Something Special

I’m about to get way ahead of myself here but I’m not the only one. National pigskin pundits and bobbleheads have ceded the AFC to the Patriots and started wondering if there’s a team that has a chance to beat them in the Super Bowl. The calculus of the statistically minded says Tom Brady has never been better. Local fanboys have noted the 2016 team is as Patrioty as any Patriots team ever.

Yeah, I’m going to go out on a limb here. I think we’re watching something special happen.

Okay, so let’s get all the usual and customary caveats out of the way.

1. Still a long way to go.
2. Still a lot of football to play.
3. Any team can be beaten.
4. Just one injury and everything changes.
5. Tom Brady is not immortal and Rob Gronkowski is not an Asgardian.

I'm pretty sure about that last one.

Anyway…

The Curious Case of Thomas Edward Patrick Brady, Jr.

A few weeks ago, Matthew Slater compared Brady to Benjamin Button. I haven’t seen the movie but I think I get the comp; Tom Brady is as good looking as Brad Pitt.

Oh, and he seems improbably to be getting younger.

It seems unrealistic to expect Brady to finish the season with 0 interceptions. It may not even be a badly thrown ball; that oblate spheroid can be a challenge to catch. Whatever the case, if just feels like it’s going to happen at some point. Right?

Maybe not.

It’s anecdotal but I don’t think I’ve ever seen Brady more dialed in and that’s saying something. TB12 already has two of the top 10 marks for single season Int%. Barring a scenario in which a pass does bounce off Julian Edelman’s hands and into the waiting arms of an opposing defensive back, I think Brady has a chance to set one of those records that can only be tied and never be broken.

Continuing to average 3 TD passes a game seems far easier to imagine with all the weapons the Patriots offense has at Brady’s command. That Brady is doing this at age 39 really shouldn't be a surprise.

Brady combines aspects from two of Malcolm Gladwell’s books, “Blink” and “Outliers” that help to explain his 2016 numbers. “Outliers” posits that the idea of genius is miscast as some mysterious, inherent talent that’s in your DNA or isn’t. Genius is, instead, the combination of opportunity with hard work; 10,000 hours of practice. “Blink” puts forth the notion that what may seem like intuition is actually based on experience. The ability to immediately recognize what’s going to happen isn’t a lucky guess or a supernatural talent; it’s the result of hundreds if not thousands of lessons learned. With experience comes insight and recognition. The fact that Brady is this good at 39 isn’t an aberration, it’s an inevitability, the residue of hard work and experience. Brady’s devotion to training and nutrition is well documented. When he says he feels better at 39 than at 29, I believe him. His throwing mechanics are perfection; not because he was born that way but because of how hard he works on his throwing motion. He’s played in 229 regular season and 31 playoff games in the same offensive system and participated in hundreds more practice reps and hundreds more hours in film study. He knows everything. He’s seen it all. He’s become Robert Downey, Jr.’s Sherlock Holmes as NFL quarterback, seeing what’s going to happen before it happens and then making it happen.

36 TD passes and 0 interceptions in just 12 games? Yeah, that could happen.

15-1-0? Yeah, that could happen, too.

A fifth Lombardi Trophy? Uh huh.

11 > 10 + 1

I stand by my initial assessment of the Jamie Collins trade as subplot. A day later I’ll acknowledge it’s a subplot the local pigskin pundits and bobbleheads are unlikely to let go of any time soon. For the bye week, at least, it’s just about the only narrative thread left to pull.

Until and unless the Patriots shut out the Seahawks after the bye and follow that up with a solid performance against, um, okay, it seemed silly to finish the ridiculous thought that a win over the 49ers would prove anything, let alone that the Patriots are better without Jamie Collins. There aren’t any teams on the second half schedule that strike me as offensive juggernauts, and that includes Seattle. Maybe that's a good thing.

Bill Belichick is certainly capable of making a mistake. Even demonic entities make the occasional mistake in contractual law. (Just trying to cover all the bases.) Still, I do take Belichick at his word. He always does what he thinks is best for the team. That’s his job. You know how he feels about everyone doing their job. If Collins was perceived by Belichick to be a threat - now or in the near future - to the harmony and camaraderie of the locker room, it helps explain why Belichick made this deal now.

More importantly (to me, anyway), I don’t see the Patriots defense playing any worse without Collins. Yes, I’m assuming Dont’a Hightower stays healthy. But if Elandon Roberts development meant Collins would play only on passing downs then why not put another safety on the field?

Maybe this is simply a football decision. Well, and a salary cap decision. Maybe it is as simple as that. Those two things.

There will be questions, either way. If the Patriots win 41-25 the gridiron cognoscenti will ask if they could’ve won 41-16 if they still had Jamie Collins. If the Patriots win 38-3 they will ask if they’re playing better without Collins. There will be advanced statistics applied to ridiculously small data samples. Insights will be offered and discarded then reexamined then discarded again.

For the moment, I can imagine whatever I want to and so I shall choose the glass that’s half full of Bill Belichick’s Kool-Aid. Eleven is greater than ten plus one. The defense improbably will play better without one of their best players.

That would be a great subplot to the Tom Brady’s 2016 “The GOAT Debate is Over, Bitches” tour.