The Evil Patriots aren’t playing nice!
I’ve seen a few mediots question whether the Patriots “ran up the score” yesterday in Miami, and whether or not they were being unsportsmanlike in the process. Puh-leeze.
Yes they were up 42-14 in the middle of the second half - which is why Belicheck pulled Brady and put in Matt Cassell. Cassell proceeded to throw an INT that Jason Taylor returned for a TD, to make it 42-21. Apparently somebody forgot to tell Taylor and his teammates that the game was over, cuz he (and they) kept playing to win. Yet… the Patriots weren’t supposed to.
For the next offensive series, Belicheck put Brady back out - and he subsequently threw his sixth TD of the game. But what was Belicheck supposed to do… wait until the Dolphins cut the lead to 14, or 7? If this morons were paying attention, they’d note that Sage Rosenfels led his team all the way back from a 32-7 deficit late in the second half. And Sage Rosenfels is on the Texans cuz he’s no longer on the Dolphins, cuz they like Cleo Lemon better. And the Titans defense isn’t that far from the Pats defense (and may be better, silly as that sounds).
Prior to that, end of the first half with a comfortable lead, the Pats drove down in their two-minute offense and Brady tried the fake-spike play (made famous by Miami’s own Dan Marino). It didn’t work - but some suggest it was unsportsmanlike to try it. Bullshit. It’s the *first* half. Every team should use everything in their playbook to take as big a lead into halftime as possible… cuz you never know what the second half would bring - in the way of injuries, momentum, whatever (especially on the road).
The point is: In the NFL, *no* lead is safe. Plus, if the Dolphins (or Texans, or whoever) doesn’t want to lose a game by 20 or 30 points, then don’t let it happen. Its not the Patriots (or any team’s) responsibility to keep the opponent from embarassing themselves in a professional game.
I believe the stat is that Bill Belicheck was 2-5 in Miami as a Patriots head coach, coming into yesterday’s game. I submit that most/all of those years, the Pats had the better team… at least on paper. But that didn’t translate to the final score on the field (usually). Tom Brady has a losing record against the Dolphins, and has won like 75% of his games against all other opponents combined. The Patriots learned the frivolity of taking the Dolphins lightly when playing them in Miami - including when they had the woeful Dave Wannstedt as their head coach. That’s right… the Dolphins would beat the Pats in Miami, even when handicapped by head coach Dave Wannstedt!
This year, the Dolphins were 0-6 coming in and had nothing to lose - and its not the Patriots problem if the Dolphins (finally) couldn’t keep up with the Patriots. Just last year, the Dolphins won 21-0 in Miami - in a season where the Pats were a Reche Caldwell away from the Super Bowl and the Dolphins… weren’t.
As Herman Edwards famously noted a few years ago, “You play… to win… the game…” That’s it. If/when the Pats are down 42-14 at home early in the third quarter, I won’t be the least bit concerned with the plays and personnel the opponent is using in the second half. Instead, I’ll be focused on what the Patriots need to do to prevent that from happening again. Wow - novel idea!
But I guess people need to find something negative to say about the Patriots these days - now that the Spygate silliness has died off.
October 22nd, 2007 at 6:37 pm
Jason Taylor’s comment on all that after the game was basically, “If you don’t want the score run up on you…stop somebody.”
October 23rd, 2007 at 4:52 pm
I don’t see the issue with “running up the score,” unless the team that’s losing is willing to reciprocate the winning team’s magnanimity by not trying to, um, “catch up,” I think is how the young people put it nowadays. Like sports with a mercy rule? Try t-ball.