What Now?

To try, at this point to put the recent run of New England sports dominance in perspective is difficult. History widens perspective and as such what is right before us becomes clearer as time goes on. It takes time to decide that eras have come and gone and even more time to determine where they belong in history. Right now we can only compare what we have recently seen with past runs that compare with it, i.e. the Steelers, Cowboys, and 49ers that all won 2 consecutive Super Bowls. We have no idea what will come from the Patriots in the immediate future, and similarly no idea what great dynasties will upstage them further down the road.

A region has rarely seen such a peak period in sports. Two franchises in New England have turned the mindset and the expectations of a rabid sports town on its head. Remember just 5 years ago the Patriots had never won a Super Bowl, the name Tom Brady hardly meant anything to us, the Red Sox were mired in the midst of an 80+ year losing streak, and a playoff berth in either sport was exciting enough. Then one team, one coach, one kick changed it all.

When Adam Vinatieri's 48 yard field goal clinched Super Bowl XXXVI for the Patriots and a shocked and overjoyed fan base, life as we knew it ceased to exist. Winning was expected now, and losing felt not only painful but wrong. 4 years later things have only escalated.

Following the Red Sox curse-breaking championship in 2004 Boston had captured an elusive holy sporting grail, 2 major championships residing in 1 city at the same time. We as fans were on top of the world. Neither our Red Sox or Patriots had been eliminated from a season in what seemed like forever, and the Patriots perpetuated our run into 2005 winning again in last year's Super Bowl. From the Patriots victory in Super Bowl XXXVIII to the Red Sox elimination in October of 2005 Sox and Pats fans celebrated 3 championships and 0 eliminations in 613 days. It simply does not get better than that, as we have learned. On the 614th day the eventual World Champion White Sox eliminated the Red Sox from the ALDS, 3 months and a week later the Broncos paid the Patriots the same discourtesy.

So here we are with our rear view mirrors strapped firmly to our foreheads, hoping to obscure our vision of the frightening future. I think that it's safe, at least at this point to say that the Red Sox run is over. They have made the playoffs, which is by no means a small feat in baseball, in 3 consecutive seasons with essentially a core group of players. That core is gone now, as is the man who assembled them (at least as far as we know). The rest of the division has gotten better as the Red Sox have (not entirely by their own doing) gotten worse. While they have not slid down the entire slippery slope of the mountain it took them nearly 9 decades to climb, they have clearly descended a little. That slight decension will likely delay the next Duck Boat ride for John Henry and his staff through the streets of Boston at least long enough for the team's makeup to change sufficiently so that it will no longer be recognizable as the team that enjoyed the tour in 2004.

The Patriots on the other hand are a different story. They could be back again next year. There are no Johnny Damon's heading out of town on this team, and Scott Pioli is not packing his bags after a power struggle with Bob Kraft. Tom Brady is not demanding to be traded and free agents are not avoiding the organization like the plague. 4 out of 6 Super Bowl victories has never been done, but it is not out of the question and is probably more likely than 3 in a row ever was. We saw this year what chance can do to a team in terms of injury and we saw how hard it is to avoid that cold grasp of chance for 3 straight years. But unlike the Red Sox the core that brought the first 3 Patriots banners home remains in Foxboro and like we always say around here when you have Brady and Belichick you always have a chance. Are the odds good that they will win the Super Bowl again next season? No. The division has vastly improved, especially the Miami Dolphins under Belichick disciple Nick Saban. Another Bill underling will no doubt right the ship in New York at least somewhat, although the problems there will take a bit longer to correct given their very limited talent offensively. And the longer a team plays with the same system the more likely it is that teams will find a way to beat it. The Patriots have been using simple deception to win for half a decade, but a formula may slowly be developing (out of Denver) on how to beat them. But there is still a chance of a return to glory.

While I am not willing to call an end to the era of dominance by the Patriots I think it is important to put into perspective what they have done. It's an over used cliche to blame the absence of dynasties on the free agency era, but as most cliches do it originates from some factual basis. The contract structure of the NFL is set up to create parody, not dominance. Ideally, by the terms of the present CBA each team comes into any given season with the same financial opportunity to win, what they do with it is another story. Given that fact what the Patriots have accomplished is even more amazing. They are not given any greater tools than the other 31 teams in the NFL; they have merely made the best use of them. Their dominance is due to an effective use of available resources not an overabundance of them in comparison to other teams.

The New York Yankees of the late 1990s used the opposite model; they bought and sold their championships. In baseball you can do that, in football you can't. New England has become the model franchise because they have combined great coaching and great personnel management with great talent. For the past 5 years they have gotten water from the perverbial stone while the rest of the league has managed to only create dust.

Of course you need incredible personalities to build what they Patriots have build, and frankly in most places it wouldn't work. A Tom Brady with a bigger ego and hungrier checking account could have brought this franchise to its knees and stopped the dominance on several occasions. Fortunately he is not of the T.O. mold and offered to structure his contract so that the team would be ensured of the ability to field a competitive team under the salary cap each season. Not many professional athletes look at it that way, each Patriot is required to (at least in some measure) or they are shown their walking papers (Ty Law, Lawyer Milloy). It sounds vapid to talk about playing for the name on the front of the jersey rather than the name on the back, but that's what happens when players put on the Patriots uniform.

