A Familiar Win

The Patriots always seem to pull out victories like yesterday's. Struggle mightily, allow hope, take the lead, lose the lead, ride Brady to yet another lead, hang on in the end. They usually win games like this ... against the Colts, Steelers, Eagles, etc.

Those were not the Colts. No no, they in fact were the Dolphins, Gus Frerotte's Dolphins.

Now some may look at this game and say, "Hey, that's just how the Patriots win. Against adversity they come up with just enough plays to sneak away with a victory." I choose to look at it and say, "How in the name of Zeus's butthole did they give up 360 $#!&ing yards to Gus Frerotte? What's next, Cody Pickett winning offensive player of the week against them?"

There isn't much else to say about this game or this team right now. The only real positive seems to be that Tom Brady is the best player on the field everytime he steps out there, and luckily that's going to be enough in a division consisting of teams led by Brooks Bollinger, Kelly Holcomb / J.P. Losman, and the afore mention Frerotte.

I guess you do have to give them credit for standing tall on the goal line when the Dolphins were threatening to tie the game at the end. Or maybe you have to give Chris Chambers a paddling for dropping a touchdown pass that hit him the stomach in the end zone on 4th down. The man in coverage on the play was Ellis Hobbs. When asked after the game what grade he would give the Patriots secondary in this game he said he would give them a "V" for victory. I think that is a good way to look at it, they deserve much worse than an F for allowing a 12th string quarterback to shred them like Senate expense reports, but they escaped with a win on the road. Heading into an almost guaranteed win next week against New Orleans I'll take it.

Other Sunday NFL stuff:

- My buddy Dan wins the first memorial, "Luckiest Fantasy Football Mistake" award for this season. He started Joey Harrington against me. My reaction when I saw the matchup on Thursday, "Holy #$%! I'm going to win this easily, the jackass is playing Joey Harrington." My reaction on Sunday night when I saw the result, "Silly Yahoo Fantasy Football, they seem to have made a few typos here, putting 3 touchdowns next to Harrington's name, just let me go find out what he really did in the box score...(sounds of typing)... Oh the humanity! Why oh good lord why!?"

- Cody Pickett was 1-13 for 27 yards on Sunday in windy Chicago, making the Kyles (Orton and Boller) share second worst quarterbacking performance of the day honors. There aren't winds accompanying a monsoon with a hurricane swirling within it to make an NFL quarterback go 1-13. If that didn't make Dick Vermeil cry...

- ... then certainly seeing his team come up with one of the worst performances of the year against Buffalo must have. That's definitely the "Inexplicable Egg Laying" of the week. Hope you took the points on that one.

- Nathan Vashar wasn't even supposed to catch the ball that he brought back a record 108 yards for a touchdown. You only put a safety in the end zone if you're afraid that the kicking team is going to fake the kick and try to throw a bomb, you don't expect or hope for the kick to come up 20 yards short. Think about this. If it's a 52 yard field goal the line of scrimmage is the 35. If a defensive back, who doesn't return kicks, catches a ball in the end zone, he's going to take a knee (okay not this guy but everyone else would). That would give you the ball on the 20, costing you at least 15 yards. Er... Obviously it worked out well but what the hell was he thinking? I wish I could be in that film session.

Coach: Okay, here's the kick...clearly coming up short. So this play should be over...but here you come. Freeze it! Right there, now see you're 8 yards away from the ball there and you're supposed to let it fall but, okay roll tape, but there you go running after it, yup okay now you've caught it in the end zone, costing us huge yardage. Why?

Vashar: Ahh yea coach, I er...thought it was gonna...

Coach: Nevermind, one mistake no big deal. Okay, here you go about to take a knee. Good thinking, it's not as good as the 35 but at least we'll get it on the 20. Freeze it! Now see here you're almost to the ground a few inches from sanity. Did the wind pick you back up and throw you out onto the field? Roll tape, so there you go, inexpicably taking off... Why? Why? WHY?

Vashar: Ahh yea coach, I er...well I'm really fast so...

Coach: Nevermind. So now you run out to the 30, directly towards traffic, stop, do a Barry Sanders, hand on the ground spin and take off up the sideline. Nice run, but did you have money on this or something? That's the only justification I can think of. Good play, you ever do that again and you're cut. By the way do some wind sprints after practice, you looked like you needed emergency defibrulation at about the 15.

- Let's all thank Dick Vermeil, not for showing us that men have a sensitive side and that it's okay to cry... all the time ... in front of national television audiences ... and in locker rooms full of half naked men. Rather, let's thank him for starting the, "Hey it's a game, let's win it," movement among NFL coaches. I wonder if Jon Gruden would have gone for 2 and the win yesterday if Vermeil hadn't gone for the touchdown and the win last week. I love it, and you'll keep seeing it until someone tries it and loses as a result. Then he will be a moron and a scapegoat, likely will lose his job and all coaches will go back into their shells until someone's balls drop back down and the cycle begins again.

- Last night the ESPN bottom line ticker listed Mike Tice's knee injury following the score. There wasn't something more important they could have mentioned first like say... Eli Manning's 4 picks? Oh right I forgot, this is ESPN, worshiping at the altar of Manning is their credo. I feel a little bad for Tice on this one. First, obviously you don't want to see someone get hurt, but the embarassing thing is the question that comes after. Why the hell wasn't he watching the play? The guy that hit him had the ball! Pretty embarassing to get taken out on the sideline and at the same time get caught day dreaming about what you'll do with all that free time next season...

Finally - The MVP.

You can't say that A-Rod didn't deserve it. What you can say is that Ortiz deserved it more. While A-Rod was the king of the meaningless home run, Big Papi was the best clutch hitter in baseball. Nothing is more valuable to a team tha big, late inning hits, not even great third base play.

The only assumption I can make is that the DH thing tipped the scales. This voting should be like a jury trial. I as the opposing attorney should be able to poll the voters and make each and every one of them tell me to my face that what Ortiz did this year wasn't worthy of an MVP trophy.

Sure I don't like it, but I don't like the way the Red Sox season ended even more and in the grand scheme of this season it's just another disappointment to add to the many that have piled up since October 1st. Remember how good things were in Red Sox nation last year at this time? Ahh memories.