Bettah

Got to admit, I did not see that coming. Not 43-21.

 

On a night the New England Patriots honored 22 of its championship years heroes, the 2014 edition looked very much like those teams that won three Super Bowls from 2001-2004. Creative and disruptive on defense, scoring touchdowns on special teams and on offense, well, two words: Tom Brady.

You remember Tom Brady. The formerly elite QB the pigskin world had left for dead in Kansas City a little over a month ago? Yeah. That guy. In the five games since Pigskin Jesus rose from the dead, he has 18 TD passes against just 1 INT.

Brady’s Bettah!

He improved his record at Gillette to 100-16. Seriously. 100-16. (For those of you without a calculator handy, that’s an 86.20689655172414% winning percentage.) 100-16! In his 200^th start he notched his 155^th victory (77.5%) and improved his record in cold weather games (40F and below) to 33-4 (89.18918918918919%). He passed John Elway for most yards passing, career thanks to 333 yards passing. He’s married to a super model and he looks like one.

I know all these numbers are readily available to you so repeating them here is probably unnecessary. But fun, nonetheless. So fun.

100-16!

In dismantling what many pigskin pundits and bobbleheads consider the most complete team in the league, Bill Belichick was just being Bill Belichick.

If you knew before kickoff that Peyton Manning would throw for 438 yards, who would you have bet the mortgage on? If you knew Demaryius Thomas and Emmanuel Sanders would total 17 catches for 278 yards, would you have taken the Patriots +4?

“Multiple guys make multiple plays to score points. That’s the idea. It’s not stats this, stats that. We’re not playing fantasy football here.”

-Bill Belichick

Once again, Belichick proved himself right when he said, “stats are for losers.” The Broncos ran more plays, held a slight advantage in time of possession and outgained the Patriots by nearly 100 yards (472-398) and lost by 22 points.

It may seem obvious that the only thing that matters is the final score but it seems that Belichick understands this ineluctable concept better than most. He will identify an opponent’s key strength and nullify it. He will recognize a team’s weakness and take advantage of it with brutal efficiency.

“He can take his'n and beat your'n and take your'n and beat his'n.”

-Bum Phillips

Belichick also seems to be able to identify a player’s strengths and put that player in a position to succeed. Perhaps the most famous example of Belichick’s pigskin acumen is Mike Vrabel; the most recent may be Akeem Ayers, whose 4^th down sack of Manning was one of the many big plays last Sunday.

Is there anything Bill Belichick doesn’t know about football? His brain is a seeming TARDIS of pigskin knowledge.

Belichick and Brady.

The whole is greater than the sum of the parts. I can’t do the math but I know it’s true.

 

 

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