Why on Earth would you want to be fool enough to think you've got the 1985 Bears when you've got the 2008 Lions?
OF COURSE being a fan should be an exercise in attempted objectivity, some of the time. Your team plays a limited number of minutes, in a limited number of games. Willingly being wrong about that team 24/7 makes no sense.
Deus Irae,
It depends on why you are following sports. Of course, I would agree objectivity is absolutely essential if I were gambling heavily on the outcome. But I purposely don't gamble. This is relaxation and only escapist entertainment, for me, relief when my profession demands constant objective reality, otherwise.
For others such as yourself, objective realism in this activity is more important, and it is what it is now; and not what it will or may be. tomorrow.
The Patriots may not be the '85 Bears, who won for only 18 months with very good talent, and a gimmick overload defense; but they are not the 2008 Lions, either.
After planning and drafting to do so, Belichick consciously tore apart, and is in the midst of rebuilding the Offensive line. He is doing it to overcome the size, talent and age limitations that became apparent, largely only, against teams with good lines in the penultimate games.
I have seen him do that for all of the other squads in turn, the LBs, the CBs etc. and it hurts the team while undergoing the transformation early in the long season. But he judged those changes necessary, and history has proved him largely correct.
Accepting the Mankins trade opportunity, revamping further than planned, may just have been a "Bridge too Far" in 2014. We shall see, and that makes it fun and interesting for me.
It is also a great intellectual and instructive exercise to watch a Maestro at his work. I believe I can see what he aims to accomplish, and can anticipate what the team will be like when done. So I can ignore the blood and surgical pain.
I believe BB is building a dominant team, greater than any he has fielded to date. It may not be ready yet, it is almost complete. But I think the Team he is constructing will become and remain dominant for the balance of the 'teens.
With the defense now very good, young and reconstructed, one more draft for D and O linemen and a LB is all that remains to do, other than replacing unanticipated career terminations and retaining key players, et cetera.
How Maestro Belichick has manipulated the CAP for today, and juggled it for tomorrow, is also fascinating exercise to follow in itself. It is reassuring that he can keep the planned, coming, construct together, too .
