Jerry Rice accuses the Patriots of cheating, while he admits to using Stickum

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‘I’m going to be point blank, I feel like it’s cheating,” Rice told Rome on January 22. “Because you have an edge up on your opponent and its unfortunate that it happened. I’m not saying the outcome of the game would have been different or anything like that because they got beat 45-7, but they still had an edge.”

In that same interview, Rice added, “I’ve played in cold weather, I know how hard the football is and you can grip the leather [if deflated] just a little bit better.”

When it comes to playing football in any conditions, the challenge becomes not only throwing it but catching it. And in the ESPN segment narrated by Jim Trotter, Rice nonchalantly made a stunning (in hindsight) confession: Rice put stickum on his gloves.

“I know this might be a little illegal, guys, but you put a little spray, a little stickum on them, to make sure that texture is a little sticky,” Rice said, laughing.

It wasn’t a little illegal, it was a lot illegal. As explained in the ESPN feature, gloves were introduced to football after the NFL decided to outlaw the stuff that guys like Fred Biletnikoff and Lester Hayes (pictured) would spread copiously on their hands, and elsewhere. Rice admitted in the feature that he enhanced the surface of gloves approved for use in the NFL with a substance that would make it easier to catch the ball.

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