumes that there even had been a walk-through, which has been a matter of debate in some circles), there clearly would be a benefit.  The coaching staff would have known which plays were coming out of certain formations, and thus could have told the players on defense what to expect if/when they see certain formations.

And the coaching staff surely wouldn’t have explained why they knew this, and the players would likely assume that it was the result of legitimate film study.

But none of this matters, because there wasn’t a tape.

Quarterback Drew Bledsoe, who was Wally Pipped by Tom Brady after Bledsoe bled internally following a vicious hit during the regular season, chimed in as well.  “I’ve followed it,” Bledsoe said.  “I’ve talked to some people about it.  To be honest with you, my take now is the same as it’s always been.  Every team in the league is trying to do everything they can to get ahead.  I’m sure most, if not all, are bending the rules in some way, shape or form.  This just happened to be one that was very public, and the organization has been reprimanded for it.

“As a player here, I never did see anything other than what was already reported. . . .  Was it a violation of the spirit of the rules?  Absolutely, it was, but I think all of that has been readily acknowledged.”

The irony here is that these reactions to the news that Walsh has (and had) no tape were harvested by the Boston Herald, which reported on February 2 that the Rams’ walk-through was indeed taped.  The situation was taken to a new level of weirdness when John Tomase, the person who wrote the Herald story regarding the existence of the tape, penned an item on Thursday parroting attorney Michael Levy’s contention that Walsh wasn’t the source of the February 2 story.

But, frankly, how does Levy know what his client did or didn’t say to Tomase or to anyone else?  We know for a fact that Tomase and others in the media were chasing Levy for months.  We believe based on what we’ve heard that Tomase and others knew that Walsh was telling tales of a videotaped walk-through practice at Super Bowl XXXVI in the wake of the September 2007 Spygate scandal, but that Walsh wouldn’t go on the record at that time.  We also believe that Herald editors and/or executives declined to go with the story without Walsh going on the record.  And, finally, we believe that Walsh’s decision to go on the record with the New York Times in an item that was published on February 1 prompted the Herald to conclude that it would be prudent and appropriate to finally print a story regarding the taping of the walk-through based on things that Walsh had told Tomase.

As of February 1, it appeared to us that Walsh was getting ready to crack.  If he did, and if another publication had been the one to get him to start singing on the record, all of the time and money that the Herald had invested into chasing the guy would have been wasted.  Moreover, an opportunity to break what could have been one of the biggest NFL stories of all time would have been forever squandered.

We might only find out whether Walsh was indeed the source if (when) the Patriots sue the Herald for defamation.  Though we don’t know how the rules of journalism regarding the disclosure of a confidential source apply when the publication is getting sued for the statements that the confidential source has made, we suspect that the Pats lawyers would push aggressively to force Tomase to disclose his source.

If that happens, we’d bet a month’s worth of lunch money that Tomase will say it was Walsh.