By now you’ve surely heard enough Patriot ball jokes that even your third grader is tired of them.

The whole Deflategate controversy that has overshadowed what will be a pretty damn good Super Bowl matchup reached its ridiculous apex last week when Bill Nye the Science Guy weighed in with his opinion (shocker alert: he thinks Bill Belichick doesn’t know anything about science.)

The major consensus among most fans of the NFL is this: The Patriots cheated by deflating their footballs somehow, and now we’ve got reports of a rogue locker room attendant going to the bathroom with the footballs unattended. It’s come to this.

Bill Belichick sounded like a climate change-denying senator in his press conference defending the team, telling the world to leave him alone because he’s not a scientist. In the same presser, Brady categorically denied any involvement while laughing off the notion.

The NFL has said it’s investigating the matter, which probably means we’ll know the outcome in eight years and it will most likely involve a half-game suspension  and a ban on New England Patriots owner Robert Kraft’s favorite artisanal cheese.

Sports reporters and moral authoritarians everywhere are incredulous at the notion that the Patriots could sully the league’s integrity (I can’t even type that with a straight face) by doing something so heinous like let the air out of a couple of balls.

But the best point to be brought up so far was made by Seattle Seahawks corner and media lightning rod Richard Sherman. Sherman, love him or hate him, called out NFL commissioner Roger Goodell’s extremely close relationship with Kraft, outlined masterfully in a GQ takedown of Goodell released Monday. Sherman pointed out the conflict of interest that exists between Goodell and Kraft’s friendship — the two were seen posing for photos at a party the day before the AFC Championship — and bluntly said New England would probably never be punished for it.

He’s probably right.

In the GQ piece, author Gabriel Sherman points out the utter hypocrisy of it all. Kraft allegedly set up Goodell’s interview with CBS after the Ray Rice scandal exploded in the NFL’s face as a favor to his friend, and privately lobbied for commissioners to back Goodell after things went sour. Kraft has also gone out of his way to defend Goodell’s exorbitant $44 million salary and is painted as “assistant commissioner” by people close to the situation.

The NFL is a billion-dollar machine way more concerned with how it appears to be making changes than actually changing things — from domestic abuse to concussions to the laughably small portion of money that actually goes to breast cancer victims during its all-pink October.

This is a league that says it couldn’t get its hands on a tape that TMZ could. One that says it is investigating this stupid controversy and hasn’t even interviewed Tom Brady about it. Still, fans and reporters and players alike stand on their soapbox and demand New Engalnd be brought to justice for the good of the league’s integrity. If the Patriots cheated they deserve to be punished. No doubt about it.

But there is no such thing as NFL integrity.

We live in a time where people are more upset about some missing air than a player knocking out his girlfriend or getting brain damage.

And that is more deflating than any football could ever be.

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Cory Gunkel is a reporter and can be reached by email at cory.gunkel@vicksburgpost.com or by phone at 601-636-4545