As the week's "festivities" come to a close I felt the urge to rant a bit about the week's activities.
1. I've heard a lot of crap about how the loss of Patricia and McDaniels (and perhaps an additional assistant or 2) will somehow cripple the Pats in the future. I found that line of thinking odd since several teams have undergone much bigger coaching losses without this topic ever being brought up. The Cowboy's have virtually stripped their entire staff apart with no apparent negative effects. at least that's the impression the mediots are passing off. IIRC, the Giants, Panthers, and Vikings are other teams undergoing significant coaching losses. Why do the mediots harp on the Pats losses (especially the locals) in order to further the narrative that beginning Monday, this era is coming to a close, yet somehow the Cowboys future is looking up?
2. Granted I rarely can listen to Felger for more than 5 minutes before he or Mazz say something that makes my head explode and sends me back to NPR to cool off. Among the snippets I caught this week, was his CONTINUED insistence that the Garopolo trade was a huge mistake that everyone should finally admit to.
Regardless of the OBVIOUS facts facing the Pats with JG, Felger continues to troll the organization with this narrative.
Of course, only he would give a forum to well known Raven and Jets LB and a leading Pats hater, Bart Scott In one part of his diatribe, he claimed to know lots of former Pats players who found playing for the Pats a joyless and difficult experience. To his credit, Felger asked him to name a few. The only name he mentioned was Adalious Thomas, his former Ravens teammate. He also claimed BB totally misused his great talent.
Felger, as usual. forgets to mention to Scott that after BB cut that "extraordinary talent", he never played another game in the NFL.
At that point, I think I needed a dose of the music of the 70's and 80's on ROR
Here's the thing that most of these idiots don't seem to get. SURE BB could have left Thomas on the outside rushing the passer with great success and stats, but what about the OTHER ten guys. Football is a TEAM game and the way the Pats play defense a player has to be able to sacrifice his own personal stats for the team. Clearly, Thomas wasn't willing to do that and became very unhappy here.
3. This entire week all I have heard about is how great the Eagle front 4 is, and how lacking our group is. Now I know stats are for losers, but as bad as we complained about our pass rush, the Eagles had even fewer sacks than we did. And for all their vaunted pass rush PLUS the advantage of playing at home so far during the playoffs, they have only managed 4 sacks, while our sorry group somehow has somehow managed to get 11.
BTW- has anyone heard ANY mediot mention the fact that the defense has 11 sacks this playoff season? I know I haven't.
During the playoffs, the "dominant" defense of the Eagles has allowed exactly 8 yds less passing yard over 2 games. 10 less rushing yds. And a whopping 13 fewer yds in total defense per game.
So if the Eagle defense is "dominant", what does that make our group of no names.
I've also heard this week that the Eagle defense is among the worse in the league at defending between the hashes, which could be a bit inconvenient since that is where the Pats like to attack the most, AND they have trouble defending TE's.
Now THAT could be a problem.
So here's the thing. I know that if individual physical talent and draft position were all that mattered, only Trey Flowers and PERHAPS Malcolm Brown could make that 8 man Philly rotation and NONE of the LB's. For what it's worth, Pete Prisco rated both rosters 1-46 and only Brady, Gronk and Flowers made it to his top 1o. And the fact is that Prisco isn't wrong in his assessment. The Eagles DO have the "better" roster...but I think the Pats have the better TEAM. Which allows me the opportunity to say again, that in football the sum can be greater than the individual parts. and you KNOW how much I love to point that out.
I guess the point I want to make is that our defensive production has been completely disregarded by the mediots,
4. I'm getting tired of hearing about QB's with minimal experience being hyped like they are 10-year success stories. I love JG as much as the next guy, but Christ, he only started 4 freakin games. How quickly we have forgotten how HARD it is to maintain excellence at the QB position. Didn't RGIII have one of the most impressive rookie seasons of any QB in recent memory? How many times have guys Marriota, Winston, and Carr flashed, only to regress at times. Dak Prescott is ANOTHER young QB who regressed after a superb rookie campaign. Dashawn Watson is another guy who has already being anointed as the "next great thing" despite a very VERY short resume.
