Belichick of the Week

I realize that I am awarding it far, far too early.  But this one I like a lot.  Upon being asked about any concerns he had about TB's health after the car accident yesterday:

“I always worry about the health of our team. There is nothing more important than the health of our team. Without players, you don’t have a team.”

Genius.

Also, anyone else notice just how rusty and old Favre looked last night?

Belichick is #1!

You probably knew already that I would love any story where Belichick was ranked as the current best NFL coach.  But what I'm really loving are the comments that follow:

"I'm not a pats fan or anything (rams fan actually) but if Belichick isn't the best coach then I don't know what reasons you could possibly have to support it that doesn't involve serious logical fallacies."

"Is Bellichik on the shady side. Probably. But I'd be very surprised if other teams weren't trying to cheat in the same way. When it comes to playcalling and decision making, Bellichik is #1. And I hate the Patriots."

And one of my favorite exchanges ever:

"Bill Belicheat number 1!?!? Of all time!?!?

The Patsys are done like dinner. Brady was never the QB everyone thought he was. He was good, but when you video tape the defensive calls of your opponent it makes QB life much easier.

...and I remember Tara Reid saying that she quit dating Brady years ago because he had bad breath."

Response:

"Brady's stats are ALWAYS near the top. You should do some research... And Tara Reid?.. really? .. He is married to Giselle dip@#$%. I would call that an upgrade...... Tara Reid?? wow, you are a complete tardobott."

It's a great point, actually.  What is Tara Reid up to these days?

He wins

Belichick is back and in fine form.  When asked about any possible injury to Tom Brady's fingers, he answered as follows:

"I don't think it's life threatening."

He also expressed great (sarcastic) joy in filling out injury reports this season.  And with that, the title goes to the master with Belichick taking home the inaugural Belichick of the Week.

If you're curious, I do feel slightly icky about just having posted a link from the Boston Herald.  Hopefully we will all get through this together.

Your Belichick of the Week (off-season edition)

Yes, he got one in while discussing the draft. As usual, the master is...well, the master:

'When we look at the board, based on everything we want in a football player at that particular time, we evaluate them and take the player that fits best for our football team. That’s what we always do, and I think the last nine years we’ve put a pretty competitive team out there on the field every year.'

Let's see, in 9 years we have won 3 Superbowls, made 4 Superbowl appearances, and been in the playoffs 7 out of 9 times. Yeah, I guess we haven't been too bad, now that you mention it.

Bill takes over defense

Okay, this was announced a few days ago and I am behind on things (it has been a busy month...thank God spring training is soon because I am looking forward to the distraction!). Anyway, Belichick has decided not to name a defensive coordinator and will be taking a more active role in the defense.

I don't like this.

Also, apparently they are not making any changes to the offensive coaching staff.

Definitely don't like this.

Compare how we looked this season (sluggish/cruddy) to how the Saints looked tonight (energetic/awesome). We need some of DAT. And while I was hardly expecting them to bring in someone totally new, a shake-up on offense is, in my view, mandated after last season.

My next question: when the hell are we going to start signing our free agents?

Pats lose in first round for first time in Belichick's tenure. Game immensely ugly.

That was not a fun game to watch.

It wasn't enough that we gave up a 24-0 lead in the first quarter, it was even worse that we could get nothing together on the offense. Tom did not have a good day, but for the first half of the game, Baltimore's D was owning our O-line in awful ways. I mean come on. Dude almost didn't have time to hand the ball to Maroney at one point. That is not Brady's fault that he can't execute in such situations. The love-child of Peyton Manning and Joe Montana couldn't execute in such a situation.

The second half was better because they changed the snap count and it was effective. Fewer turn-overs. The turn-overs freaking killed us. And two of them bounced off someone and there just happened to be a Raven there (admittedly, we got one of those too, but three times in one game? When does that happen?).

Let's not even talk about the defense. I mean, full credit to the Ravens RBs (Flacco's QB rating was, like, 8.6 in the first half or something...Tom's was 32.something, which isn't exactly great either), who completely dominated our players, including that killer first run where we gave up, like, 833 yards (okay, it was actually 83, but it felt like ten times that). Wilfork was tied up most the time and contributed. TBC, bless him, picked off a ball that hit a Ravens' player. Not all was gloom and doom. No wait. The rest of the D was doom and gloom.

It was ugly. It was a horrible way to go out. It's time for Change. I'm torn because I think we desperately need new coaching staff, yet I think that part of the problem is the turnover in the coaching staff. Dilemma.

