The cheating accusations against the New England Patriots are reaching critical mass.

Fans and media can believe whatever they want about Bill Belichick’s operation, but as the coach himself said in a conference call last week, their program is “not built on excuses.” Which, sorry, is how you look if you blindly accuse the Patriots of “cheating” you out of a victory with no evidence of that.

The reality is, Belichick and his staff are on a different level from most others in the league. It’s especially sad to see former Patriots players like Tedy Bruschi have to go on TV and defend their team and the championships they won, and the hard work they put into earning them.

Former Patriots linebacker Rosevelt Colvin, who joined Toucher & Rich Monday for the first time since last season, played in three Super Bowls with the Patriots, winning twice. A lot has been said about his team in the off-season, and he unloaded on those questioning their accomplishments.

Not only did he strongly defend his team against the baseless cheating accusations that have been made in recent weeks, he gave fascinating insight into the Patriots’ gamesmanship – things they did to gain competitive advantages that any other team could legally do, but apparently did not.

When asked about the recent ESPN and Sports Illustrated reports, citing 90 unnamed sources and their stories of suspected Patriots cheating and teams’ methods of protecting themselves against it (almost none of which has been proven), Colvin said he took the allegations personally, and defended the Patriots against the accusations – while pointing out that even the Patriots suspect other teams of breaking rules – difference is, they don’t make excuses.

“When I played, I suspected that a guy was taking steroids too, or a guy was taking HGH, or a guy was doing something illegal too,” he said. “I suspected that guys were stealing our calls too…In my opinion I think a lot of the things are fair gamesmanship that most fans and most media don’t even know about. Not that it is necessarily cheating.”

On the allegations, he continued: “We never had anybody’s play call sheets, we never had anybody’s video of them practicing. We never sat there and watched it in the film room.”

On the allegations of stolen play sheets, Colvin found them ridiculous and turned the blame on the simplicity of their opponents: “If you’re that elementary, where you only have one gameplan, to the point where you’re leaving dummy gameplans…Then that’s the reason why you’re still 8-8 at best every year, 6-10, and not even thinking about keeping the same coach every other season.”

Colvin and the Patriots did record extra game film – from TV broadcasts that everyone can record. He gave some insight into how the Patriots played so well against Peyton Manning early in the former Colts quarterback’s career. Peyton supporters will probably consider this next part from Colvin “cheating”…

“Did I record the TV copy of Peyton Manning every year so I could hear what his calls were? Yeah, because when I got in the game and I heard him call that call, I said ‘Hey maybe this is a run, and maybe 90 percent of the time it was a run.'”

These small (and perfectly legal) competitive advantages can add up, and all it means is the Patriots were (and still are) the best in the business at doing everything they can to gain an edge in games.

Colvin continued with tales of on-field gamesmanship, explaining how he used the quarterback’s own tactics to his advantage.

“I read lips, and I’m stealing calls all day long,” he said. “So if your quarterback is a young, naive quarterback, and he’s standing over there in the huddle yelling out the call and he says ‘Hey, on two on two!’, well I’m going to go on two and I’m going to jump the snap. Am I cheating because I sat there and listened to your quarterback yell out the play?

“That’s not cheating, that’s just called being alert.”

Rosevelt Colvin won two Super Bowl rings in 2003-04 with the Patriots. (Photo by Mark Mainz/Getty Images)

Colvin called out the other teams yet again: “[The Patriots] were a little more savvy mentally, and Bill with his knowledge in the game and the history he’s had in the game…He’s coached longer than some of these guys have been alive.”

Colvin also spoke on the most recent controversy to surround the Patriots, the malfunctioning headsets that played a role in the early part of the Patriots’ opening night win over the Steelers. The NFL has since exonerated the Patriots and the headset problems are acknowledged as a league-wide issue, but that didn’t stop Patriots haters from throwing out fresh cheating accusations.

Colvin said the Patriots were always prepared to play without headsets, in the likely event that the situation would come up.

“My last few years in New England, we started camp without headsets. We always started out signaling,” he said. “You got to have a base foundation in that always comes from base signals.”

Again, he called out the other team for being unprepared for the situation: “We’re not three-year-olds. How hard is it to just tell the guy next to you on the sidelines ‘Hey, we’re running base cover 2, tell the middle linebacker!'”

Like Belichick, Colvin is fed up with the rest of the country attempting to tarnish what he accomplished along with many other Patriots players in the early 2000s. They did everything they could to gain edges, and did things that any other team could do themselves. But other teams don’t seem to take those extra measures, because they’re not as well-coached or well-prepared. Instead, they make excuses by calling the Patriots’ gamesmanship “cheating.”

Colvin knows how much work the Patriots put into their Super Bowls. Ultimately, he doesn’t care what other people are saying, because he’s a Super Bowl champion and no one’s going to take that away from him.

“It’s gotten to the point where people just try to run with stories and try to make things seem what they’re not,” he said. “It gets irritating, but at the end of the day you polish your Super Bowl rings and carry on.”

Listen to the full interview with Rosevelt Colvin below: