Despite Yesterday I Still Thank God Everyday For Making Me A Pats Fan
As much as I wanted to avoid talking about the Patriots today it’s impossible. Not when the entire world is open firing on us like they are right now. See that’s the thing about being a Pats fan. Everybody wants to see you fail. We’ve been king of the mountain for so long that it’s only natural for the rest of the league to hate us. For the rest of the country the only thing better than their own team winning is us not winning. I don’t blame them. If I didn’t live here I’d hate us too. Like nobody cares that the Cardinals lost. Nobody cared when the Steelers or Chiefs got bounced. The only team people care about is the Patriots. They hate us with the white hot intensity of a thousand suns. Fans don’t boo nobodies. Leagues don’t run sting operations on loser franchises. It makes days like today that much harder to endure when everybody and their grandmother is piling on. When you have the KFC’s and other losers of the world mouthing off.
The bottomline is this. In an era where parity is king and the NFL strives for equality the Pats have been to 6 superbowls in 14 years, 10 AFC title games and 13 division titles. If you throw out the year Brady got hurt that means Brady and the Pats have been to the Superbowl in half the seasons he’s been in the league. Before every season begins we know we have a 50% chance of being in Superbowl. If we don’t win it all than the entire season is viewed as a gigantic waste of time. We are left stunned and depressed and questioning the existence of god. Meanwhile other cities treat just making the playoffs like they won a world championship.
Why am I saying all this? Because on days like today it’s easy to forget how lucky we are to be Pats fans. There has never been anything like this run in the NFL and there never will be again. You wonder why everybody hates the Pats? Why Goodell and the Colts made up Deflategate? It’s because for the past decade we’ve ruled the NFL with an iron fist the likes of which this league has never seen before. Does it suck we lost? Of course it does. Every year when you get to the end you need some luck. We didn’t have it this year. Last year we did. But over the last decade plus we’ve had more memories than most fanbases get to enjoy in 10 lifetimes. The tuck rule play, the Snow kick, 2 superbowl winning field goals, Malcolm Butler’s INT etc. We’ve also had our fair share of heart break. The helmet catch, the Welker drop, yesterday etc. You just can’t be in so many big games and not have your share of triumph and heartbreak. Would I trade places with Denver or any other fan base? Not in a billion years. Because when the season starts anew we know we already can pencil ourselves in for the AFC title game. Denver will go back to being mediocre. Quite simply they hate us because they want to be us and who wouldn’t?
PS – I’m sure talk radio is going to tear this team apart today. Our offensive line stinks, Belichick is a moron blah, blah, blah. Again when you get to the Final 4 you need to get lucky. You need some breaks. These games come down to 1 or 2 plays. We easily could have won yesterday. We easily could have lost to the Seahawks or Ravens last year. We easily could have beaten the Giants twice. We easily could have lost to the Raiders in the tuck rule game. People tend to make sweeping generalizations when you lose, but this league again is built on parity. When you get to the end all the teams are so equal. There is no fatal flaw. We play the Broncos tomorrow and we probably beat them. Yesterday just wasn’t our day.