At the beginning of the year did anyone see the Patriots as a 14-2 team? No.
But that does not *****-ing matter. They DID go 14-2 (#1) and were two home games (against a team they had just beat 45-3 and the historically owned Steelers) from going to the SUPER BOWL. Pre-season expectations are irrelevant, this team has proved they're a SB team since the Steelers game.
Do you know how rare an opportunity like that is? How can you just assume the Patriots will be right back next year? The NFL rarely works like that. Brady had an MVP season, the Patriots set a historical mark of excellence for turnover ratio and our offense was scoring 30+ points a game.
We blew an amazing opportunity to win a Super Bowl. I am not chalking it up as a "good rebuilding season" but rather "this is the third time we clearly should of won the SB and did not". Saying "oh well, good rebuilding seasons" assumes that the team will perform even better next year.
An amazing regular season completely down the drain, all for nothing. We won big, we blew out the elites, we won some tight ones and put together the 2nd most impressive regular season resume of the Belichick era. Hell, we even went into the playoffs EXACTLY how you want, playing your BEST football, off a huge winning streak and clicking on all cylinders, off a bye and against an inferior opponent.
I can't believe it.
Given that the season evolved the way it did, we all have every right to stand in disbelief that it ended the way it did yesterday for our MVP and his team. Personally, I found myself, a grown adult, being remonstrated by my young children that "Daddy, there isn't a microphone in the TV. They can't hear you screaming in Foxboro."
And, yes, indeed, I agree with those who observe that we lost another great opportunity in 2006 and, well, there's no need even to mention how we all felt when we realized that we were going to be "18--1."
If the glass is half empty, we are rooting for a team that has forgotten how to close and that now leaves its fans in perpetual "disbelief."
But if you look back at the Patriots' SB wins, each one of them left one or more teams and their fans in similar disbelief.
In 2001/02, we beat an arrogant Steelers team on their home turf in the AFCCG
without our starting QB. Then in the SB we beat a 14 point favorite that was being touted at the time as "the next dynasty." That's without even mentioning how the Raiders and their fans feel until this day about "the tuck." In one year, we left three good teams in disbelief.
In 2004/05, again, we thwarted the Steelers at home in a Championship game, leaving them with the disbelieving feeling that they were supposed to be the real dynasty. In 2003/04, we stole the dream of MVP Peyton Manning and the Colts on a memorable, snowy day in Foxboro.
That's football. That's the NFL.
A series of three or four single game "seasons" that determine who hoists the Lombardi and who stands "in disbelief," certain that they would have prevailed were it "best of five or seven."
Not convinced? Look back to the 1970's and 1980's when Landry and Staubach had the misfortune to lose two SB's in four years at the hands of Noll and Bradshaw. Look at a very good, Elway-led, Broncos team that fell in two of three SB's to Joe Gibbs and the Redskins and Joe Montana and the niners. Look at Bud Grant and Fran Tarkenton who lost three of four SB's to teams led by Shula, Noll and Madden.
We don't yet know where Ryan and Sanchez will end up in comparison to those other teams. A flash in the pan? Maybe. But they'll have been to the Conference Championship twice in a row, so we might have to recalibrate that assessment.
There's a reason that, across 44 years and their 88 contestants, only two franchises have been to more SB's than the Patriots six (Cowboys at eight and Steelers at seven) and that only three teams have won more titles than the Pats three (Steelers at six, Cowboys and niners at five) and that many other teams have ended their seasons "in disbelief."
I'm still furious at what happened yesterday and, yes, in a little disbelief. But, I don't see it as "completely down the drain, all for nothing." Franchises become "great" by competing in the trenches for a title, year after year. We may have come up short yesterday, but the Patriots have earned their place among the truly elite franchises of a very difficult league. We'll be back.
