If you still believe in polling data (I seriously understand if you don't) then we can confirm with actual numbers and stuff that the Patriots are the most hated team in the NFL.
Suck it, Dallas Cowboys! We all know who the real America's Team is now, don't we?
Okay. This is hardly shocking news for those of us east of the Connecticut River. We've been dipping our lobster in the salty tears of our enemies for sixteen years. Most of us stopped listening to the hate let alone caring about it two years ago.
Then wouldn't you know the Patriots make it to the Super Bowl again and we have to hear about Spygate one more time. Like Deflategate isn't enough. Where's the recency bias when you really need it? Anyway, being the sensitive child that I still am to this day, I can't help wondering (yet again) why… Why do they - as in the ineffable them vs. us - hate the Patriots?
They're Cheaters!
Being as objective as I can reasonable be, I have to say an in depth investigation into the Patriots high crimes and misdemeanors fails to validate this justification for hating New England's football franchise. Then again, this isn't about logic. Or perspective. Or science.
The Patriots as cheaters has proven to be a durable narrative. Spygate is nearly a decade in the rear view and still cited as Exhibit A against the Patriots. Quick Quiz: Excepting Deflategate, name all the other times the Patriots were caught cheating since 2007? I'll wait...
Moving on...
Even their use of the game's rule book to their advantage has been held up as evidence of their cheating ways. Former Oakland Raiders are still whining and mewling over the Tuck Rule (the operative word being "rule"). That the League has changed rules after losers bitched about how unfair it is the Patriots know these rules significant New England victories only fuels the argument that the Patriots are habitual line steppers.
I get it. It's embarrassing getting outcoached. It's hard losing, especially in a sport that's been engineered for parity. If you lose and lose and lose and lose when you're supposed to win and lose and win and lose, well, you need an explanation, a job-saving reason, a rationalization of some kind for…
The Patriots Win All The Time
Once upon a time, when the Yankees were good and the team in Washington was called the Senators, the Tony for Best Musical was won by "Damn Yankees." It's a variation on "Faust" with a long-suffering fan of the pathetic Senators signing a lease-to-buy agreement with the Devil so his beloved baseball team can beat those damn Yankees.
I'm guessing a Jets fan has written a musical about those damned cheating Patriots but it hasn't been produced because it's terrible.
Ba-da-boom!
Anyway, the Patriots of the Bill Belichick era do win at a statistically improbable rate (unless, of course, they're cheating!) given the many constraints to sustained success in the NFL. The salary cap is evidently quite easy to fuck up (given how often and repeatedly that's done) which leaves teams both cash and talent poor. Then there's the draft order that punishes success and rewards ineptitude. And the regular season schedule that punishes success and rewards ineptitude. The annual exodus of talent from championship teams in free agency (got the ring now I'm gonna get paid). The Patriots, indeed any NFL franchise, should not be able to win at a 75% rate year over year.
And yet, since 2001, New England has averaged 12 wins a season. They won all 16 regular season games in 2007, won 14 games four times and 13 games once. They've gone to six consecutive AFC Championship games and… Oh...
I'm sorry. Have you got a tissue?
They're Arrogant
I'm not sure I get this one. Belichick and the Patriots consistently talk about other teams, their coaches and players with nothing but respect. Victories are satisfying because "that was a good team we played today." Where's the arrogance?
Okay, I admitted that I finally saw the Tom Brady smirk earlier this season.
Yes, Bill Belichick did get caught on a hot mic dissing the Jets with a celebratory "Suck my dick" but come on, that was friggin' hilarious, am I right? Because… Jets.
More importantly, when you win as much as the Patriots do, can you actually be arrogant? I mean, what are they supposed to say?
And Patriots Fans Are Always Talking Shit
Yes. We are. We do.
So do Steelers fans. And Cowboys fans. I mean, come on, even Jets fans talk shit.
This is a good reason for hating Pats fans but a terrible reason for hating the New England Patriots.
Bill Belichick Yelled At Me To Get Off His Lawn
Bill Belichick is not Rex Ryan.
Thank Christ.
I think Bill Belichick's press conferences are hilarious. It's a style of comedy I would grant is an acquired taste, much like the movies of Wes Anderson or Kevin Costner but once you get them, they're really funny. I could see Robert Downey, Jr. playing Belichick in the Tom Brady biopic.
We're on to Cincinnati.
Genius!
Tom Brady Is Perfect
Secretly, you wish you were Tom Brady. And so does your girlfriend. Wish you were Tom Brady. She makes you wear a Brady jersey when you have sex and keeps encouraging you to "go deep" and saying things like "I want you under center" or yelling "Alert! Alert! 55's the Mike!" You're looking at years of expensive therapy for the crippling inferiority complex that grows ever more complex each and every time you see Tom Brady.
Of course you hate him!
Good news, though. He can't play forever.
Wait-What?
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