04/26/24
December 02, 2003
What’s the biggest threat to the New England Patriots’ playoff hopes this year? It sure isn’t injuries. You gotta know it isn’t weather. It isn’t lack of defense, or lack of timely offense, or the chance that Bill Belichick will lose his mind and his composure and start making incredibly stupid decisions. No, the biggest threat is respect. Two years ago at this time, no one thought they had the stuff. They didn’t even get respect after they had the rings on their hands. Now pundits such as SI’s Don Banks and Peter King are saying that they’re near or at the top. It’s still not what you’d call gushing praise, and as a Pats fan, I’m glad: that kind of hype paints a big target on you that the Patriots could do without. Let everyone gun for the Chiefs and the Titans (well…maybe not the Titans) and diss the Pats, all the way up to and through Super Sunday, if they so choose. I’m sure another ring will take away the sting. The lack of respect is, in a way, perfectly understandable, because I don’t think there’s a single statistical category that the Pats lead in. If anything takes the Pats all the way, it won’t be something obvious, not even their justly praised defense. Instead, it will be a quality that doesn’t show up in any of the stats: namely, the ability to consistently make something out of nothing, and to land on their feet when disaster strikes. My only regrets, as this season is starting to shape up nicely, is a)that my ski instructor job keeps me from being able to see these 1 PM games, and b)that the new stadium has a dome on it.
posted by lil_brown_bat to football at 10:51 AM - 7 comments
I haven't sensed a lack of respect for the Patriots at all; in fact, they seem to be regarded as one of the only genuinely impressive teams in the league. Yeah, they're getting R-E-S-P-E-C-T now, not so much only a few weeks ago. I'm superstitiously glad, however, that they still don't seem to be getting lots of buzz and hype, if you know what they mean -- just gradual, growing, quiet respect. However, after watching last weekend's game, I gotta say they were lucky to get out of Indianapolis with a win after giving up a 21-point lead. Heh. As a Boston Globe writer said yesterday, if the Carolina Panthers are the Cardiac Cats, surely the Patriots are the Palpitation Pats. It's that somethin-outta-nothin I was talking about, and as upsetting as it is when they scare you like that, they also have this way of winning when they really oughta lose. Take the Dallas game: lots of folks said, "Wow, shutout, awesome!" I saw an offense that barely showed up. Looking at it one way, New England didn't win that one, Dallas lost it. But at the same time, well...that's football. When was the last time you saw a team play an error-free game? The Pats make a lot of mistakes, but they're very good at exploiting the mistakes of others, too. So far, it's been enough.
posted by lil_brown_bat at 12:50 PM on December 02, 2003
However, after watching last weekend's game, I gotta say they were lucky to get out of Indianapolis with a win after giving up a 21-point lead. How in the world does Tony Dungy kick deep with 12 seconds left in the first half and then kick to Bethel Johnson again at the end? Same way Ty Warren drops a guaranteed interception, and the same way the Patriots commit a dumb penalty when the Colts are about to punt the ball away. Everyone does dumb things, and usually they even out -- if the Colts had won we'd be saying they were lucky New England made so many mistakes.
posted by Bryant at 01:00 PM on December 02, 2003
if the Colts had won we'd be saying they were lucky New England made so many mistakes. Yeah, good point. The Patriots did everything short of hire a chauffer to get the Colts back on track in the second quarter; Bethel Johnson didn't stop the Colts, he merely kept it from being even uglier. I can't believe the Pats pulled that off and I can't believe (or maybe I missed it) the Colts aren't screaming in he press about Willie McGinest's "collapse" a few plays before he ended the game. On a side note, did anyone else feel the Colts have no heart? I've never seen a team, as a whole, duck tackles, run out of bounds and dive to avoid collisions the way they did on Sunday. Maybe Edgerrin James always dives under tackles like that before he gets hit to get a yard or two, but it seemed like all their skill players trotted out of bounds when they could have done a Walter Payton and got one or two more yards. The fact the Colts lost by a yard . . .
posted by yerfatma at 01:26 PM on December 02, 2003
I saw an offense that barely showed up. Looking at it one way, New England didn't win that one, Dallas lost it. That's crazy talk. The Patriots hit the Cowboys so hard in that game Roger Staubach and Drew Pearson were put on injured reserve. They didn't need to score a lot of points when the Pokes couldn't do squat with the ball.
posted by rcade at 01:54 PM on December 02, 2003
Did I miss a memo or was Dallas the #1 ranked defense at the time (and may still be) of the Patriots game?
posted by yerfatma at 03:29 PM on December 02, 2003
RE: Titans vs. Jets Aberration. Exhibit One was Steve McNair's gimpy leg. The boy didn't run last night and there was at least one occasion where he could've broken for a touchdown (a sideline cam caught Herm screaming "Watch for the play action run!" right after that one...). I'm not positive he should've been on the field last night, but with an MVP campaign in full swing + a Monday Night Game + a chance to take a bye week by the teeth + McNair's general blue collar pride, there he was. The arm was solid, but he was at maybe fifty to sixy percent mobility. Exhibit Two was a Jets team, rather Chad Pennington, on the upswing. Had Pennington (a Tennessee product himself, by the by) not been injured at the start of the season, does anyone doubt that the Jets would be in the playoff hunt right now? Regardless, the boy had a quarterback rating in the 90s and two touchdown passes in the second half. Exhibit Three were a series of tough calls and some freakish passing. Refs vetoed what looked like a legit touchdown and pushed the Titans back fifteen yards for a pretty innocuous throat cut unsportsmanlike conduct. Minutes later, both qb's traded the ball back and forth like it was burning their hands. McNair NEVER turns the ball over like that. Regardless of those sour grapes, we gotta chance to win with Indy on home soil. If the secondary tightens up a bit, I think we got a bye coming.
posted by forksclovetofu at 06:27 PM on December 02, 2003
I haven't sensed a lack of respect for the Patriots at all; in fact, they seem to be regarded as one of the only genuinely impressive teams in the league. Unlike the year they came out of nowhere to win the AFC and shock the Rams in the Super Bowl, the Pats have been talked up all year. However, after watching last weekend's game, I gotta say they were lucky to get out of Indianapolis with a win after giving up a 21-point lead. How in the world does Tony Dungy kick deep with 12 seconds left in the first half and then kick to Bethel Johnson again at the end?