The end of the Patriots’ quest for perfection isn’t devastating, but losing Gronk would be
COMMENTARY
It was never about going undefeated anyway. Oh, shutting up those puffed-up 1972 Miami Dolphins and achieving what proved agonizingly out of reach in 2007 would have been a welcome bonus, a perfect punctuation mark at the end of the Patriots’ post-Deflategate season of vengeance. But undefeated? That was always the sidebar, not the story.
The players will never admit to even pondering perfect. They are taught that the best way to navigate the long season is to be on to the next opponent and only the next opponent, with no other potential foe considered until it comes up on the schedule. But you, me, and our favorite sports-radio caterwaulers sure contemplated a Patriots season without a defeat, even if the topic was raised prematurely.
When did we first start talking about this, Week 4?
We do like to get ahead of ourselves around here, but that’s no matter now. As it played out, the Patriots were barely beyond the halfway point to 19-0 before suffering the first blemish. Sunday night, that what-if officially became a what-never-will-be. The Broncos, led by young quarterback Brock Osweiler, who played as if he has no intention of returning the job to Peyton Manning, and aided by some horrendous officiating, defeated the Patriots in overtime, 30-24.
So it goes. There’s a 1 in the loss column on Monday morning, and that’s a bummer. Context considered, it’s also staggeringly impressive considering December arrives on Tuesday.
Going unbeaten was a nice daydream, but it was a secondary daydream. The goal, one so attainable if only good health weren’t so hard to come by in football, was to reach Super Bowl 50 no matter the number in the regular-season loss column, win the game, and watch NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell smile with starched anguish as he handed a fifth Lombardi Trophy over to Robert Kraft, Bill Belichick and Tom Brady, men who should, by most reasonable human emotions, want to take turns conking the commissioner over the head with the silver hardware.
And that’s why the sting of the loss in Denver — itself just a measly, single loss — lingers only until … well, until we hear the news, one way or another, on whether the primary goal died the same night as the secondary daydream, until we hear about Rob Gronkowski’s right knee.
While watching the Patriots’ offense fulfill what feels like a quota of at least one crushing injury per week lately — first Dion Lewis, followed by Julian Edelman, and then Danny Amendola — we’ve wondered when the tipping point would come. The next-man-up philosophy may help a team trudge onward amid the NFL’s injury carnage, but one of those next men up was always bound to remind everyone why he was so far down the depth chart in the first place. Eventually, the next man up wasn’t going be able to do the job, which is exactly what happened Monday when rookie Chris Harper fumbled a third-quarter punt that changed the tenor of the game.
One of the comforts as Patriot after Patriot headed to the infirmary was the notion that if Tom Brady and Rob Gronkowski were healthy and surrounded by a reasonably capable supporting cast, the Patriots’ championship hopes would remain healthy as well. Which is why, when Gronkowski writhed on the turf with 2 minutes and 49 seconds remaining in the fourth quarter Monday night, clutching his right leg after a low hit from Broncos safety Darian Stewart, it felt like we were watching the Super Bowl hopes die.
That moment was awful on so many levels. It was awful because it was Gronk, so happy-go-lucky and yet so dominant, the kind of charismatic athlete you’re fortunate enough to have on your favorite team just a few times in a lifetime. It was awful because he’s already had to overcome so many injuries, and you feel for the guy. It’s awful because football just isn’t as fun when he’s gone. And it was an awful bit of déjà vu, too, a reminder of that devastating knee injury in Week 14 of the 2013 season, but with an odd twist:
Stewart is the Broncos’ free safety. The strong safety? T.J. Ward.
It’s a wonder Bernard Pollard and Sergio Brown didn’t show up on the Broncos’ depth chart last night.
Ward, then with the Cleveland Browns, is the player whose low hit derailed Gronkowski’s ’13 season. The resulting injury in essence cut down the Patriots’ Super Bowl chances that year as well. That Patriots’ season eventually ended in Denver, with Brady relying on the likes of Austin Collie and Matthew Mulligan in the conference title game. The next men up did all they could, but it was not quite enough.
The blessing, if we can call it that, is that the news this time may not be so grim. Several prominent reporters tweeted in the game’s aftermath that Gronkowski’s injury may not be nearly as serious as it looked. Don’t know about you, but I’m going to wait to exhale on that until we have an official diagnosis and timeline.
The end of the quest for perfection isn’t devastating; here’s hoping we can say the same thing about the collateral damage.
Chad Finn can be reached at [email protected]. Follow him on Twitter @GlobeChadFinn.
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