The end of Spygate: Walsh doesn't deliver, but Belichick still looks bad

Matt Walsh (left) didn't answer any questions from media after his meeting in Manhattan. AP Peter King's Mailbag Peter King will answer your questions each week in Monday Morning Quarterback: Tuesday Edition. Name: Email: Hometown: Question: SEND Follow Peter King on Twitter

NEW YORK -- So, is it over? Is the nine-month Spygate nightmare finally over?

Unless there is new specific and conclusive evidence that the Patriots did more than we know now -- after the league's 50 interviews and Roger Goodell's session with Matt Walsh today -- it should be.

In this long and winding story it's not inconceivable that another whistle-blower may surface. But there seems to be no indication from anybody -- people who hate the Patriots, people who used to work for the Patriots, archrivals of the Patriots -- that there's another soul who has more information to spill and make it worse for New England and its tarnished coach Bill Belichick.

Four things are clear in the wake of an eventful three-hour, 15-minute morning meeting at NFL headquarters (and an occasionally surreal aftermath) between Commissioner Goodell and whistle-blowing former Patriots employee Walsh:

• The commissioner found no significant evidence ("significant'' being the operative word) of further wrongdoing by the Patriots and plans no further discipline of the Patriots. He believes what he handed down last September -- the $750,000 total fine and the stripping of a first-round 2008 draft choice -- fits the crime of serial videotaping of opposing coaching signals dating back to when Bill Belichick took the Patriots' coaching job in 2000. "I don't anticipate it [further sanctions],'' Goodell said at an afternoon news conference. "The fundamental information that Matt provided was consistent with what we disciplined the Patriots for last fall ... I don't know where else I would turn.''

• The league found nothing earth shattering from Walsh's testimony or his videotapes, nothing like illicit taping of the walkthrough practice the day before the 2001 Super Bowl. "He was not instructed to tape the walkthrough by anybody,'' Goodell said. "He does not know anyone who says there is a tape.''

Goodell found Walsh forthright and believable, which the Patriots will surely scoff at -- especially since Walsh was fired by the club in 2003 for, according to the Boston Globe, illegally audio-taping a conversation between himself and Patriots vice president Scott Pioli. "He didn't sound like a vengeful guy,'' was the opinion of one source with knowledge of the morning talks.

However -- and this is where the word "significant'' comes in -- league attorney Gregg Levy said Walsh did tell the commissioner that he witnessed the Rams' walkthrough practice, and he told Patriots assistant coach Brian Daboll about a couple of strategic points, including the fact that he saw Marshall Faulk lining up for kick returns. That's the kind of strategic edge, though not game-turning, that would be a good nugget to know for a coaching staff prior to a game.

• Walsh didn't connect the videotaping directly to Belichick. In his conversation with Goodell, Walsh referred to Belichick, eerily, as "the man behind the curtain.'' Goodell said he was told by Walsh that after videotaping opposing signals, he would turn the tapes over to Ernie Adams, a shadowy figure in the front office whose title is "football research director.'' (When Belichick coached in Cleveland, no one knew what Adams did, and owner Art Modell once said of Adams: "I'll give anyone $10,000 if they can tell me what Ernie Adams does.")

Apparently what he did, in part, was try to match signals from coaching staffs to formations and plays, so that the next time the Patriots played the team in question, they might be able to steal signals if the coaching signals had not been changed. Goodell also said Walsh took his direct instruction from Patriots video director Jimmy Dee.

• After nine months of an on-and-off league investigation into video spying that included 50 interviews, Goodell doesn't think the practice is commonplace through the league. Nor, he thinks, has it been. "I don't think it's widespread,'' he said. "I think it's very limited in its practice and its effect.''

The league hopes Tuesday's events close the book on the sordid case of a three-time Super Bowl champion cheating from 2000 to 2007, a story that commanded the headlines when the Patriots were caught videotaping the Jets' coaching signals in the 2007 season-opener. Will it? Probably. But the shock waves will be felt for a while.