Get ready for one last humiliation as Patriots look to close a season of failure
You know how this is going to end, don’t you?
COMMENTARY
You know how this is going to end, don’t you?
Let’s not hold any delusional aspirations that Sunday is going to be any different than the debacle that was Monday night. The Patriots added yet another nadir to their wretched and disparate season with a 38-9 loss to the Buffalo Bills that proved just how out-of-balance the AFC East really is.
It will be fitting to watch New England finish its 2020 campaign with a loss to the New York Jets, a team implausibly on the rise after it seemed destined for a winless season. How better to say farewell to the most forgettable Patriots season in two decades than with a demoralizing defeat at the hands of the team Bill Belichick can stand losing to the least?
In fact, a loss is probably the best thing that could happen. (Mind you, we’re on a scale, here.)
Some might argue (hello) that the Patriots dropping the first meeting between these two teams in early November would have been a productive outcome. At the time, New England was only 2-5. Tanking the rest of the season in order to secure one of the draft’s top quarterbacks seemed to be an avenue to consider. Instead, they snuck past the putrid Jets and went on to tease with an inspired victory over Baltimore. Then, the Houston game happened and everyone just sort of stopped caring.
Now, the Patriots are in a different stratosphere, a free-fall that has seen them humiliated by division rivals in back-to-back weeks. What better way to make it abundantly clear to Belichick and the Krafts that this is a ship that needs to be righted immediately? Lest the Patriots fall into a further irrelevancy while their “dedicated” fan base keeps draping its sorrows in the creamsicle-colored jerseys from its hero’s new home.
It was difficult to watch Tom Brady and the Buccaneers beat up on the Detroit Lions Saturday afternoon, then have to witness the complete futility of Cam Newton and Jarrett Stidham (a combined 9-for-21, 78 yards) Monday night. The Patriots have a lot of issues (wide receiver, tight end, offensive line, linebacker, defensive end), but quarterback tops the list. You could argue that Dan Marino couldn’t throw to the likes of Jakobi Myers, Damiere Byrd, and whatever N’Keal Harry has become, but you have to start somewhere, and the Patriots are in this boat.
At 6-9, the Patriots are already assured of their worst record since their 5-11 season in 2000, Belichick’s first year at the helm. There’s really no difference between finishing 6-10 or 7-9, other than moving up or down a few spots in the no-man’s land of the first round that the Patriots have succumbed themselves to for winning a handful of forgettable games. Might as well leave room for one, last humiliation.
Belichick sounds like he still needs it.
Maybe there’s just no outward display of it, but Belichick hasn’t seemed to take an ounce of accountability for the way this season has unfolded. But he is the one who put together this personnel (even if it is a roster backed into salary cap purgatory, and has the most COVID holdouts of anyone in the NFL). He is the one who watched his well-coached team in “all three phases” get burned on a fake punt in consecutive weeks. He is the one who stuck with the Newton, who has been constantly regressing, in the midst of the season, when his team might have, miraculously, still had a shot at a playoff grab.
https://twitter.com/redsoxstats/status/1343757804536999936
Yet, on Monday night, there was Bill explaining what happened. The Bills were better.
Yawn.
Bill, what happened to your team since shutting out the Chargers, 45-0, three weeks ago?
“Well, tonight we didn’t play as well as we’re capable of and Buffalo played well.”
Bill, why can’t your starting quarterback hit the side of a barn?
“We just didn’t execute the passing game well, and they played well defensively with their pressure.”
Hey, Bill. Why were your precious special teams fooled for a second-straight week on a fake punt?
“They executed it well. They got us before we could make the play.”
Now, here come the upstart New York Jets, winners of two of their last three games, jettisoning the No. 1 pick to the Jacksonville Jaguars in the process. Sam Darnold is the future, apparently, even if Adam Gase is not.
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But wins against the Rams and Browns, both pining for the postseason, will only matter as much to Jets fans as one, season-ending blow against their hated rivals.
They’ll get it, too. These Patriots are in no position to beat anybody. They are a dysfunctional and incomplete entity that needs nothing more than to close the book on the season and turn to 2021.
Maybe a loss to the Jets kicks them into further gear. Maybe ending the season with such an embarrassment prompts Bill into thinking that, you know, maybe he should look into acquiring a quarterback for next season, something he refused to do until Newton fell into his lap for $1 million. Maybe a tight end, too.
There will be no more lame excuses about the salary cap to deal with (the Patriots will have the seventh-most cap space in the league). Dont’a Hightower, Patrick Chung and friends will, presumably, be back. Maybe the Patriots will rebound in 2021. But after seeing the Bills again Monday night, it’s probably more accurate to predict the team has miles to go before it catches up in terms of talent.
One more week and it’s over. The Patriots are going to lose to the New York Jets. The way they looked Monday night, they are going to get blown out by the New York Jets. Take the points.
A season that began with uncertainty is ending in failure.
What’s one more reminder to end the year, striking out against the AFC East opponents they used to once treat as afterthoughts?
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