The Day After

God its so painful
Something thats so close
And still so far out of reach

The title of the post is from the 80's movie about nuclear war and the above quote is from Tom Petty's song American Girl which he performed at the halftime of Sunday's Super Bowl.

The Day After fits my mindset (and the mindset of many Patriots fans I'm guessing) because today is literally the day after and Patriot Nation has been devastated. However, instead of nuclear bombs it feels more like neutron bombs where all the life has been killed but the buildings remain intact. The Patriots as a team remain pretty much intact assuming Randy Moss re-signs but some of the life, the suore di vive seems to evaporated. Nuked by the Giants on Sunday.

Sometimes humility is an expensive lesson to learn. I had the Patriots and the over Sunday. Today I'm very humble. I knew it was going to be a long day when I took the Pats winning the first quarter (-3) as a prop bet and the Pats failed to score on the last play of the quarter but managed to score on the first play of the second quarter. That set the tone for my day. Thank goodness that I did OK playing cards - so that my donation will be like selling a pint of blood instead of auctioning off one of my kidneys.

I'm guessing the Pats are pretty humble right now as well. Not to take anything away from the Giants but Tom Brady hasn't looked right the past two games. I'm reminded of a couple of years ago when Brady looked "off" at the end of the season and only later did we learn that he had been playing with a sports hernia. The biggest group of Patriots eating humble pie this morning has to be the offensive line. The Giants defensive front destroyed them. The second biggest group dining on crow today has to be the Pats defensive backs who dropped (by my count) 5 passes that easily could have been interceptions and which would have changed Eli Manning from hero to goat. I'd be remiss in not mentioning the Pats coaching which didn't have its A game working yesterday. I have no idea why Bill Belichick didn't have Steven Gostkowski try a field goal late in the 4th quarter. Josh McDaniels play calling probably has anyone with a head coach opening wondering if he's not quite ready for prime time.

Two predictions. First, after reviewing the tape of the game - the Pats will probably target either an offensive lineman with the 7th pick of the draft or trade down for two picks and roll the dice with a defensive back, linebacker or O-lineman. Second, I'm predicting we have seen the last of Bill Belichick in that red hoodie. Ever.

One quote had been circling in my head all week leading up to this game. In 1980 after the USA hockey team had beaten the Russians in the "Miracle on Ice" they still had to beat Finland for the gold medal. After the first period of the game against Finland, Brooks walked into the locker and said, "If you lose this game, you'll take it to your fucking grave." Brooks paused, took a few steps, turned again and said, "Your fucking grave." The Patriots will take Sunday's loss to their fucking graves.

To their fucking graves.