"Hangnailgate" grips Patriots as rematch with Texans' nears

Just who is sending a message to whom?

Earlier this season, Baltimore Ravens' coach John Harbaugh bought into New England Patriots' Coach Bill Belichick's standard Injury report motif, as reported here ,after being fined by the NFL for not being forthcoming on his injury reports.

“Bill figured it out way before the rest of us did. His injury report is that long. It’s been that way for years,” Harbaugh said, according to the Baltimore Sun, “We tried to do it the other way and be straightforward with our injury report and we got fined for it. So we’re moving on and doing it Bill’s way.”

And Bill's way is listing everything on his injury report “Right down to the last hangnail”.

So it goes to figure that when Bill Belichick ameneded his injury report this morning to show the ommission of 15 players previously listed on earlier reports, suspicion and intrigue were sure to follow.

Is the NFL having a compliance issue with the Patriots? Is it Texans' coach Gary Kubiac pulling a Mangini and reporting his counterpart for overloading the injury report to gain a competitive advantage?  Or is it just Bill being Bill?

It's easy to look at the injury report and think that Belichick is messing with folks, but it's very difficult to assume that 15 out of 20 players listed on the Patriots' earlier injury report suddenly and miraculously gained full health, like they regenerated or respawned in a video game.

Typically, it seems that half of the Patriots roster ends up on the weekly injury report before each game.  Tom Brady had been on the report for what seemed like the past decade with a bad left shoulder but, mysteriously, he was ommitted from the report earlier this season, and it was suspected then that the League had questioned his protracted presence on there.

While that remains a mystery between Belichick and his hairdresser, it is equally unclear if the league lit a match under Belichick, forcefully suggesting that he ammend this injury report - but one thing is clear:  The Patriots are healthy, and that means the Gary Kubiac's charges are in a heap o' Texas sized trouble.

With that in mind, here is the Patriots actual injury report:

Patrick Chung	S	Hangnail	Limited	Limited
Dan Connolly	G	Hangnail	Limited	Limited
Nate Ebner	DB	Hangnail	Limited	Limited
Aaron Hernandez	TE	Hangnail	Limited	Limited
Dont'a Hightower	LB	Hangnail	Limited	Limited
Chandler Jones	DE	Hangnail	Limited	Limited
Brandon Lloyd	WR	Hangnail	Limited	Limited
Logan Mankins	G	Hangnail	Limited	Limited
Jerod Mayo	LB	Hangnail	Limited	Limited
Rob Ninkovich	DE	Hangnail	Limited	Limited
Mike Rivera	LB	Hangnail	Limited	Limited
Brandon Spikes	LB	Hangnail	Limited	Limited
Aqib Talib	CB	Hangnail	Limited	Limited
Wes Welker	WR	Hangnail	Limited	Limited
Tracy White	LB	Hangnail	Limited	Limited

Dang those pesky hangnails!

Surely there is more to this story than what it appears on the surface - but then again, maybe not.  But one thing is certain, if Patriots' owner Bob Kraft asks Belichick, "On a scale of 1 to 100, how much did this help us?", Belichick will smile and say "1"...

...because we know what happens if he says zero.  Spygate taught us that. 

And Belichick is nobody's schmuck...