Waiting for Monday Night

The locals are bracing for a pigskin tsunami of humiliation on a national stage this week. Monday Night Football. It’s the game that everyone else in the NFL is watching. The game every football fan is watching. No hiding place.

It’s a huge early season test for the Patriots. The Chiefs in Kansas City in front of a crowd determined to wrest the title of loudest crowd (on the Guinness Book of World Records scale) from the Seattle faithful of “12^th Man” fame. Part-man, part-machine ballers Tamba Hali, Dontari Poe and Justin Houston will feast on the weak and cowardly New England offensive line, rending their flesh and crushing their skulls before sucking the marrow from the bones of Tom Brady’s broken body.

Figuratively, of course.

 

Context is everything and I don’t mean the “2-1-0 and tied for the AFC Lead” context. I mean the Super Bowl context as in “this team doesn’t look good enough to win a Super Bowl.” It may not be fair but it definitely is what it definitely is. These are the New England Patriots, an annual favorite for the playoffs, led by HOF locks Bill Belichick and Tom Brady.

Or are they?

Was Bill Belichick outcoached by Joe “I don’t know who my starting QB is” Philbin in Week 1? Are we catching glimpses of Tom Terrific’s mortality? How much longer can we blame Nate “Turnstile” Solder and Danny Amendola’s inability to beat man-on-man coverage for Brady’s struggles?

Every dire possibility is on the table and nothing short of a blowout win in KC Monday night will cause the fanatical fringe elements of Patriots Nation to douse their torches and put their pitchforks back in the shed. A 9-3 win ain’t getting that done.

The O Word…

The offensive line has shouldered much of the blame for rather bleak statistical measures of Brady and the passing game. Although scientists have yet to measure exactly how much time Brady would need to find an open Danny Amendola, a little more time would clearly give Brady time to consider receivers other than Julian Edelman and Rob Gronkowski.

The trade of Logan Mankins has done little to improve pass protection but it has done some damage to the running game. Stevan Ridley (everyone knock wood with me – three times) hasn’t fumbled but he’s averaging a pedestrian 3.5 yards per carry and he’s worked hard to get that much out of his opportunities. Every team says they want to run a balanced offense and the Patriots are no different. (I suppose you could say they’ve achieved that by being mediocre in both facets of the offense.) At the moment the offensive line isn’t doing anything particularly well to the point where some pigskin pundits and bobbleheads have wondered if this group is even capable of doing anything particularly well. Since most of these guys have a track record I’m going to hold on hope they’ll get their act together at some point.

By Monday night? That may be too much to hope for.

But I’m hoping so.

All men are mortal; Tom Brady is a man…

Count me as one of those who didn’t see this coming, even after Bill Belichick used a 2^nd round pick on Jimmy Garoppolo. I thought Brady would flash his 2010-2012 form in 2014. Those rookie wide receivers – Aaron Dobson, Kenbrell Thompkins and Josh Boyce – were now second-year veterans. Amendola had a year in the system, too. Gronk would be back at some point and Ridley and Shane Vereen were in contract years. Brandon LaFell looked like a solid pick up in free agency. Julian Edelman would probably lead in receptions again but with all those options, he wouldn’t come close to 100 catches. 2010-2012? More like 2003-2004 when Brady would regularly complete passes to seven or eight different receivers in a game.

So, that hasn’t been happening.

It’s impossible for me to believe Brady has lost it so suddenly and so decisively. I’m not saying that in fact that hasn’t happened, just that I can’t believe it, can’t let myself believe it. In my mind, Tom Brady retires after throwing the come-from-behind game-winning touchdown pass in the final seconds of the Super Bowl.

That isn’t how these things end, though.

There are many factors at play here; the offensive line, the backs and receivers and Brady himself of course and that makes it all the more difficult to come to any conclusions but I feel fairly certain that Brady hasn’t lost it for one simple reason.

He hasn’t been benched or traded by Belichick.

This thing is going to get better. Perhaps as early as this Monday night.