OJ's Glove

Of course. Again, a Conference Title is an accomplishment. Having more of them is better than having fewer. I'm not sure why this is so difficult for some people to understand.

This is a little deceiving for a couple of reasons. First, two of Montana's four wins were "down to the wire" close games against Cincinnati. Two were blowouts, but Montana's excellence also happened in the middle of a 13-in-a-row NFC dominance of the Super Bowl. During that time, there were people arguing that the NFC Championship game was the "real Super Bowl", because that's where the two best teams in the League played each other. There were just too many times where the AFC puked on themselves in the big game. So I take the actual Super Bowl game stats from that period (like never throwing an interception) with a grain of salt. There's much better balance between the conferences in this period. And 4-2 is better than 4-0. Bills fans - of all people - should remember that a conference title is an accomplishment. They give you a trophy for it and everything. Anyone who argues this is basically penalizing Brady for taking his team further into the playoffs before losing than Montana did, and giving Montana extra credit for getting bounced in the NFC playoffs every year the 49ers didn't win it all. I'm sorry, but this makes no sense.

I'm not sure why people say stuff like this. Every game is different, different teams match up differently with each other. The chances of NE turning the ball over 3 times in their own territory (or something equally suicidal) two weeks in a row is unlikely. Pittsburgh has matched up poorly with the Patriots for years, and almost never beats them.

What you're not thinking about is that the League controls the electronic communication. If it goes down, the League is supposed to make sure both teams can't use it. If the Giants used their own devices to get around that, it's a violation. Also, if you're using your own walkie-talkies, there's the potential you can change the frequency to listen in on the opposing team's Coach-to-QB playcall. None of that can happen if you're only using League-controlled equipment, which is one of the reasons the League controls it. They should be penalized, it's not BS. If anyone here trying to minimize this ever saw Belichick doing the same thing, you'd be singing a different tune.

You seem to be under the mistaken impression that the Boston sports media are "professionals".

Half the NFL would dispute that.

This is a false-expectations, mythic media hottake which is a residue from 2007. Too many people assume that if the Patriots aren't blowing teams out, there's something wrong with them or they're not as good as advertised. Ignore 2007 and go back and look at the scores of the games the four years they won - 01, 03, 04 , 14. Some are blowouts, many are not. I remember vividly that '03 season when the final scores of games were hardly dominant, and everyone said they looked beatable. But nobody could actually beat them, and they ended the season winning 15 in a row. Don't anybody fall for the media BS that the Patriots should be destroying every opponent they play. Most of the last 17 years don't look like that, even with the gaudy W-L record. Plenty of their wins are relatively competitive games.

I think Fred is disappointed in the direction of the Bills, and has been for a long time. But he's hardly alone there.I don't think that means he's a Judas or something. You can't expect him to not be happy when the Pats are successful, based on where he came from. Like I said, if the Bills were a really good team, I think Fred would be happy about it.

It's not just that he's paid. Fred is from Mass., graduated high school there, and went to Boston College. I'm sure he rooted for the Patriots when he was a teenager. This shouldn't surprise anyone. I'm sure Fred would be thrilled if the Bills started having real success again. I know he'd be happy if that happened. But you can be sure he's also pretty damned happy when the Patriots are good, and he's been happy quite a bit in recent years. You can't really blame the guy. He's a New Englander, and there'll never be a time when he's not.

Actually MIami went to three in a row. SB 6, 7, 8.

The next time the Steelers beat the Patriots in a big spot will be the first time. Brady has more or less owned them with a few infrequent exceptions. It isn't a coincidence that the two times the Steelers managed to win the SB in recent memory, they managed to avoid having to face NE in the postseason both times.

I was at the game, and every play where this issue happened, the ref announced to the entire stadium that Vereen was reporting as ineligible. Just because you don't hear it on TV, doesn't mean it didn't happen. I heard it. Vinovich even additionally announced over the PA "Don't cover 34!" (which he shouldn't technically have said as it is direct advice to the defense) because Harbaugh was pissing and moaning and didn't know what was going on. All the referees were in proper position when the ball was snapped. Belichick knew the rule. So did the refs, I guarantee BB asked the refs about it before the game to make sure it was kosher before he tried it. The Ravens coaching staff didn't understand it. The NFL confrmed that everything BB and the refs did was consistent with the rules. Tough darts. Threads like this just showcase stupid blind ignorance and jealous bias by opposing fans. Give it a rest. I appreciate the knowledgable Bills fans trying to educate the haters on this issue.

