Adversity Isn't Just A Suburb of Boston

See what I did there? I'm riffing on "Denial isn't just a river…" Oh, you got it? Okay...

If you're a Patriots fan, you know this is when it really gets interesting. The team is running like a 20-year old Ford 150 in dire need of a tune up. Injuries are piling up and seem to be clustering around a few key position groups. Has there been controversy? (Antonio Brown. Check.) Are there rumors of a rift between Tom/Bill/Robert and Bill/Robert/Tom? (That's become a cottage industry for pigskin pundits and bobbleheads, hasn't it?) Somehow, the cap-strapped Patriots are connected to every disgruntled player on the Other 31. Meanwhile, New England is working out street free agents who are coming off a disappointing, injury-limited start to their careers. Hey, when you're short on cap cash, you got to shop at the pigskin Dollar Store.

Time to plug some holes in the wall with toothpaste…

If This Is Wrong I Don't Want To Be Right

They're 6-0-0. They've outscored their opponents by 142 points. On a short week, battered by injuries and a Nor'easter, they won 35-14, covering an absurd 17 point line in the process.

So, what's everybody want to know?

How much longer must we endure this pigskin disaster that is the 2019 New England Patriots?

Jeopardy

They're chronically involved in controversy, their roster has been decimated by retirement, free agency losses, and injuries, they lack playmakers on offense, their AARP-eligible quarterback just had the worst game of his career yet they're still undefeated, sit atop NFL power rankings, and remain the money makers' favorite to win back-to-back Super Bowls…

[Jeopardy! music plays...]

Who are the New England Patriots?

A Big Game In Buffalo

Injuries. Scandal. Palace intrigue. Doubts. A media-hyped, early season divisional game. On the road.

We've been here before, haven't we?

Just Another Sunday For Patriots' Fans

For about a day it was just about football. Okay, not just football. After all, Antonio Brown brought more baggage to Foxborough than the boys on The Darjeeling Limited. Still, I was looking forward to Tom Brady, Brown, Julian Edelman, Josh Gordon, James White, Sony Michel, and Phillip Dorsett doing amazing pigskin things. We were going to need a word that went on beyond explosive. 

And then, an explosion of a completely different, yet somehow unsurprising, kind occurred.

Don't Pinch Me

Like most of the good citizens of Patriots Nation, I'm in "pinch me" mode this fine Sunday morning. 

Only… Don't pinch me. 

Today I'm just living the dream, a dream where people are constantly arguing over whether this 2019 New England offense is better than the 2007 perfect-adjacent Pats of Moss and Welker. A dream where yet another "troubled but talented" player comes to Foxborough and winds up with a ring on his finger. 

In my dream, Josh McDaniels and Tom Brady access an almost endless set of combinations of Antonio Brown, Josh Gordon, Julian Edelman, Demaryius Thomas, Phillip Dorsett, Sony Michel (with and without James Develin), James White, Rex Burkhead and whatever tight end is healthy that week; deploying those assets to maximize weekly matchup advantages, destroying NFL defenses through the air and on the ground, scoring seemingly at will, while the New England defense plays with the lead, toying with opposing quarterbacks like a cruel cat with a blind mouse. 

In my dream, Brady and Brown bond over their love for old helmets and their loathing of Roger Goodell and the league's power brokers. Brown embraces the Patriots Way (even if it's for totally selfish reasons as he rehabilitates his image and sets himself up for a big payday from the Detroit Lions in 2020), drinks deeply of the Belichick Kool-Aid, and just does his job. Gordon stays healthy and feasts on CB2s and CB3s as opposing defenses scheme in vain to stop Brown and Edelman. 

In my dream, Sony Michel breaks out in his second season as Brady takes advantage of opposing defensive coordinators pulling a defensive lineman to put six or seven defensive backs on the field. James White is wide open on wheel routes. Rex Burkhead returns kickoffs just to get some touches.

In my dream, the Patriots defense is always playing with a two-score lead by the end of the first quarter, against offenses that have abandoned the running game, and all hope, for that matter.

In my dream, Edelman, Brown, Gordon, and White catch TD passes and the Patriots win their 7th Super Bowl championship in a rout, beating the Cowboys 56-0.

Don't pinch me.

Death, Taxes, and the Patriots

The Ringer has become one of my daily reads for pop culture and sports. I clicked on the What We’re Most Excited to Watch in the 2019 NFL Season link with anticipation and was not disappointed. (Well, a little.) There is certainly no shortage of compelling narratives waiting to happen for the NFL's 100th season. Patrick Mahomes encore. Kyler Murray, Kliff Kingsbury and the Air Raid Offense is intriguing, as is the possibility the Ravens might bust out the wishbone. Baker Mayfield and the return to relevance for the Cleveland Browns is full of pigskin pathos. Zeke Elliot and the Cowboys. Aaron Rodgers and Matt LaFleur. Drew Brees and the Scientific Proof that Luck is Real (and not always good). Nick Foles and the Jaguars. Jadaveon Clowney and the Seahawks. The sustainability of the Los Angeles Rams and the Millennial Offense as trend or fad. Ben Roethlisberger and the Ewing Theory Steelers. Carson Wentz and America's health care system. Antonio Brown. 

There was one storyline that was dismissed in a throwaway line at the end of the Ringer post: Death, taxes, and the Patriots. 

I'm not arguing that any of the plotlines noted above are not worthy of our attention. I just find it curious that what we have with the New England Patriots of Bill Belichick and Tom Brady is a movie nobody wants to see.

Well, nobody west of the Connecticut River.