"A Patriots centric sportswriter...."
The mere act of you writing that term shows your basic misunderstanding of the actual situation and what is at work there.
It is something that has been at work for over 15 years.
Anyone who knows the history of this "journalist" knows he wants to set the Patriots and the Kraft family up for the biggest negative financial fallout possible when the winning years are over. Shaughnessy and The Globe are out for a HARD LANDING for the business in Foxboro. it is all about economics. Those who don't want to pay attention can remain lemmings.
If you don't know the motivation of a writer (after being shown the ample history and evidence) and continue to close your eyes and make blind statements, then that is your choice.
Now read closely, because here is the CORE to this whole matter that most (Shaughnessy hopes) miss:
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Shaughnessy doesn't give a whit how and whether this affects the Texans. He is merely attempting to mold New England fans' opinions to cause the greatest amount of overconfidence and thereby (someday) mass economic fallout when the winning stops. The moment it dawns that his writings are NOT aimed at the players but at the regional economic market is when the lightbulb will light up for you.
Money makes the world go round.
Shaughnessy counts on the readership to remain malleable fodder.
.
Shmessy, reach for the decaf and remove the tinfoil hat before writing.
"Patriots centric sportswriter" = a writer employed by a media outlet to pen columns regarding the Patriots of the NFL.
Motivation for the column is irrelevant, the description applies. Now if you want to argue what skills it takes to be a sports writer? There will be common ground.
occam's razor (interpreted): The simplest explanation is probably right.
Explanation 1: CHB has written his column with a 'Lois Einhorn-Ray Finkle out to eventually get even with Dan Marino' diabolical plot to aid in financially ruining the Kraft family who he and his company blames for ruining the Red Sox (Shout out to Ace Ventura).
Explanation 2: He is a blowhard ***hat who penned an attention grabbing column. Just about every rabid sports town has their blowhard ***hats who write biting, attention grabbing columns to sell advertising at a higher rate for their employer which eventually leads to their own greater financial success (regardless of their personal like/dislike of the team's owner).
Apply the above interpreted version of occam's razor.
So let's examine the content for obvious lies/inaccuracies: Is what he wrote baseless (regardless of his motivation and his use of exaggerated wording)? While us fans rehash the Monday night win and find ways to see how this Sunday's game will be much closer and the Texans are a formidable difficult team to beat (myself included), the cold hard reality is the Texans haven't really played to a level in some weeks that would be good enough to beat a Patriots team in Foxboro that plays up to their normal standards. Sorry for the disrespect to Texans fans but that just is reality. The Texans are a team that said they are playing the game of their franchise just several weeks ago and got embarrassingly walloped! A couple weeks later this a team that went into Indy with
TONS riding on the game (another franchise game?) and got not so difficultly bested by an Indy team that, IMHO, would also have little chance of beating the Patriots in Foxboro this Sunday. This is a team last week that was playing, at home, arguably the worst team in the entire NFL playoff field where the QB had something like 40 yards of passing at halftime and didn't successfully convert a single third down -- and they beat them by 6 points where I don't think they lead by more than a TD beyond a few minutes.
But hey, maybe CHB is an evil genius. He has used the truth to set up a no lose situation for himself. They Patriots beat the Texans and he was right! If they lose to the Texans it furthers the diabolical plot. Damn, CHB is smarter than I gave him credit for....
But here is some bad news for you, his/their diabolical plot has succeeded before it was let out of the barn. Why? Fans/the fickle nature of the human condition already have it 95% covered for him/them. Look around and see how the fervor for a team plummets if they field losing teams. Yet pass the word onto Bob Kraft about the diabolical plot (if he doesn't already know). I'm sure CHB and his gang of mentally giant conspirators will keep Bob Kraft up at night
(fyi, all columnists rely on readers)