AzPatsFan

I am glad that people are beginning to comprehend the "Annuity Aspects" of the ingenious way Bill Belichick goes about harvesting the banking of his high, Draft picks.

But there is also an insidious thing occurring too.

Last year there started to be the first truly ugly and venomous criticisms of Bill Belichick. It started with the genuine knot heads and ignorami. We all know who they are. They are egged on by Internet and Media slugs.

This season the venomous criticism spread to the momentary discombobulation of even sane posters. We have all seen it. Its like defining deviancy downward.

I saw what happened to my favorite NFL, non AFL, team in Cleveland. The rumors started that Coach Paul Brown had the "...game pass him by". "Even though he gets to the Championship game, the Browns don't win it, anymore." Soon the only Team named for the Coach, fired him. Even though he was a minority partner, to boot.

I saw what happened in Miami. "What has Shula done for us lately? All he ever does is produce winning seasons but no Super bowls". Soon enough Don Shula was history.

Paul Brown came back to build and win a championship with his own expansion club. The Man in the Fedora proved that "..the game did NOT pass him by..."

Don Shula never came back. But their teams, the Browns and the Dolphins have won exactly a pile of horse manure since, these two great Hall of Fame Coaches were driven out of town, by the Ignoratti, and Ignorami.

Now, I see the same process occurring and taking shape here in New England. Patriot fans, Wake Up.

DarrylS

There are some who want a quick fix and put all the chips in.. but many of us can see that this team is being rebuilt for the long haul, what many cannot recognize is that this team is being rebuilt without missing a beat.

Last year we upgraded out TE's, ST's and DB's.. this year we spent capital on the O Line, DB, RB and more ST's..

The Kraft Family and most of the football intelligencia can see this, but wait until tommorrow Callahan, Dennis, Felger, Mazarotti and the rest of the mediots will make an effort to whip the crowd into a frenzy.

Remember last year driving home in the "hurricane", and some mediot was on Damon Liquidiara(sic) amd he was saying that BB was past his prime and should retire, how did that 14-2 work out for you Damon you azzclown???

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"Being the best doesn't mean you always win. It just means you win more than anyone else".. tweet from Kurt Warner to Tom Brady.

Box_O_Rocks

Mel Kiper knows more than BB - he said so, it must be true.

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"Avert thine eyes! You're not hot enough to be looking at me."
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Coach42

People generally think teams should draft for need the Patriots don't and it drives them crazy.

Personally I'm stoked to possibly have power football back in my life. Gronkowski, Solder, Mankins, Koppen, Cannon, Vollmer, Smith, with Ridley or BJGE is an imposing Two TE power set. Maybe now we can actually make teams respect our run game. The Jets certainly didn't in the playoff loss.

jeffbiologist

First, dont exaggerate for effect. Comparing BBs criticizm in the age of the internet to Shula or Brown is bad form. Apples and Oranges. BB has put HIMSELF in the spotlight/crosshairs during the draft process with all the moves he makes. Hard to argue it any other way. Fact is he has gained picks, but % wise he still isnt that much better than many other teams. Fans get aggrovated when we come up 1-2 plays short, 1-2 players short of winning that playoff game. When we have traded that missing all pro player away for a future pick and dont replace him we pull our hair out for good reason. We HAD THE MEANS TO MAKE THIS TEAM BETTER AND DIDNT DO IT! If I have a choice of winning the next 2 Super Bowls and then losing both BB and TB or have another 6 years like the last 6......No contest, you play to win the Super Bowl!

supafly

Jeff--my gosh buddy, you are on a ROLL lately

First of all, sometimes the ball just bounces the wrong way...a la 2007 perfect season SB vs the NYG. How many times is that ball going to stick to the side of his helmet like that?? (Not to mention all of the 'other' things that happened..no holding call, multiple dropped INT's, etc) In a game such as this, all you can do is try and put yourself and your team in the best position to win. I think we can all agree that Belichick has done that, in a very high percentage of games.

As far as the Seymour situation goes--we have no insight at all into what went down, or the thinking behind it. None, whatsoever. I can pretty much guarantee you one thing--Seymour would not have made anywhere close to the money (guaranteed or otherwise) that he will make after the next 2 yrs with the Raiders. They gave him what? Close to 15 million a year? That's almost 2x what Wilfork is making (approx. on average annual/per). I do not think that Seymour is worth all of that, as much as I do miss him. We made a choice to re-sign the supposed staple of our 3-4 defense at NT, thinking that we could take a step or two down at RDE, all while gaining a high first rd draft pick. The decision has been made, and that is that. Stop the nonsense of thinking that Seymour's replacement was just there for the picking!! You cannot predict what next year's draft will bring as far as trying to 'replace' him (not sure that you really can), or even this year's free agency. In other words, yes we took a couple steps down at that specific position, but how many steps UP did we take at other positions??

The statement of 'you play to win the SB' is not going to be agree upon here either, at least not in the context you are speaking in. Of course that is the ultimate goal, but at what cost?? Do you want to be like teams such as MIN, PHI, DAL, etc who try and get flashy players to 'go for it' that one time, or do you want CONSISTENCY?? I would much rather have the almost guaranteed playoff berth, be it wildcard or not, every single year--than a one SB team who will likely not make it back.

I believe we have a gift, and I am NOT a 'homer.' What we are witnessing is a very good run of enjoyable football, coaching, and management that is rare. Go ahead and root for your flavors of the month, and year in and year out this will still be a double digit winning team with a great chance at making the playoffs. Are you forgetting that most so-called experts and posters on this site had NE as a 10-6 team last year?? It was supposed to be a rebuilding year, yet they went 14-2 and had a 50/50 shot of hosting the AFCCG with an extremely young team + a bunch of has beens and nobodys.

And if you're serious about winning 2 more SB's and giving up both Brady and Belichick, that is your opinion, but I do not share it personally. I would much rather have a 'shot' every year for 10 more years guaranteed.

You cannot win the SB every year, or else the magic and the incredible feeling wouldn't be there when/if it does happen. You talk of the 'last 5-6 yrs' as if they totally sucked, but please look at what happened:

--06 AFCCG (hosted wildcard game)
--07 AFCCG and SB berth (hosted 2 playoff games)
--08 11-5 record despite Brady getting hurt in quarter 1 of game 1 (became the first team in 16 gm season not to make the post-season with an 11-5 record)
--09 Probably our 'worst' season in a while, since '05 anyway (still hosted a playoff game--talk about spoiled..)
--10 14-2 season, gained #1 overall seed + best record in the NFL with an extremely young team. Got rid of Moss early to boot--proved to a LOT of people that they are still quite a force to be reckoned with (again, hosted a playoff game)

Are you serious? (I would argue that almost ALL teams with the exception of Pittsburgh would have traded anything to have these chances). Like I said, sometimes the ball just bounces the wrong way. Just think of all of the great times, and enjoyable Sundays that you have had during these last 5-6 years!!

Dude, with all due respect--please come back in from the ledge. We are here for you, and you are going to end up stepping the wrong way

MaineMan

Fortunately, for the rest of us, Bob Kraft is not Art Modell or even Dean Spanos.