After another season of Sunday to Sunday drama action, the NFL season has concluded following another Patriots Super Bowl victory on Sunday, February 3rd. A season of offenses ravaging up and down the field ended with the lowest scoring Super Bowl in NFL history, featuring two of the leagues better offenses. So, where does this leave us?
Maybe at this point, we can’t ignore that Tom Brady, Bill Belichick, and the Patriots dynasty is either the greatest sports dynasty of all time or one of them. For the sixth time in his career, Tom Brady is a Super Bowl victor. Brady now stands alone as the player with the most NFL championships. Despite only putting up 13 points, Tom lead the game-winning drive in the 4th quarter, once again, to help the Patriots win their sixth Super Bowl in franchise history, tying the Pittsburgh Steelers for the most in NFL history.
How did they do it, again? Well, the Patriots executed, and executed when they needed to. The defense was able to put pressure on Jared Goff and make him uncomfortable while clogging the running lines and shutting down the platoon of running backs Todd Gurley and C.J. Anderson. In turn, the Rams were constantly giving the ball back to the Patriots or off the field fast, not giving the Rams offense extra opportunities.
On offense, the Patriots were halted to only 13 points, but again, executed when they needed to, lead by none other than Tom Brady at quarterback. Coming down the stretch of a tight defensive game, Brady worked his magic through tight windows to find Edelman and Gronk using short two second dropbacks to work his way down the field, with one 29 yard “deep” ball that just got through into Rob Gronkowski’s hands.
Despite looking their most vulnerable this year, the Patriots found a way to win another Super Bowl, which puts the rest of the league in an awkward spot. This was one of the most offensive seasons in league history. Teams like the Rams and Chiefs, which both matched up with Patriots in the playoffs, had plenty of the exciting bells and whistles on offense. Yet, against the Patriots in the playoffs, the Chiefs were held to only a touchdown until the 4th quarter, and the Rams had just three total points in the Super Bowl.
While there is much envy to the Patriots dynasty, they are something special. The Patriots symbolize so much of what successful people are. Like most that are successful, they are met by resent by a lot of people, “oh the Patriots cheat, Brady is a cheater, and they get lucky!” and so on and so forth. The Patriots also struggle early, they often don’t play well in September, it takes them a while to figure things out, success doesn’t often come quickly or early. The defense wasn’t great during the regular season, but wound up being a big part of the Super Bowl victory, holding a top offense to three points. Yet, what makes the Patriots so special is what they do every single day from the first snap of training camp to the last kneel down in the Super Bowl, and that is that they work hard. They don’t take shortcuts, they don’t get distracted, they don’t stay inside to practice when it’s single digits outside, they do things right, and if they don’t, they practice until they get it right and then continue to do the same thing over and over so that they will be able to do it in game. Obviously, sometimes the game plan doesn’t work. When it doesn’t, they don’t crumble or fall like most, yet are willing to adapt and make gametime changes fast. When things are dire, they have people like Tom Brady that are willing to come in with a chip on his shoulder and make special things happen in crunch time.
They aren’t perfect, they aren’t even a great Patriots team to their standards. In fact, their Super Bowl MVP, Julian Edelman, is only 5’10”, was a quarterback in college, and was taken in the 7th round of the NFL draft and converted to wide receiver. Yet, somehow, someway every year, whether through great execution and game planning to great quarterbacking, the Patriots find a way to get it done. At the end of the day, maybe we should all strive to be like the Patriots model of consistency. Even when the situation around you isn’t the best, you work your tail off and focus on your job, control what you can control, and you will be surprised how the things can fall your way.