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February 4th, 2008
02:13 pm - Superbowl
Dear Patriots:
Oh, gee. Someone finally figured out how to beat you.
It took all season, and eighteen games, but the Giants figured out how to shut down your offense, and you lost. Naturally, there are millions of other reasons. You always manage at least one or two stinker games per season, and maybe this was the one (though you picked a hell of a time for it). You were distracted by the media. You were pressured by impossible expectations. Tom Brady had a bad ankle. Tom had a bad game. Your defense finally got tired at the very end.
You and your coach pretend that your almost-perfect season was all for nothing, since you didn't win the Super Bowl. Maybe you feel that way, but I saw you all holding your heads high as you walked out of that tunnel at the end of the game, and I think you still had a season you could be proud of, deep down.
To me, nothing takes away from the fact that you won every single regular season game. As one of your opponent's coaches put it a few weeks ago, "Who does that?" Only the very best teams in the history of American sports ever do that.
Yes, you choked last night. It hurts, but really, it's not the end of the world. Thanks, boys, for a fantastic season!
Current Mood: resigned
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January 26th, 2008
11:17 pm - We're on HBO! (Not really, but...)
http://www.hbo.com/infl/video/
On the drop down list, pick "Inside the NFL: Fan Life: Full Tilt Full Time". Take ten minutes and watch.
This video essay is about our friend Randy. It is also, secondarily, about Tedy Bruschi and the New England Patriots, and about the fan community that has built up around Randy. His story is tremendously inspirational; please watch it sometime between now and the Super Bowl. Meanwhile, the Patriots are making history as one of the best teams in football, ever, and Randy is one of their most interesting and well-known fans. I am so, so grateful to be a part of this community.
By the way, Rich appears in several spots in this clip. And Matthew makes a cameo appearance for a couple of seconds -- look for the baby who glances disdainfully at the camera and crawls away. :-) (I was interviewed too, but thank goodness, they didn't use any of my footage!)
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January 23rd, 2007
11:07 pm - Oh yeah -- the Patriots.
We did, in fact, do something more exciting this week than take photos of Matthew. We went to Zip's place on Sunday night and watched the Patriots play the Colts for the AFC championship.
Ohhh boy. Where to start?
First of all, my aunt is a Peyton Manning fan. It's a Mississippi thing, in her case, but the man has a lot of fans around the country. No rings yet, unlike Tom Brady, and she and I tease each other every season about the merits of our respective quarterbacks. Anyway, she left me a phone message right at the end of Sunday's game. I haven't heard it yet, but I just dread listening to it. Yep. I'm bitter.
Maybe we Patriot fans have gotten just a little bit spoiled. If a season ends with anything less than a trip to the Super Bowl, we view it as a failure. On the one hand, that's a whacked-out perspective. By definition, only two teams get there; no fan base should be ashamed of a team that gets to the final four and loses there, or we'd have a lot of miserable and ungrateful fans all over the country.
On the other hand, is it so wrong to expect excellence?
Especially when you KNOW the team has it in them? We've seen flashes of greatness in this season's Patriots. Our defense was fantastic during most games. The passing game actually worked well, despite the loss of our best receivers, and despite Tom Brady's mediocre performance through much of the season. Laurence Maroney gave us a revitalized running game, and he and Corey Dillon were unstoppable for a while there. "Ghost" Gostkowski, the rookie kicker, may yet fill Vinatieri's shoes; he got noticeably better over the season, and ended up being a good clutch player in the end. Troy Brown saved the season at least twice, even though he's almost as old as I am. And I'm always amazed by how well new players get integrated into the team. Jabbar who? How the hell did this guy end up being Brady's best receiver in the post-season?
Boston's a tough crowd to play for. I blame the Red Sox, myself. Either that or the general grumpiness that seems endemic to New England.
Oh, forget all that. The real issue here is the Colts. We had an 18-point lead, then choked and lost to the Colts, of all teams! That's bitter. I'd almost rather have lost to the Chargers last week, just so we fans could hold unchallenged the belief that the Patriots really were better than the Colts this year. (They're not. We know that for sure now.)
The national media is making it worse. They seem to have decided that the Patriots are the bad guys this year, and the poor ringless Colts are the good guys. Ah, how times have changed since 2001! I guess being consistently excellent, year after year, despite sickness and injury and salary caps, makes people tired of you. They want the next underdog story.
Either that or we Patriots fans have gotten insufferable. Entitled. Could be, y'know.
I should just suck it up and call my aunt. I should be gracious and tell her that the Colts really were better this year, that Manning was better than Brady, and that they deserved the win. I should smile and say that just getting to the AFC Championship was enough for me -- woo, two extra post-season games! -- and I don't really expect the Pats to get to the Super Bowl every year.
Do I actually believe all that?
I'm not telling. :-)
Current Mood: ![[mood icon]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/mood/classic/angry.gif) aggravated
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