For you haters: Brady is not done (are you freaking kidding me?), Belichick is not washed up (he coached Matt Cassel to an 11-5 season last year!), and the Pats can be a strong team again. But there is a whole pile of work that needs to be done in this off-season. I have a laundry list:

1) Pass rush
2) Pass rush
3) Pass rush
4) Offensive coordinators whose plays are more exciting than 'Pass to Welker or, failing that, to Moss.'
5) Pass rush
6) Defensive coordinators who can teach how to rush the pass
7) BETTER FREAKING COACHING BY THE COORDINATORS
8) Pass rush
9) Running backs who can *hold* *on* *to* *the* *freaking* *ball*

That's all I've got.

Incidentally, who wants to take bets on when Adalius Thomas gets released? He can take his Jetson pack elsewhere, I think.

Except Bill. Bill does not go after Moss.

From today's press conference:

"I have a lot of respect for Randy, I think he's one of our best players and I think if you watch other teams defend him and watch other teams play against him, they think the same way -- other than these two guys from Carolina after they lost another game. I guess they don't think that way. They haven't won a lot of games now."

Everyone starts going after Moss

I don't think that this needs to be said, but I love you, Randy Moss. You bring joy and happiness to my Sundays. You can run ahead of almost anyone and catch absolutely unbelievable passes. Your contribution to the Patriots has been nothing short of astounding.

That being said, yesterday was not your day. First, Brady was intercepted when he was throwing to Moss, which most of us interpreted as 'Moss didn't run the route correctly.' Tom's radio interview today provided a different interpretation. I may stick with mine, though. Then, on his one catch of the day for 16 yards, he turned it over. Seriously. Patriots need some freaking remedial 'how to hold the football' drills or something. Even Wes let one drop this week, which is unusual (but he made up for it with 105 yards on 10 catches. You're doing just fine there).

But then Yahoo picked up on this story (as they are wont to do) and turned it into 'Moss about to screw Patriots over and leave weakened, pathetic franchise in his wake (if you don't think he's capable, consider Minnesota and Oakland)'. I am exaggerating, but not by much. Furthermore, apparently Tony Dungy called Moss 'fragile' on SNF last night and said that in all of his years of coaching, he had never once sent a player home for anything under any circumstances at all, no sirree.

Dungy, when you have three Superbowl rings -- or for that matter, three Superbowl appearances -- you can offer advice to Bill Belichick on how to coach. Until then, you don't get to say anything.

Moss may have had a bad day (and he did), but that's okay. Everyone has bad days sometimes. I still love you.

All Hell starting to Break Loose in Foxborough

You remember last season when the Habs starting choking to a serious degree and I posted that story about how some of our players were linked to organized crime? Then I said something about how the whole thing was falling apart? Well, it isn't quite that bad at Foxborough, but things are not all that great:

1) Moss, Guyton, Burgess, and Thomas all were sent home yesterday because they were late for practice. The weather was bad, so they may have had an excuse, but none of that from Bill. I admire the hardassedness of this decision because I think it's the right one. Hopefully it will turn people around and provide the much-needed kick in the butt that this team requires right now. Or it fails horribly, particularly because...

2) Tom Brady did not practice and was on the injury report today and yesterday. Yesterday was for his finger (which was injured prior to the last game) and -- as always -- right shoulder. Today, they added 'ribs.' Not good. Not good at all. I missed this, but apparently he was taken down pretty hard during last Sunday's game.

Oh, and some woman gave birth to my future stepchild this past week. Congratulations to Tom and whoever that is.

I spoke too soon, clearly

This week's Belichick of the Week needs to be reassigned. From the master's mouth:

“That’s the way it is every week,” Belichick said. “The game is over, it’s over. Move on to the next one. We’ve had big wins. We’ve had tough losses. We haven’t had any ties, but it would be the same on that, too. We move pass that game and move on to the next one, and this is the most important one.”

