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Good has triumphed over evil.
What a storybook season for
the Patriots. After watching the game, Jim and I
recapped all of the crap this team has been through this
season:
- Being given an overall failing grade in the draft;
- Their quarterbacks coach dying in August;
- Being picked to finish in the cellar of the division
by virtually everyone;
- Losing linebacker Andy Katzenmoyer to injury
for the season;
- Losing their first game to the Cincinnati Bengals;
- An ongoing soap opera with Terry Glenn;
- Losing their Pro Bowl quarterback to injury in week
2.
- Sticking with second year QB Tom Brady when Bledsoe
was healthy.
The Patriots' last loss of
the season was to the Rams; the Rams' last loss of the
season was to the Patriots.
The team to win the pre-game Playstation
match-up (this year between Troy Brown and Isaac
Bruce) has now won the last seven Super Bowls. In the
Playstation game, Ty Law picked off a Warner pass to
end the game.
How can any team enter August
not believing they could win the Super Bowl? Even the Houston
Texans will have some experience and a good dose of
talent when they first take the field in the
preseason. Even Bengals fans have hope.
This was the best coaching
job by anyone I've seen. Bellichick dealt with
a great amount of diversity and stuck with his plan.
And Dick Jauron won the Coach of the Year.
Brilliant.
The difference between these
two teams was summed up so well by the pre-game show.
First, the offensive starters for the Rams came out,
announced by name, each nodding his head as his name echoed
through the Super Bowl, as to say, "look at me, look at
me." The Patriots opted to not have any
individual players announced, but to enter the stadium as,
simply, "The New England Patriots."
While the Patriots are a
class act, St. Louis coach Mike Martz is a royal
ass. After the game, when asked several questions
about the Patriots' victory, Martz essentially said,
"they didn't win; we lost." What poor
sportsmanship. Admit that the other team came out and
played harder than your guys, and that you got outcoached.
Ricky Proehl said it; Marshall Faulk said
it. Not Mike "The Genius" Martz. As
long as he's coaching the team, they are the most unlikable
team in all of sports - even more than the Yankees.
Maybe Martz should take a
look at the numbers: Antowain Smith outgained Marshall
Faulk; Tom Brady had a better completion
percentage and threw two fewer interceptions than Kurt
Warner; The Patriots scored more points than the Rams.
In their three playoff games,
the Patriots did not turn the ball over a single time.
They forced eight turnovers.
I loved the part of Fox's
pregame show where various former players read the Declaration
of Independence. I'm very tired of companies
wrapping themselves in the flag. But this seemed very
genuine, gave a good history lesson (how many viewers had
never read it before) and reminded me what this country, at
its best, stands for.
And now, my chance to wax
poetic. Bear with me . . .
How fitting that the team in
red, white and blue, the team called "The
Patriots," would overcome such adversity to win the
Championship this year. They didn't have a lot of
talent, but they had a lot of heart. When they came
into the Stadium as one - a team - it was a great reminder
of what one person can do as a part of a greater entity than
he can do as one man. I will remember these playoffs
for this team, who was outmatched by better personnel three
consecutive games - and who never stopped believing that
they were the best TEAM in football.
Thanks to the NFL, to all the
fans, to all of our readers, and to the Patriots for making
the 2001 NFL season one I'll never forget.
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Well, knock me over with a feather. I wrote in my pregame
analysis that the Patriots would make the Rams sweat, but I
never seriously thought they had a chance to win. This is
easily the most stunning Super Bowl win since the Jets beat
the Colts in Super Bowl III.
Face it, most Super Bowls are about as exciting an old Soviet
newsreel about a tractor collective in Minsk.
But this one ranks among the two or three best.
Well-played and crisp, down to the last play. A fitting end to a memorable
year.
The game plan by Patriots coach
Bill Belichick was
brilliant. His defense had Ram quarterback Kurt Warner
befuddled the first three periods as St. Louis never got in
a rhythm. It was obvious, though, that by game's end the Pats
defense was gassed. Had the game gone into overtime and the
Rams won the toss I think they would have won. This
accounted for the Pats aggressiveness on the final drive,
when some, including Fox commentator John Madden,
thought they should have let the clock run out and get ready
for overtime.
New England's 20 points was the
fewest by a Super Bowl
winner since the New York Giants scored 20 in beating
Buffalo in 1991. The Giants defensive coordinator that year?
None other than Bill Belichick.
I say let the Rams play in every Super Bowl. Their win in
2000 and loss Sunday each came down to the game's final play
and were two of the most remarkable games ever.
The season will by ranked by
the Rams as a failure. That's what happens when you are the
preseason favorite, go 14-2, get anointed as almost
unbeatable and then lose the Super Bowl while favored by 14
points. Mike Martz, he of the extreme arrogance, was
outcoached. Can someone tell me why Marshall Faulk,
the league's best player, had only 17 carries? He averaged
nearly 5 yards a carry and would have been effective while
Warner was out of sync. My
MVP is Pats cornerback Ty Law. He had an interception
return for a touchdown and played exceptional pass coverage
all game. The Patriots
offense was a non-factor in the first 28 minutes of each
half. But they awoke in the final two minutes of each,
getting a touchdown to end the first half and Adam
Vinatieri's 48-yard field goal to end the game. The
key play on the game-winning drive was Tom Brady's
20-yard completion to Troy Brown that got the Pats
into field goal range. A great throw by Brady, great route
and catch by Brown, who was also able to get out of bounds
and stop the clock.  Brady,
the Pats' quarterback and game MVP, is good-looking but a bit
of a doofus. He seems like a sweet doofus, though, as
his postgame comments showed. He was nice, sincere and
genuine and truly in awe of having had won. He grows on you.
The
Rams had 160 more total yards than the Patriots, the largest
margin ever by a Super Bowl loser. The
less said about the commercials the better. The
less said about the pregame show the better. One
example of why Fox's coverage was lame: no reaction
shots of either the Rams or Patriots bench as the winning
field goal was made. Getting those shots is taught in TV
101. The telecast was uneven, with few compelling shots and
replays that were often off the mark of what really happened
on a play. As for Pat Summerall's final telecast with
Madden, it can be said that Pat stumbled off into the
sunset. There are two
NFL teams I despise--the Rams and the Baltimore Ravens, each
led by a coach who thinks he's a freaking genius and let's
everyone know it. Two weeks ago the Ravens and Brian
Billick were eliminated and on Sunday it was Mike
Martz's turn. There is justice in sports sometimes. The
streak lives! No team that has lost to the Tampa Bay
Buccaneers in the regular season has ever gone on to win
the Super Bowl. Nov. 26, 2001: Tampa Bay 24, St. Louis 17.
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New
England's Adam Vinatieri kicked a 48 yard field
goal as time expired to lift his team to a Super Bowl
Championship. This is the same guy who kicked a
45-yarder in driving snow to tie the Raiders with under a
minute to go in the Divisional round. On Sunday, he
sported the beard he'd been growing since that Oakland
game two weeks ago. The good luck charm seems to
have worked. Plus, Vinatieri's a gay-friendly
Christian with