Now ALL these guys have a lot of POTENTIAL, but can we hold off, just a little before we canonize them. The fact is that Tom Brady is a better QB than JG, and the Pats simply ran out of time to keep him. End of story. But not if you are a mediot looking for a narrative to beat Bellichick over the head with something.
5. While the Eagle front 4 is good and Fletcher Cox is great, But I believe that the Pats have played several front 4's that are just as good and functioned well against them. By this time, the Philly front 7 has been build up to the point of ridiculousness, especially for a group that puts down QB's even less than we do.
Now I have serious concerns about the DEPTH of the Eagle pass rush and that it is unlikely the Pats will be able to wear down their pass rush late in the game like they have so many other good pass rushing teams. And while I won't be surprised to see Brady taken down 2 or 3 times this game, I don't see them being able to CONSISTENTLY stop our passing attack over the course of this game.
6. I am truly saddened by the hate the Pats have received over these 2 weeks. I GET the whole "Patriot fatigue" thing. And I get the Eagles underdog narrative as well. They are a nice story, and if the Jags had won, I'd probably be rooting for them too. But SO ARE WE. 34% of our roster wasn't deemed good to even be drafted. Isn't that a great story? How come it hasn't gotten any traction? In fact, why are the Eagles even being looked at as the underdogs? THEY have all the all pros. THEY were the #1 seed in their conference. THEY are 15-3 too. Aren't WE t"he little engine that could" At a bunch of no-name retreads and nobodies led by a 40 year old great desperately trying to hang on to the spotlight. Where is THAT narrative?
7/ And then there are the LIES. I have come to the very sad and frustrating realization that in today's society everyone is allowed to have their own personal "truth" REAGARDLESS of the facts that pertain to them. How many times are the facts put out there that Deflategate was a clear and obvious fraud and that "spygate" was literally "much ado about nothing:" Yet the stink of the cheating label persists.
So many articles and analyses have proven beyond ANY doubt that the Pats have been defrauded of millions of dollars, multiple first round picks and their good reputation, yet the stink still prevails. The latest I heard was the Colt LB that supposedly started the entire thing with his pick, completely debunked the league narrative about how he thought tthe ball was deflated. Yet the story came and went almost without comment. SOOOOO frustrating.
8. ANOTHER rant that I forgot to add to the original and that was that the common wisdom that the Seattle coaching staff blew the Superbowl with that pass play on the GL. I hate that point of view because it demeans the play spectacular play that Browner and Butler made.
Collingworth could wait to point out what a horrible call it was, and even Zolack was being Zo in saying it was a horrible call. I NEVER thought it was a bad call WHEN you have all the info. And before I get into the details it should be noted that no one less than BB told Zolack he was wrong in his opinion. In the NYT's article on Zolack he recounted Bill explaining why it was a reasonable call.
a. If the Seahawks wanted to run a pass in this sequence, THIS was the down to do it.
b. The Pats' GL defense gave them a numerical advantage should Seattle decide to run the ball
c. Against a similar defense earlier in the game, Lynch failed to get a 3rd and short.
d. Over the course of the season, Lynch was something like 1-7 or 1-8 in similar situations in converting the play for a TD or first down.
e. The chances of Lynch fumbling on a run were about the same as there being an interception on a pass. Both being very, very low.
So given all this plus the fact that even if the play isn't successful there was a 99% chance they'd be able to line up again and run it TWICE if they wanted. When you coach you cannot play call for a 1-2% negative possibility.
Instead, I think they should spend more time dwelling on the remarkable play Butler made on the ball, and that he had the ability to not only break up the play but to go after the ball and get it despite the collision that was violent enough to knock the receiver as backward. This shouldn't be about the call, but about the great play that was made.
9. And that reminds of another quick rant. It drives me nuts when the mediots complain about Atlanta NOT running the ball, and then just a year later they complain about Jacksonville NOT passing it.
Have they no shame at all. Don't they see the hypocrisy of these two narratives? I hate it because they present that opinion that the Pats never WIN Superbowl, it's just their opponents lose them.
OK, I have been informed that I have gone well past the recognized limit of
allowed for good taste and told I will have to end this before I used any more. Enjoy the game on Sunday and thanks for allowing me to relieve myself of all this angst.
