Were you a big Dillon fan when he was here?

PatriotsReign said:

Good soldier-type players are the reason why the Patriots have gone to 4 super bowls and won 3 since 2001. I LOVE those type players, but I love a coach who can sell that to NFL stars even more.

My point was that I'm ok if we sign a bad-soldier now and then (Dillon, Moss) as well. If you look at the history of bad-soldiers in New England, you'll find that they fail far more often than they succeed.

Dillon quit on Cinci....and? So what? He didn't quit on the Pats in 2004 and I'll take that one year since it resulted in a championship. I can also separate my appreciation for a player vs. his personal life. Moss was a strange character, but what a player he was to watch!

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Again, I said I appreciated what Dillon did for the team. Doesn't mean I gotta buy his jersey and root for him making the the Pro Bowl or what ever personal achievements. I never rooted against the guy, but I rooted for the uniform when he was here.

I don't understand why people have a problem with this. Many of the Pats fans who love Dillon rip fans of other teams who root for similar character guys on their team. I am just not a guy who is a fan of individual players on the Patriots who are players that I would ridicule other team fans for rooting for. I don't root for them to fail, but that doesn't mean I have to be a fan of their's and ignore the rest because they have a Flying Elvis on their uniform. If Dillon was a Jet instead of a Patriot, many Pats fans who loved the guy would say "Jets fans are classless for rooting for a wife beater who quit on his former team".

I thought Dillon was a scumbag before he came to the Patriots. I am not going to be a hypocrite and be a fan of his just because he was a Patriot. He proved after he retired that he was always a scumbag. I am a fan of the New England Patriots not every player on the roster. There are players today that I am not a fan of for various reasons (mostly because they are underperformers at the moment though).

MoLewisrocks said:

Which Corey did...for one year. Clock killin' Corey Dillon was also one and done Corey Dillon. And I don't think he hit a wall physically so much as he got what he wanted and became complacent. One of Bill's bigger mistakes in judgement was signing him to an extension after 2004 rather than letting him play out the string in 2005. Which of course led to the Maroney era...

Good soldiers are how Bill wins wars.

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You've got to be kidding. He stepped up when they had zero running backs and played on a high ankle sprain when he should have been on crutches. You don't remember him slicing through the line sideways because he only had one leg he could push on?

'04 Patriots...best Pats team of all time ('07 be damned) and Dillon was the battering ram that help position this team on top of the pile. Teams just couldn't handle his 4th quarter poundings. The term "bend but don't break" was not in our vocabulary then because the Pats owned the field....what a year. The Pats dominance in '04 was on par with the dominance of the '85-'86 Celtics...a team built to dominate. You knew the '04 Patriots and '85-6 Celtics would roll and rule. It was just a matter of collecting the hardware at the end of the season. I'm starting to believe this Bruins team may join this list.

I'm not even sure that this is a serious thread, but I recognize the OP and I know that he is not a troll, so I'll answer the question seriously.

Absolutely! While Dillon was at the end of his career and Welker was ready to take off in his, I think that those, along with Randy Moss for 2007, represent the most significant active player additions that the Pats have made under Belichick. I put Dillon with Welker, whose own contributions span multiple seasons, because he helped make that 2004 team my personal favorite of the entire BB/Brady era.

Loved Clock Killin Corey Dillon!!

One of my favorite Belichick moments was in the locker room late in the '04 season. Belichick yells out, "Where's Corey Dillon?, Hey Corey, you ever been to the playoffs? Well, you're going to the playoffs." The locker room erupted, Dillon looked like he was going to cry.

Yes, it was a very good show, had a great time ... oh wait

Bob Dylan with the Grateful Dead Live Vol 1 BobsBoots - Bootleg CD-

Brady_to_Moss said:

I remember when the pats got him..i was on a school trip in New Orleans. I was pumped to get him..my buddy's not so much. Bought his jersey. And ever since that game in the snow vs the colts..he is one of my favorite pats backs behind faulk.

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Funny I remember the day we got him too. It was Patriot's Day 2004. That same day was the Boston Marathon and the Red Sox beat the Yankees

Big, big fan of Dillon. Loved him while he was here.

Big fan...as soon as we signed him I knew we would win back to back championships. We have had no real run game since him...

WhiZa said:

Funny I remember the day we got him too. It was Patriot's Day 2004. That same day was the Boston Marathon and the Red Sox beat the Yankees

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I see selective memory has you forgetting that the Boston Bruins lost to the Montreal Canadiens in a Game 7 shutout that day too. I try to forget this, too. It's made easier now by the fact that the Bruins have won the Stanley Cup.

In all seriousness though, I absolutely LOVED Corey Dillon that first year. After all, how can you not like a guy that averaged over 100 yards a game. The guy was an absolute beast.

The Patriots won Super Bowls with Antwain Smith, so adding Corey Dillon was almost unfair for the rest of the league.

Skeptical at first but it didn't take me long to be a big Dillon fan when he was here. I wish we could pick up someone close to his ability to keep defenses honest and off Brady. I have no doubt that if he was on the team they would have won in 2007.

I was nervous when we got him, liked him when he was playing well, then kind of soured on him when he went downhill and started complaining. A true fair weather fan am I.

Re-watch 3 games to glory, 2004 edition. There was never a moment where you can confuse Corey Dillon of being a bad seed. He was indeed a good soldier, always respectful, his teammates and coachs loved him.

Corey "clock killing" dillion is one of my favorite patriot players of all time.

That's why i always laugh when you guys compare him to the law firm

coolguy said:

Corey "clock killing" dillion is one of my favorite patriot players of all time.

That's why i always laugh when you guys compare him to the law firm

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Nobody has compared him to BJGE, that's in your imagination. If you still insist, please give a specific example.

2004 Dillon > any other single season performance by a Pats RB I've seen (following since 93).

It's too bad he went downhill so fast after that, still well worth the 2nd rounder though.

RayClay said:

You've got to be kidding. He stepped up when they had zero running backs and played on a high ankle sprain when he should have been on crutches. You don't remember him slicing through the line sideways because he only had one leg he could push on?

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Agreed. It was all about injuries with Dillon after 2004. Not surprising with a running back with that much wear on the tires.

I actually recall that he was in great shape at the start of 2006 training camp, and looked like the old Cory in the first preseason game. Then he got injured again.

That's what happens with older players: it's not so much that their skills decline, so much as that they're more easily injured, and most importantly they take a lot longer to recover from injury. As Stephen Neal said, playing NFL football is like being in a car wreck every Sunday. Players pack it in when they can't recover fast enough between games to be effective.

PatsDeb said:

I was nervous when we got him, liked him when he was playing well, then kind of soured on him when he went downhill and started complaining. A true fair weather fan am I.

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Nothing wrong with being a homer Deb...most of us are just that.

Honestly, I hated the move, since I wanted us to draft Steven Jackson, but that season was amazing and was my favorite back since C Mart.

And its funny, at work I was talking to an Eagles fan about that Indy playoff game when people were talking about the cold for Saturday's game. Might throw Three Games to Glory on to watch that game again, since I even mentioned Dillon in the second half destroying that Indy defense.

I was young when this move was made, but I remember loving it. Loved it even more after the Divisional round against the Colts. I can remember Manning's face on the sidelines as Dillon was running over and through just about everyone in the Colts secondary.