In Bill I Trust (aka, it's all gonna be okay...just maybe not this season)

I got thinking about the embarrassment that was Monday night's game and while this is probably not our year, I suddenly had some insights that made me feel better. As we all know, Belichick is a smart guy, so anything that I'm seeing I would think he is seeing even more acutely. And I was reminded of a trauma moment in Patriots' history (I feel like 'trauma moment' should have its own German word, which would be something like 'Traumaaugenblick'). There have been three Traumaaugenblicken to me in the past three years: 1) We blow a 21-3 lead to the Colts for the AFC Championship in 2006; 2) The FREAKING HELMET CATCH (not to mention Eli dodging the sack) during Superbowl in 2007; 3) Tom Brady takes the helmet to the knee and ends his season in 2008. What is more important, though, is how we handled those moments. Belichick learns, fixes, and tries to improve the problems. For instance, after 2006, with the understanding that maybe we need real receivers, he signs Moss and Welker. There is another important theme in this story that emerges here: Belichick's willingness to take risks (Moss certainly was one), and having a back-up plan in case it doesn't pan out (Welker being the back-up plan in case Moss didn't work). As we all know, that went pretty well, right up until Traumaaugenblick #2. I think that last season we didn't get much of a chance to understand how the team had changed after the 2007 SB because the first couple of months were spent evaluating Cassel. In the end, things turned out okay, and had Brady been our QB, we almost certainly would have been a playoff team.

However, where we got beat last year was on defense (think about the Miami game we lost, the Chargers game, and the Jets game as moments when our defense broke down). So this year, Belichick took another risk and revamped the defense. For the first 10 weeks of the season, that risk seemed to have paid off pretty well; we were 2nd overall in points allowed and even after the past few weeks, we are still 7th. Consider that we have played the leading team for offensive points scored (the Saints), and the third-leading team (the Colts) -- if you're wondering, we're the second-best team for points scored. That's not too shabby considering the changes. And I can't stress enough that the changes needed to happen. I still believe that aside from the aging LBs (Eli dodges the sack, remember?), the other flaw that needed correction was the secondary, which was a freaking mess last season. That appeared to be mostly fixed until this past game, where suddenly there were major gaps. Something tells me that another attempt will be made to fix it this year. One of the qualities I most admire about Belichick is his ability to stop a bad situation from getting worse: he's not too proud (or arrogant) to admit his mistakes in the roster.

One of the key factors in this season which I think is overlooked is the Joey Galloway one (dammit, I need to revive that tag!). He was supposed to be our third receiver and would not have been a shabby one. But that didn't turn out...who knew that he couldn't keep his feet inbounds? So we gambled (by getting rid of Gaffney) and that did not pay off. There isn't anything anyone can do about it now, and it doesn't help that a lot of the other potentials, such as Edelman and Tate, have been injured.

Why am I saying this now? Because I can promise you that no one watched last week's game more acutely than Belichick and he sees those weaknesses. More importantly, he will try to correct them. While it might not be possible this late in the season -- and let's not forget that barring a complete meltdown of Bucc-ish proportions, this team is still going to the playoffs -- he will try to change it for next year. It may not work: consider that our secondary is not where it should be. More continuity in the coaching staff would help, I think, since there has been a lot of turnover during the past few seasons. The situation at running back would benefit from more stability; again, it was a gamble signing Fred Taylor and it appeared to be a good one right up until the point when he got injured (imagine if we had Maroney and Taylor, our running game might be pretty solid). So did this season turn out the way we had hoped? No, it's not 2007, and it never will be again. However, 2007 also ended in one of the most painful Traumaaugenblicken imaginable, so we should be happy it's a new team. It may not be perfect, but it's ours, and as always, in Bill I trust.

Current Belichick of the Week

I'm awarding it early seeing as he is not even done with the press conference yet:

'They were just the better team tonight. You had to see that, you were there.'

Bill is sad :( If I could, I would give him a hug.

Belichick has run the gamut

Upon being asked in a press conference today whether he had ever cried, here was Belichick's response:

“I’ve coached 35 years, so I’ve probably covered most all the bases," Belichick said. "I think I swore once, too.”

They are moving on

I have it *on authority* that the Patriots have moved on from Sunday, so I vow to do the same. In Bill I Trust. Still. Yes, I do have something bordering on unconditional love for this team, so I will overlook the times that they don't quite execute as well as I would like. They have still given me more joy and entertainment over the past years than anything else I can think of. And for that, my Pats, I love you still.

As you may recall (or not), the last time that the Pats lost two games in a row was in 2006 against the Colts and the Jets. That cannot happen this year. We need to stay strong through the rest of the season, lock up the playoff spot, and be able to focus on January early. So we need to stay on top of the division. So far, Miami has lost one divisional game, so we're okay in that department. But it behooves us to beat the Jets this weekend...okay, maybe not 'behooves,' but sure would make things easier down the stretch.

One of my friends unearthed this week's Belichick of the Week. As usual, no one can top the master:

Interviewer: "Did you disagree with that spot [on the Faulk catch]?"

Belichick: "It doesn’t really matter."

And he is right. Remember: you can't change penalties or injuries, so just let it go.

