The 2007-08 Patriots Brought Us Back Down to Earth

Domination. Dynasty. Dee best team in the league. Ever.

The 2007-08 Patriots sure had a good shot to claim association rights for all these words and phrases. After slapping around the already weary and beat up San Diego Chargers for their 4th AFC Title in 7 years, most fans were feeling pretty good about a week 17 re-match with the New York football Giants. I knew we had a legit shot. I think most people in Boston and New England were in the “cautiously optimistic” caucus, knowing full well that there are no sure things in sports.

Even for the more-dominant-than-usual Patriots.

After all, we hearty frost-bitten New Englanduhs were only a year removed from one of the worst playoff defeats in Boston sports history. Losing to the Colts in that gad-dang velodrome out in the heartland was far worse than losing Game 6 of the World Series in 1986. Since I grew up a FAN (not an obsessive-compulsive devotee) of the Red Sox, I didn’t know that Buckner doffing that ground ball only evened the series at 3 games apiece until I was 21 years old. All that time, until that one fateful night watching a NESN retrospective on the magical Boston sports season of 1985-1986 in which all 4 of our professional teams were in the finals, I had assumed that clip was in fact depicting the Mets clinching the title. I was too busy growing up, being a weird kid in Natick, playing football, throwing the shot-put and applying to college, to realize that NO, stupid!!!! The damn Sox had Game 7, and an extra day thanks to rain, to redeem themselves and blew that too. Sure, Game 6 was devastating. They were a strike away from having the Series crown. But it carried way too much weight in this town.

Two years removed from the sweet relief of the 2004 World Series title, and having won 3 Super Bowls since 2002, the dark days of 1986 were a distant memory on Sunday, January 21, 2007. But what would go down on this day was worse. It stung more. The ’86 Sox were close. And broke a lot of hearts – but they really just cut through scar tissue and refreshed old wounds. The Patriots of recent memory had been different. We were supposed to go into Indy and beat a good team whose defense, up until the playoffs, had underachieved mightily. Matchups be damned. Dwight Freeney going against Matt Light and whoever the other tackle was? Light plays up in big games. Bob Sanders covering wideouts like Jabar Gaffney and an aging Troy Brown? It had never been a problem before. Know why? “We got Bra-dy, cha---cha, cha-cha-cha!!!”

That’s right, we had Brady. Recent history had told us loud and clear that the Pats’ defense had to play well, but not spectactular, against Peyton. We had Kevin Faulk, one of the best and most versatile situational backs out there. We had a veteran / rookie team of Corey Dillon and Laurence Maroney. The offense looked as good as it ever had. Plus, we had Brady.

Since Brady took the helm, a slightly modernized Walsh-style offense thrived. And won games. But not today. Too many well-thrown balls dropped. A defensive effort that was good enough to give us a chance, but without the punch to put Peyton’s ass on the carpet often enough to rattle him or take the ball out of his hands with turnovers. So we went home defeated.

Then came the most exciting Patriots’ offseason since drafting Drew Bledsoe at the dawn of the Parcells Era. The ultra-value investors of the Patriots’ coaching and management staff decided to grab a few blue chip wideouts to go with their superstar quarterback. We got Wes Welker. We got Donte Stallworth. And most importantly, we got Randy Moss. The Patriots stacked up like never before. Already picked as a contender yet again, they had a superstar QB, solid defense capable of improving, and a 2nd year running back in Maroney who showed signs that he’d blossom in 2007. We had an elusive, tough, and speedy bulldog of a wideout in Welker who not only fit in the playbook, he fit in the fans’ hearts as the scrappy underdog. And Randy effing Moss.

Tom Brady was more excited for 2007 than he was on his first date with Gisele. And for good reason: Moss re-defined the deep ball during his years with the Vikings, to paraphrase Chris Carter on HBO’s Inside the NFL. A team that was a couple plays away from an exciting AFC win title, and would have beat that wide-eyed Bears squad by 17, now had an all-world wideout with whom their all-world QB could pick apart defenses.

To say we were the Super Bowl favorites heading into the 2007-08 season was a platitude rivaled only by saying something akin to “My, it is soooo nice outside today!” while wasting a July day reclining on a beach in Maine. We’d go 14-2, and beat whoever the NFC sent to Arizona. That was my prediction that July, sitting on that beach in Maine. Barring devastating injuries, smooth sailing was in store for these New England Patriots. A team that won the right way, with class, pride, and an unrelenting determination was going to win their 4th NFL Championship. I felt it in the cockles of my heart, dammnit!

Like the 49ers and Giants teams of the 80’s and early 90’s, the Patriots had swagger, personality, star power, and a defense, and fans whose devotion rivals that of the craziest NFL fan base in the country. They had not been denied their perfect regular season. They would enjoy the extra week off given the best team in the AFC, and of course home games throughout the playoffs.

Two weeks after defeating Green Bay, the Giants rolled into the desert drooling and snarling. Riding high on a playoff run almost as improbable as that of the 2001-2002 Patriots, having broken the sunburned balls, slapped around Dallas as if they had stolen their prom date, and pulled of a win in the most frozen condition the Tundra had ever seen on an infamy-preventing, career-redeeming field goal by Tynes in OT. Not only were they white-hot and peaking at the right time of the year, their week 17 near-miss against the “unbeateable” Patsies was still fresh in their minds, and thus they were still playing as if each Sunday were their last. Not Brett Favre-Mississippi-drama-queen-debutante style. They played inspired, with fire under their asses, and ice in their veins.

Pats fans moan about the Giants’ victory, citing the lucky grab towards the end of the game, insisting still that Eli is not that good of a quarterback. He played well enough for them to win, and the Giants’ defense had the gameplan they needed to win. Pretty simple really: if Brady is getting knocked down, he can’t throw to Moss or Welker or anybody else.

So now that the wounds from the Patriots’ loss to the Giants on that cold dark evening have long since scarred over, I can look back and say that the team is better off having lost that game. No parade, no rolling rally, no dancing in the streets. I love Boston, I love Boston fans, but let’s face it, some are just as annoying as that Jersey kid with a Yankees cap on, talking shit on Lansdowne Street. It wasn’t enough in 2007 for New England to worship the team, we needed the whole league, the national press, the whole damn world to be glowing from this win. We became the very type of fans that we despise with such ardor - we became entitled.

Thank you, David Tyree. Thanks Osi. Thanks Eli. The winter was cold, but the Celtics won and the summer was gorgeous.