This team first mentality seems to weed out some of the stat and contract oriented players from the Patriots roster and replaces them with players who genuinely want to win. Take Corey Dillon for example. He was mired in mediocrity (and that is being kind) in Cincinnati for the better part of his career. After growing sick of it he talked his was out of town with a reputation as a locker room cancer. Then he took less money and followed Brady's contract structure in order to have a shot at a ring with the Pats. He was not a guy that was sick of being underpaid and underappreciated, he was sick of losing. If you want the huge amount of 0's after your name, go to Oakland; if you want a ring on your finger come to New England. It's been that simple. It's a remarkably simple philosophy, yet one that is so terribly difficult to implement in today's sporting landscape. In order to convince those who want to win that the Patriots had what it took to win they had to accomplish something out of nearly nothing. The credit for that goes to Belichick and Pioli. Before they were able to bring players here (and what veteran does not want to play here now?) they had to take a team that had no shot at a title and win one anyway. Credibility to your system comes with success, not successful thinking. Credbility to the Pats came to them on the foot of Adam Vinatieri almost 6 years ago.

Walking off the field Belichick was quoted as saying (yelling) to an assistant, "Can you believe we won the fucking Super Bowl with this team?"

He knew that by all rights they should not have won it, but they did and what followed after was a direct result of that heroic effort.

But nothing lasts forever. The reality of the game is starting to set in on the Patriots and the financial realities are starting to catch up with even them. You see the nice little scenario I drew up back there only works if everyone is on board with it, including the super stars. While Tom Brady has the humilty of a man who knows what it's like to be an underdog other stars on this roster do not necessarily share that trait. Richard Seymour held out from camp this season, and while he eventually played and starred yet again on the football field his contract dispute showed that even the greatest and most team minded organization has to be congnicent of star power. Some players can be replaced and spotted for, Seymour is not one of them. As players continue to flourish in this system their star power will become evident and the Pats will have to make some tough choices concerning their futures. Eventually some will be let go to protect the integrity of the team, but that will take its toll. The long term effect however will be to keep the mindset of the players who are here on the team aspect of the game. While greatness can never truly be replaced it can be augmented and as we have learned in New England it can be created out of unlikely candidates. They won't win every year, and the tenure of this regime will eventually end but as long as the philosophy remains the same they will continue to head in the right direction, regardless of where they are forced to start from.

Purely from a fan's perspective this recent run of greatness has been sporting validation. For a few years we were immune to the insecurities of being a fan. We did not have to worry about whether or not our team would win, we merely wondered how they would pull it off this time. It was like a sports fantasy land. Losing was odd, unfamiliar, and easily forgotten. Winning became expected, almost mundane, and ordinary.

After last season's Super Bowl I called my dad, as I'm sure so many fans in New England did. Our conversation was probably so different from the one we had after the 2000 Super Bowl that they would be unrecognizable as topically related. In 2000 I think we were both screaming. I remember saying, "I have never been this happy in my life!" (A line that caused me to spend the better part of the night that my team finally won something consoling an hysterical girlfriend who took offense to that concept.) I think I remember my dad telling me that he went into my 15 year old sister's room and picked her up out of bed he was so elated. It was a feeling totally unknown to us. Last year I think we talked for a while about the actual game and about how this whole winning thing was becoming routine. I remember starting the conversation saying, "Ho, hum another Super Bowl, " half sarcastically, half seriously.

It's amazing how easy it is to get used to winning. But now in retrospect it meant so much to this region and to me. It gave us pride and identity. We wore Patriots jerseys, hats, t-shirts, and sweatshirts with pride. That pride was unchallengable because our team (unlike our fans) did their talking on the field, and they spoke loudly. Success was also a interpersonal galvanizing force in this area. It was something that had grown men who don't know each other hugging on a street corner in Brighton after the first Super Bowl victory. It had traffic stopped on Beacon Street in Cleveland Circle horns happily honking as crazed fans celebrated in the streets. It brought us together more than arguing after losses ever drove us apart and hopefully, as we head into our first off season of discontent we will remember that. This organization handled itself with discretion and class at all times, and while fans will never do that I think their behavior (while frustrating) set an example for a region to follow. The team itself didn't care what anyone said about them because they knew that one Sunday's they would more than likely come out on top, that confidence filtered to us. Anyone could say what they wanted about New England, but they couldn't take away our victories or our self assuredness about the victory to come.

This has been a time in Boston sports that I will never forget. When I'm an old man sitting in a rocking chair eulogizing this era to my grandchildren the stories will get magnified and the glories will be exaggerated but my pride in having shared the prime of my life with the prime of Boston sports will remain clear and my gratitude will only grow. Instead of bemoaning the potential end of a dynasty I wish to thank the Patriots organization for providing us with one in the first place and wish them luck in continuing their success (for our benefit and theirs) down the line. Like I said before 4 out of 6 would still be a dynasty.