A Fitting End To Patriot's Season!

Some time ago I wrote an article asking a simple question of Tom Brady and this season: Can he, or can't he? The Tom Brady question. And I purposely refused to make my own judgement too early because sometimes (Tony Romo) players can go into a zone late in the year and raise their play to another level. Eli Manning did it in 07... unfortunately for the Patriots.

The question of Tom Brady was answered most definitively yesterday, when Ray Lewis and company made him look like, well, Drew Bledsoe in his "happy feet" role. Believe me, I know Brady wasn't the only Patriot looking bad yesterday. The truth is The Ravens made the Pats and Brady look bad. A further truth is this: there are very few times in his career when Brady looked completely confused and intimidated. In fact, I have never seen him look this bad.

Again, I know it was not only Brady that looked bad. I know about the secondary and the lack of commitment to the running game, and the absolutely vanilla offensive play calling that fools NO0NE.Just ask Ray Lewis. And hey, I know losing Welker hurt them, but Edleman scored two touchdowns in his place. He and Faulk were the only two bright spots on that team yesterday. Was Moss even on the field yesterday?

Coming into yesterday's game Brady had been sacked 16 times this year. Not too bad really when considering the big picture. But he has been hit and rushed a lot. Everyone knows that is a QB's achille's heel, but for Brady, it has become a monkey on his back since SB XLII. We saw what the Jets did in week II, and what the Ravens did yesterday.

Do I think Brady is done? Not by a long shot. But I think Randy Moss needs to rethink his priorities, and the Pats need to rethink their offensive play-calling and comittment to the run and their defensive mind-set. They MUST keep Brady from being harassed by the bullies in the NFL or he will need take a page from Dan Marino and Peyton Manning's books and get rid of the ball faster. Thus, change the play-calling and run game.

I'm not a statistician, I can't tell you all the numbers on particular players. I watch for performance, effort, and results. Yesterday's performance, effort, and results speak for themselves. The Pats deserved to go out like chumps yesterday.