Your notions are slightly off here. Yeah, they were all close games. The point being that Brady didn't play poorly in any of them really, and handed his defense the lead late in the game in the two he lost. Even in 36 where he was basically a rookie and wasn't statistically good - and the Patriots offense only scored one offensive TD, he still had the game winning drive in crunch time to set up the FG. Then of course the shoot-out against Carolina in SB38 where he was great. They never "stopped the Rams at the one yard line" in SB36. I think you're confused on that one. The Rams were only in the red zone twice in that game and scored TD's both times. The play where Warner fumbled on the one yard line and the Pats returned it for a TD was overturned by a penalty. They had a ten-point lead on Philly in SB39. Philly's long-bomb TD that made it a three-point game wasn't technically in garbage-time, but it was close to it. There was no "winning FG" in that game. Manning was lousy in the one SB he won, arguably against the weakest NFC champion in the last 20 years.

Not really. Look, for all I know the Patriots are headed right for 4-12, and soon. All I'm saying is don't bet on it. It seems repeated on this board often that The Patriots are all done and sooner rather than later - it's just a matter of time. I don't really buy that. No team is permanently good. Look at the Niners and Raiders right now. But that doesn't mean a currently very good team is headed for "implosion".

It was? They were 9-7, tied for the division lead and missed the playoffs on a tiebreaker. Brady led the league in TD's. 2002 could have been better, but I certainly wouldn't call it miserable.

You missed the point. I said the 94 SB winner was completely different than the team that won the SB in 81. The fact that there wasn't any free agency didn't matter. The "cores" of the two teams were completely different. The Niners had plenty of turnover from 81 to 96 (hard to avoid turnover over such a long period), and never once were they a team that had no hope of sniffing the playoffs - and they were usually a lot better than that. The Raiders were the same way (but not as dramatic) between the late 60's and early 80's. Very high winning percentage and very few losing seasons. You can argue it's harder now, but we already have precedent for a team that was consistently good because of the top-down organization, rather than any one player. Don't assume some team is ready to "implode". It's just wishful thinking. Bob Kraft has owned the Patriots for 12 years and they've only had 2 losing seasons.

It took the 49ers over 15 years to "implode" and become a team that other teams actually wanted on their schedule. They didn't win the SB every year, but they had ten or more wins every single year and the last SB that they won was a completely different team than the first one - including the QB and head coach. Don't assume these things automatically happen. Don't expect the Patriots to win the SB every year, but don't assume a crash-and-burn either.

I agree. But it also begs the question as to why no other AFC team was able to win one or even be competitive very often in the SB during that period. Cincinnati had two close matchups against the Niners, but not many other games were that close. I don't really have a good answer. The Broncos were pretty talented and Elway's record speaks for itself. So why did they get spanked so badly three times? Not sure.

The balance of power is clearly a shifting thing. The 13 in a row was a bit much, though. The one year everybody thought the NFC sent a relatively weak representative during that time (1990), they still managed to win the game against a team that everybody agreed had superior talent. Call it the gameplan or whatever other reason you want to use, but I just find it interesting that one of the few times during that streak when the AFC had the best chance to steal one, they still couldn't do it - despite the Bills' talent and later resilience. Most other years during that time the NFC representative was expected to win convincingly and usually did.

Agreed, but throughout the period of NFC dominance, there were good AFC teams that were able to beat good NFC teams in the regular season. That always happened. There has to be a tangible reason the NFC won 13 in a row. It's not coincidental.

Only pathologically jealous Bills fans think the Pats weren't "dominant". 34-4 in two years. Never been done before. Owning three consecutive wins records, including postseason. (21, 18, 10) Never even trailing in a game between mid-November and the Super Bowl in the '03 season. But just ignore all that, and pretend the margin of victory in the last game is the only definition of "dominance". If that's all you have to hang your hat on, keep those blinders on and pretend you don't hear me. Easier that way. Especially since the sting of getting whipped in the SB is still so fresh in the minds of Bills fans, it's all some of them notice. By the way, the undefeated '72 Dolphins only won the Super Bowl 14-7. Don't let me ever catch some of you calling that team "dominant". We wouldn't want any hypocrisy around here, would we?

Oh, that's a good one. Hilarious. I love Steve Grogan, but no Patriots fan in his right mind holds him in higher regard than Brady. You guys really are funny.

The first part of your sentence is a completely made up insult. The second is simply misinformed. People who "follow Parcells" continued to follow him when he left for the Jets and then Dallas. None of those people remained Patriots "fans" when Parcells left. It's patently obvious to anyone who values truth over untruth. There's nothing funnier than Bills fans whose only way to complain about another team's success is to whine about how the fans of said team aren't sufficiently rabid - without anything factual backing it up. "we lose more often than you do but we care more." Weak.