Falcons owner Arthur Blank said he was “embarrassed and angered” when he found out in November that the franchise was being investigated by the league office for piping in crowd noise to the Georgia Dome over the past two seasons.
“We cooperated fully,” Blank said on Wednesday. “We certainly support the integrity of the league, the integrity of fair competition and the integrity of the shield. We are not happy about it.”
The investigation has been completed and the team is just waiting for league to respond with possible sanctions, which could include a fine or possibly a draft pick.
“Based on the information that we have now, we’ve dealt with it as best we can currently,” Blank said. “But until we see the full report we can’t really make a statement or more than that. We have to see the report first.”
The Falcons were not turned in by an opposing team. They issue come up in league’s regular review and periodic check of the audio of games in terms of crowd noise.
“That’s not our culture and what we are about or what the NFL is about,” Blank said.
Falcons president Rich McKay is chairman of the league’s competition committee.
“There’s plenty of in-game, either noise or use-of-the-board fines,” McKay said.
There have been 10 or more other similar cases around the league that have looked the way noise is used on third down and the use of music.
“This specific instance they’re looking into, I don’t know that,” McKay said. “As far as somebody played something too loud or somebody played something too long.
He’s not sure what exactly went on and if the Falcons will get sanctioned.
“We’ll wait and see,” McKay said. “Let it come out.”
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