Rage Cage: Post-DeflateGate Patriots Are Out For Blood
New England’s March of the Stormtroopers of Death continued on Sunday, with the Jacksonville Jaguars being the latest unfortunate team on the slate. As some say, the game was over before the first snap. With a final score of 51-17, surely the Jaguars were in a condition similar to Michael Bluth after he found out there was always money in the banana stand.
So maybe because New England has an early bye this season, or maybe/probably because the Pats have already scored more points in three weeks (119) than the 2007 Patriots did, the talk of the town seems to be whether Brady and Co. are dishing out embarrassing losses to spite the rest of a crybaby league and if Brady in particular is raining touchdowns even after games are well out of hand to extend Johnny Cash’s favorite finger to a league that, perhaps irreparably, smeared his reputation.
Brady himself rejected comparisons to 2007 on Monday, stating on WEEI that it’s only Week 3 and it’s not time to break out the Jump To Conclusions Mat yet:
“No, I can’t understand that one quite yet. It’s like three games into the year. There is so much football left and there are so many things that can happen. We’re not even a quarter of the way through the season, so it’s way too early to think about anything. We have so many quality opponents and teams that we’re playing, especially on the road. You never know. Look at the teams that are 3-0 at this point, like Atlanta, like Carolina. Arizona. There are some teams that, OK, you wouldn’t really expect that. Look what they’re making of their season. As things shake out, late November and December, you’re going to see what teams are made of.”
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Fine, whatever. The way these radio interviews normally go, Brady could be asked about his favorite flavor of ice cream, and he’d probably answer with something like “There’s so many different kinds of ice cream to consider, and each one has it’s good parts, that’s a decision I’ll have to look at and make when the time comes,” or something that’s similarly true, but clearly doesn’t actually say much of anything.
Of course, on a surface level, Brady and the Patriots playing pissed-off football to embarrass the rest of the league makes complete sense. They finally won a Super Bowl after 2007’s Spygate scandal, and then had to deal with 8 months of (mostly) nonsense that revolved around the equivalent of LeBron James using different sneakers. On a technical level, though, if playing angry always resulted in these types of scores, the Saints would have won every Super Bowl since BountyGate.
To really answer the question, beyond a surface-level “Well, gee whiz, New England sure is lighting up the scoreboard this year! Brady’s angry!” it’s worth it to look at a pretty old ESPN feature on the 2007 Patriots and how they approached the season after Spygate – ironically, written by Seth Wickersham, the guy that published the 10,000 word NFL HEY YOU GUYS DON’T FORGET PEOPLE THINK NEW ENGLAND CHEATS puff piece on Spygate right after the Brady verdict last month.
Put simply, the 2007 Patriots, Brady included, were taking the field every weekend with the intention of complete and total annihilation, and that take-no-prisoners mantra came into existence largely because of the criticism they all took after Spygate.
Behold:
Ellis Hobbs (cornerback): “It (Spygate) kind of came out, then it disappeared. It was elephant in the room but the elephant was invisible. Bill did such a good job of keeping us focused, or keeping us distracted. One day, Bill said, ‘A lot of you guys have paid your debts. Your family is suffering. Parents are suffering. Bodies are suffering. Wanna know what cures it? Winning. Winning cures everything.'”
Dan Koppen (center): “It really was kind of a pain in the ass. You gotta deal with that whole situation, but as players, it was bulls—. None of the players knew what was going on. We played the game. We just wanted to say ‘F— you’ to everyone.”
Eillis Hobbs (cornerback): “Bill just said, ‘Every time we step on the field, prove you’re the best.’ We weren’t showing any weakness. There is no sportsmanship. We’re going to keep putting points on the board. We didn’t care. With Spygate, we had to over-satisfy.”
Roosevelt Colvin (linebacker): “People thought Bill was giving Tom all the answers. So it was a matter of, we’re not just going to stick it to you, we’re going to stick it to you a little more than we usually have. We’re going to prove a point, and prove it hard.”
Donte Stallworth (wide receiver): “[Before the Pittsburgh game] Anthony Smith, their safety, went off, talking about Spygate, running his mouth like he was a Hall of Famer. Bill read it off to us. Bill says, ‘This is the way he feels about you guys.’ That week, I’m in my locker, and Bill came over to me and said, ‘Hey, do you plan on playing this week?’
‘Yeah.’
‘It’s not going to matter anyway, according to Smith.’
After I got the game plan, I said, ‘We’re going after this kid.’ Not just targeting him. Trying to embarrass him. And we threw like three touchdowns over his head. And I remember Brady talking all kinds of s– that game. I was like, this is my dude. I love this dude.”
(If you guys remember that game, you also might remember Hobbs after the game, when someone asked him about Smith’s guarantee. “Lesson learned. A hard lesson learned. I’ve said some things I’ve regretted, but nothing to that degree. Nothing where I’ve gotten the whole East Coast ready for you, saying ‘Come on over here so we can slap you around.’ There’s nothing wrong with confidence. You’ve got to have a little swagger on the field. But there’s a fine line, and he crossed it.”)
ESPN’s Jackie McMullan, writing for Boston.com at the time, also noted that New England’s tune regarding Smith pretty much did a complete 180 after they had thoroughly whooped the Steelers, and embarrassed Anthony Smith deliberately by targeting his, ahem, over-zealous tendency to play the run:
“It’s interesting to revisit the comments from New England earlier in the week, when most of the Patriots professed indifference over Smith’s comments. Now we know better. He ticked this team off, and it was hell bent on making him pay. Brady’s verbal assault was accompanied by some choice words from Moss as well.”
Finally, one more quote from Ellis Hobbs on the play when Brady hit Randy Moss and they set records for passing touchdowns and receiving touchdowns in a single season, respectively:
Ellis Hobbs: “It was kind of a Jordan moment. You knew it would happen, just not when. You knew he was going to Moss. Randy missed it. Then he did it again. Like it was meant to be. It looked so easy. They knew it was coming, and they couldn’t stop it. Everybody knew what we were going to do. We knew that you knew. Go stop it.”
They’ll never admit it, of course, at least not yet. But this year’s Patriots rallied around their quarterback from the minute he was accused of shady business (LeGarrette Blount and Patrick Chung, in particular, had some choice words about Brady’s suspension), stuck by him all summer long, and so far, have dished out three Mortal Kombat FLAWLESS VICTORY type wins, with two of them coming against teams most people had pegged as potential Super Bowl squads.
The only question left is whether Belichick will let Brady loose against injury-depleted Dallas and a wildly inconsistent Colts team after this week’s bye, or if the Patriots will just run the ball 40 times again.