Update (Tuesday 12:14 a.m.): Pro Football Talk’s Mike Florio reported Monday night the surveillance video of the locker room attendant shows him going into the bathroom with two bags of 12 balls. There is a restroom between the referees’ room and the field at Gillette Stadium. Credit to Jeff Howe of the Boston Herald, who pointed this possibility out Monday afternoon.

Florio’s source also said the tape shows the attendant in the bathroom for 90 seconds. That likely wouldn’t be enough time for him to deflate 12 footballs. Unless …

(Yes, we are now debating bathroom habits. This is how absurd Deflate-Gate has gotten.)

Another chapter has been added to Deflate-Gate.

The NFL has identified a Patriots locker room attendant who allegedly took footballs from the officials’ locker room to another area prior to the start AFC Championship Game, according to Jay Glazer of Fox Sports. Glazer also says the NFL has interviewed the attendant, and possesses video evidence.

Tom Brady and Bill Belichick have denied that they had knowledge of the Patriots playing with illegally under-inflated footballs in the first half of the AFC Title Game against the Colts. ESPN reported last week 11 of the 12 Patriots footballs were severely deflated when the officials tested them at halftime. Belichick said Saturday during a defiant press conference the balls dropped below the league mandated 12.5 to 13.5 pounds per square inch due to the weather.

“Now, we all know that air pressure is a function of the atmospheric conditions,” Belichick said. “So, if there’s activity in the ball relative to the rubbing process, I think that explains why when we gave them to the officials and the officials put it at 12.5 [PSI] if that’s in fact what they did, that once the ball reached its equilibrium state, it probably was closer to 11.5 [PSI]. It’s similar to the concept of when you get into your car and the light comes on and it says low tire pressure because the car has been sitting in the driveway outside overnight and you start it up and you start driving it and the light goes off.”

The NFL released a statement about its investigation Friday, and said over the weekend it has interviewed over 40 people about the matter. Brady said in his press conference Thursday the NFL hasn’t spoken to him.

It remains a mystery as to why the referees reexamined the Patriots’ footballs at halftime. WCVB’s Mike Lynch said last week Colts linebacker D’Qwell Jackson turned over what he thought was a deflated football to officials after he had intercepted Tom Brady at the end of the second quarter. But Jackson denies the story.

The NFL’s statement says the league was tipped off about the Patriots using illegally under-inflated balls, but doesn’t elaborate.

The silliest scandal in professional sports rages on.
You can read more stories on Boston startups, technology and innovation at https://www.bizjournals.com/boston/inno