Upon further review

Here is the 4th down attempt from last night.

What this tells us:

[It was a first down]

This is how close this game really was. Sure, the 35-34 final score might hint at that. But the game essentially came down to this play right here. The Colts won by inches.

[In fact, not even inches, since it was a first down]

I mean, sure, maybe we stop them on the next drive. Maybe we could have stopped them if we'd punted. Maybe if Bruschi sacks Eli in SB 42, the Pats win. But this game? This game was about as close as it possibly could have been, and it really came down to this precise play.

[Which should have been given to the Pats, thereby rendering the final drive null and void]

In other words: leave Bill Belichick alone! You don't like his risky style, find another team to cheer for. He's shown that he knows what he's doing and while he's willing to take big chances, he often reaps big rewards. Yesterday was not one of those days.

[Although it actually really was a 1st down]

On the sidelines

The NFL Network attached a mic to Bill Belichick during last weekend's Miami game and recorded the results. This is very cool!

Belichick vs. AFC East teams

In Tedy Bruschi's weekly interview on ESPN today, he included a rather fascinating statistic:

'Since Belichick came to New England, he is 40-12 against the AFC East, and eight of those losses have come against Miami.'

Okay, that's kind of crazy. And I'm not sure that it is quite right.

Now, let's consider when those were: 2008 (1), 2006 (1), 2005 (1), 2004 (1), 2002 (1), 2001 (1), 2000 (2).

2000 and 2003 we lost to the Bills (2003 in the opener after we cut Malloy and everyone thought Belichick had lost his mind). 2008 and 2009 we lost to the Jets. But we also lost twice to the Jets in 2000, then once in 2001, 2002, and in 2006 (I spit on you, loss to Mangini's Jets!), so that's a total of 7. So I think that total is more like some number of wins - 17 against the AFC East. Which is still pretty good, but not quite 40-12.

However, if we add them up as Belichick + Brady, then we do get a record that is better than 40-12 because that omits 2000 (4); of course, we also need to take out 2008 (2). So now we have 40-10. Which is a damned fine record, I must say (80% win rate). Sure, our division has been kind of lousy at times during the 2000s, but still, not bad --> adopting my Bill tone, there is still a lot of work to do, and of course we could do better.

Things are going down in Foxborough

1) Last night, the team announced that it had cut Tully Banta-Cain, which surprised the hell out of just about everyone. Tully Banta-Cain, besides having one of the best names in the league, was leading the team in sacks and had played relatively well. However, then everyone speculated that either Belichick was certifiable or perhaps TBC (as he is now known) would be re-signed soon. TBC confirmed that when he talked to a radio station yesterday (not that Belichick is certifiable, that he expects to be re-signed soon).

2) No one knows what the deal is with Adalius Thomas (also defense). He was a healthy scratch for Sunday's game, which was weird. He also missed several practices earlier this season for non-health issues, which I thought was weird at the time, but I forgot to post on that.

3) Today, the Patriots released Galloway, Michael Matthews, and Eric Alexander. Galloway is gone, no re-signing there. It appears that Matthews is also gone. Who knows with Alexander. There is still no word on the Thomas situation.

4) Rumors are flying about a potential trade for the Patriots. Maybe a WR to replace Galloway? One rumor is Deion Branch, because, let's face it, who doesn't love Deion Branch? I mean, one of my favorite things in playing my old Madden is that I can throw Brady to Branch for ridiculous yards. But that doesn't mean that he's still the same old guy (he's had injuries). Others speculate about Julius Peppers (DB for Carolina), a speculation that has been going on for quite a while and started last off-season. Trading deadline is today at 4pm.

Let's give them credit: they were not boring in the past few days.

Also, I am unbelievably grateful to be able to retire the 'Joey Galloway' tag. I had such high hopes. Just goes to show that not everyone can be fit into the Belichick system and win, you need quality players to execute on this level.

Again, you can't beat the master

This week's Belichick of the Week goes to the man himself, again:

"I thought it was a real good effort by our team today all through the fourth quarter. I'm real proud of them. I thought we executed pretty well, made some big plays in both the running game and the passing game, from all of our defense, good solid all-around effort."

'Executed pretty well.' Not 'well' or 'very well.' Pretty well. Clearly there is still work to be done, according to Coach Belichick.

Belichick of the Week

This week's Belichick of the Week goes to the man himself. When asked why he decided to go for it on 4th and 1 on his own 24 yard line (at the time, I said that was crazy), his answer was, "I thought we could get a yard."

Nobody does it better than the master.