- Joined
- Jul 11, 2005
- Messages
- 16,910
- Reaction score
- 31,517
OF COURSE we can. Don't you see how NARROW the margin is between victory and defeat. We saw it all last year. KC had remarkable luck and mental toughness that good teams have. But each week they were getting by, by the skin of their teeth with the break of a key mistake by their opponent, or a timely call by the refs. They won double digit one score games and could just as easily been a .500 team if things hadn't broken their way so often.
Now the Pats ALSO won a LOT of those kinds of games over the years. You tend to get that when you have a top QB, good coaching, and CONTINUITY. How many times did we see the Pats, at the height of their power squeak by bad Jet and Bill teams when they screwed up at the end of games.
So it IS possible, all the way to the Super Bowl a la 2001. EVERY NFL team can hit lightning in bottle for a season and win a ton of close games they could just as easily lost. Just like we see highly anticipated teams watch it all go into the ****ter like the Niners this year.
Another point - How are we evaluating this team on the first of April. We don't even have a draft class, nor can we evaluate that draft class in April. We will barely be able to do so in December, especially the lower rounds. There are still around $50+MM worth of FA's to add as well.
Hard to judge the talent without knowing the schemes they will run on offense or defense. With a rookie QB not nearly as good as the one we have now, Josh put together a VERY respectable offense that year and the WR's and I would opine that the OL, and WR etc. were, at least on paper, were not any better than they are right now. I would say that we are actually already better.
We sucked at getting TO's last season. If that area alone improves dramatically, the win total will rise significantly. ALL those little things like did we miss playing against a top player on a particular game that made it easier to win. IF we play 4 or 5 games against back up QB's over the course of the season. That helps. If this staff can consistently come up with solid game plans week to week, that can change week to week depending on who we play. And that will be hard to do no matter how good they are because it still is a NEW staff, first time working together as a unit and there will be growing pains there as well.
So COULD we be in the race for a playoff berth going into the last few weeks of the season. ABSOLUTELY. In fact, I will be mildly surprised if we aren't. It's a tough league to win in, and a great majority of the players are JAGs. It's how those teams evolve over the team building process and become the team they become have a massive impact on the win total.
Talented groups of individuals can sometimes NOT gel into a great team and teams will lesser talent can often end up being MORE than the sum of those individual parts. We saw it so often in the first 2 decades of the century. But here's the thing, we have no clue at this point what's going to happen. We can only watch it unfold
Just sayin'
Now the Pats ALSO won a LOT of those kinds of games over the years. You tend to get that when you have a top QB, good coaching, and CONTINUITY. How many times did we see the Pats, at the height of their power squeak by bad Jet and Bill teams when they screwed up at the end of games.
So it IS possible, all the way to the Super Bowl a la 2001. EVERY NFL team can hit lightning in bottle for a season and win a ton of close games they could just as easily lost. Just like we see highly anticipated teams watch it all go into the ****ter like the Niners this year.
Another point - How are we evaluating this team on the first of April. We don't even have a draft class, nor can we evaluate that draft class in April. We will barely be able to do so in December, especially the lower rounds. There are still around $50+MM worth of FA's to add as well.
Hard to judge the talent without knowing the schemes they will run on offense or defense. With a rookie QB not nearly as good as the one we have now, Josh put together a VERY respectable offense that year and the WR's and I would opine that the OL, and WR etc. were, at least on paper, were not any better than they are right now. I would say that we are actually already better.
We sucked at getting TO's last season. If that area alone improves dramatically, the win total will rise significantly. ALL those little things like did we miss playing against a top player on a particular game that made it easier to win. IF we play 4 or 5 games against back up QB's over the course of the season. That helps. If this staff can consistently come up with solid game plans week to week, that can change week to week depending on who we play. And that will be hard to do no matter how good they are because it still is a NEW staff, first time working together as a unit and there will be growing pains there as well.
So COULD we be in the race for a playoff berth going into the last few weeks of the season. ABSOLUTELY. In fact, I will be mildly surprised if we aren't. It's a tough league to win in, and a great majority of the players are JAGs. It's how those teams evolve over the team building process and become the team they become have a massive impact on the win total.
Talented groups of individuals can sometimes NOT gel into a great team and teams will lesser talent can often end up being MORE than the sum of those individual parts. We saw it so often in the first 2 decades of the century. But here's the thing, we have no clue at this point what's going to happen. We can only watch it unfold
Just sayin'
Last edited:
