I'm getting sick and tired of all this posturing, dear readers.
And I'm tired of being sick and tired.
Patriot Nation is poised for another Super Bowl run and, while I'm excited at the prospect of watching Mr. Brady go for another championship, I'm hesitant to invest real hope as a result of our recent big-game failures.
Past peaks of regular season successes followed by valleys of playoff shortcomings have left me fatigued. Exhausted, actually. So my request for Bill & Brady this year is simple: stop leading me on. Seriously, stop. I can't take it anymore.
No, seriously.
You teased me with the allure of undefeated immortality with no climax in '07. Then, last year, during our playoff revenge tour, you carelessly dropped the ball at a critical moment costing us all a sigh of relief.
A much needed sigh of relief, I might add.
Listen, I don't mean to sound angry or unappreciative. You've been great to me since for well over a decade. It's just, well, I've been sitting on post-season blue balls since 2007. That's right. Blue balls. Since 2000-fucking-7!
And I can't take it anymore.
So do me and everyone else in Patriot Nation a solid by getting your hate-fuck on against Baltimore then finish the job against the NFC in New Orleans where, luckily, we've had Super Bowl success. Make it happen, fellas. Please. For my sake.
Because I'm ready to burst.
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Quick Thinking
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-- Advice of the Year Award (well, so far) goes to brother Timmy for telling me the following immediately after Notre Dame's victory over USC on November 24th, "If they play Alabama in the National Championship Game and the spread is below 10, bet your life on 'Bama."
-- Sound advice, brother.
-- Sound.
-- Advice.
-- Too bad my life's trade value was so low with the bookie.
-- As I get older, and a bit wiser, I'm realizing there's a BIG difference between those hoping to find love and those who need to find it.
-- People in the latter group are a scary lot.
-- Getting-soap-in-your-pee-hole scary, in fact.
-- They're also the ones who disclose every trivial relationship benchmark via their facebook status updates.
#dislike
-- Quote of the Week honors go to my boy Mr. Octavio for dispensing this gem to one of our single co-workers, "Listen, when you go out, you shouldn't be looking for the girl who wants you to buy her a drink. You need to be looking for the girl who wants you to be buying her breakfast."
-- Difficult arguing with simple brilliance.
-- False pretenses aside, Lance Armstrong's Livestrong foundation has raised nearly 500 million to help "inspire and empower people affected by cancer."
-- That's gotta be worth something, right?
-- Speaking of dominant athletes who misled the public, I hope your play can live up to the fictional rivalry Nike's marketing team whipped up for you this season, Tiger.
-- But you should have had the balls to title the commercial "No Hole is Safe" instead of "No Cup is Safe" because, as we both know, you're better when the world hates you.
-- And this year is about winning majors.
-- Not approval ratings.
4 comments:
I'll still take the 2007 "F**K YOU" season any day. That ride was fantastic. They meet up in the SB against a team playing really well, and the Giants got the benefit of a bunch of holds and the refs not making the "in the grasp" call they called all year. My favorite part of that year was Brady getting in the face of the PIT DB after the dude ran his mouth all week. You can't judge the season by 1 game. Judge it by the whole body of work.
That being said...as a betting man, I like the 49er's to win the whole thing, based on matchups. I also like Baltimore getting 9.5 this weekend.
Now, your job in this blog between now and Sunday: Explain "Spygate" to the masses. That is the crutch that all the (lord I hate this word) "Haters" will lean on. Explain to them that what happened was that the Patriots tapped from on the field, as opposed to the first row of the stands. Explain that EVERY team used to do it, but Uncle Rog sent a memo to stop it and the Pats ignored it. Explain that the "taping practices" crap was made up by a golf pro out in California who had been let go by the organization. Explain that the golf pro would not sign a deposition of this accusation after the NFL asked him to because he was lying, and later admitted as much. Remind that masses that since "Spygate", the Patriots don't have a Super Bowl win....just the best record in the NFL.
- Wrong: Your looking for the girl who will buy YOU breakfast.
Chad,
In a perfect world, every guy would be able to find a girl that would buy him breakfast. But this is not a perfect world. It would take nothing short of a miracle for my co-worker to graduate from single slob just attempting a conversation to successful stud receiving congratulatory morning grub following a triumphant one-night stand. In this instance, walking on water may actually be more plausible.
Baby steps.
Known to place the occasional wager, I like Baltimore at 9.5, too. I also agree with your SF sentiment. (And I'm not just saying that. One of my earlier season blogs touts SF as the eventual Super Bowl champ. Even before the QB change.)
But I'll have to disagree with your "body of work" argument. Greatness isn't measured on regular season wins and losses. This isn't Indianapolis. This is New England, brother, where championships matter.
Everything else is just noise.
As for Spygate, I feel any discussion is moot. The entire "incident" is a crutch uneducated fans use to justify their Patriot Nation envy. Plus, any logical explanation would fall on deaf ears. Logic isn't accepted by the masses.
Scapegoats are.
As always, I love your spirited commentary. Message me here, on FB or Twitter if you'd ever like to do a guest blog spot.
Open invite.
best,
s+t
Ugh...what happened. I can accept the fact the Pats lost. What I can't accept is the way they lost. Brady being inaccurate, Welker (possibly concussed) dropping balls, Ridley looking like Appolo Creed in Round 2 vs. Draggo, etc.
Then again, I take a look at it through eyes that would be foreign to my younger self. I look back to 1999. The Sox having been beaten by the Yankees in the ALCS, I came to terms that none of the 4 local pro sports teams would ever win anything. The Sox were woefully using the same model that failed them every year. The Celtics were a truly cursed team that was not even fun to watch. The Bruins were a team run by lovers of mediocrity. Then there were the Patriots. A team that seemed to always have some of the parts, but not the whole engine. That soul crushing return by Desmond Howard was sure to haunt my dreams for eternity. Why couldn't Troy Brown have been healthy!? Surely he would have stopped him. Alas, I gave in and accepted that championship parades in my town would be a memory from childhood that I would ramble on about to my kids, slurring words like "Bird" and "McHale". We all know how things changed. 10 years, 7 World Championships.
The real sorrow in all this is that we are another year closer to #12 cleaning out his locker. While we don't have a championship, we do have one thing we were missing for so many years: Hope.
The Patriots will arrive at OTA's with a strong and healthy team. The Bruins are 4-0-1. The Celtics leadership is strong, even if the product is lacking. The Red Sox...well I hate their ownership with the fiery passion of the Sun god Ra and their pitching is terrible. The point is we've seen worse around these parts. We've crawled through a river like our friend Andy Dufresne and came out clean on the other side and we can do it again.
FYI, 15 minutes before kick off I took the Baltimore money line. My wallet is a cold, heartless bastard....but I would have paid for a Pats win and I can prove it.
- Guest blog? I'll be your wing man anytime.
Chad,
The pain is still too near for me to really discuss our Patriots' failure. That loss cut deep -- real deep -- irregardless of the fact that I had Baltimore and the Under.
Yes, I just intentionally used irregardless.
But keep the input coming, brother. Still waiting for you to contact me with an email address so we can discuss some guest blogging.
For the first time ever, I'm doing some things behind the scenes that will result in a considerable spike in viewership and the only thing that will keep people coming back is fresh content on a regular basis.
If we keep blogging, they will come.
I'm reaching out to you and a few friends to be part of it. Hit up the sports+thoughts facebook page and send me a message.
Until then,
s+t
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