A Bad Day at the Office

It happens.  On the plus side, the last time the Patriots lost to the Bills in Buffalo, New England went on to win the Super Bowl.  So, there’s that.

Cheer up!

Big Game Mentality

I find it hard to sit down and watch any game with absolute confidence that my heroic pigskin avatars will prevail.  That may sound funny coming from a Patriots fan; in the last five regular seasons, New England has won 63 and lost 17, a .788 winning percentage.  Anyone can have a bad day at the office but Tom Brady has had fewer than most.  I should worry?  But I do.  Even before the games I know they should certainly win (a home game against Miami in December) I suffer spectral anxieties about the rare happenstance only the most sophisticated of predictive analytics could account for.  I will regularly consider the game turning on a receiver slipping to the turf, turning a certain reception for a first down into a pick six.  That happens.  All the time…

Romo's Rib

So Washington defenders, or DeAngelo Hall anyway, have figured out that hitting a guy in the ribs who has a broken rib would likely result in said guy – Dallas QB Tony Romo – being rendered hors de combat.  And they decided to go public with this knowledge, totally dissing Jon Kitna.  I’m Jon Kitna, bitch!

Moving Day

Too soon?  Maybe not.  As bad as the odds to make the playoffs were for 0-2-0 teams the numbers are positively grim if you fall to 0-3-0.  The difference between 2-1-0 and 1-2-0?  In one case, you’ve got something to build on.  In the other, you have to remind everyone – especially yourself – that this is a long season, a marathon and not a sprint, plenty of time to turn things around…  Yeah, right.  As the kids say, destiny is not easy to run from…

A Small Data Sample

In honor of Week One:  We hurt each other.  In honor of Week Two: We do it again.

People and Things that Came Before

So, I guess the Dallas Cowboys will be playing the part of al Qaeda.

No Country for Old Linemen

Are the Patriots too old to win the Super Bowl?  If so, the Steelers are going to need canes, walkers and maybe even some of those awesome electric scooters I see advertised on TV if they’re going to make it to Indianapolis.  I mean, they’ll need planes and buses, too, of course.

The Constant

I was mentally prepared for the post-Favre era but an opening weekend without Peyton Manning?  I’m not sure I’m ready for that jelly.

Death by 27 Cuts

Hard to say there were any real surprises as the Patriots and 31 other NFL teams cut their rosters from 80 to 53.  The moving and shaking hasn’t stopped, of course. 

Not a Hater

As hard as I try, I just can’t be a hater.  I think I realized this when I could only name three movies to my Top 10 Hated Movies list.  I’m sure some have seen more but I have seen quite a few movies.  Doing some math in my head for a few seconds I came up with an estimate of 3,000.  Not all in the theater, of course.  I’m going to say 2,000 on tape or disk.  That’s like a tenth of a percent.  I feel like I should hate at least 1% of the time.  Only a robot could hate less than that.