10 Reasons Why I Like New England

I haven't done too many sports posts on here, so I thought what better time to do so than today.  With a realistic possibility of a rematch of Super Bowl XLII on the line today, a great Brady vs. Henson piece on ABC yesterday, and my morning filled with PS3 and Breaking Bad, I couldn't think of anything better than to share my thoughts on the most recent football dynasty.

Many people hate Bill Belichick and Tom Brady and with good reason.  Some believe that Belichick should have been booted from the league a few years ago when he was caught cheating.  I've never given any real thought to why I like these guys so much.  Belichick especially is one of the least likable people in sports.  They shrug off interviews, they run the score up and they keep on winning, things that would normally drive me nuts.  Brady is too good looking for his own good and has kids with not one, but two super models - including one out of wedlock.

But I've got a few reasons to like this strange couple and outside of the Bengals and the Bears, there isn't a team in pro football that I root harder for to win a Super Bowl.  I'm going to try to come up with 10 reasons, but I probably won't get that far:


1) Probably the single biggest reason - Brady is a Michigan alum.  I've been a fan of the Wolverines as long as I can remember and don't see myself ever giving up that allegiance.  So, the more Super Bowls Brady wins, the more he distances Michigan from Ohio State in the "we have better NFL players" game.

2) Brady wasn't supposed to be here.  He was a sixth round draft pick, an afterthought for most, including the Patriots.  Drafted ahead of him?  Chad Pennington, Giovanni Carmazzi, Chris Redman, Tee Martin, Marc Bulger, and the great Spergon Wynn.  But he worked his butt off and made himself in to one of the best in the game today and has a shot at being, statistically, one of the best to ever play the position.

3) They have done it without superstars around them.  Sure, Brady got Moss for a couple of fun years, but it wasn't enough to get them through an undefeated season.  While Dan Snyder goes out and signs every washed up star with an attitude, Belichick fills his team with guys like Danny Woodhead, hard workers who play within his system.  And they win with maddening consistency.

4) Belichick is one of the most innovative coaches in the league.  Who led the team in rushing (albeit without many touches) in their game against Tim Tebow last week?  His second tight end, Aaron Hernandez.  Where did Julian Edelman play last week?  As a defensive back for much of the game.  How many snaps did Chad Ochocinco get?  1.  He always finds a way with players that might not be the best in the game - or sometimes the best on the team.

5) I've never had a reason to cheer for a dynasty team before.  I wasn't alive for the Big Red Machine.  The only dynasty the Bengals could claim is a 21+ year run of not winning a playoff game.  The Wolverines football team is probably the closest thing to a dynasty I've seen, but even they have only one a single national championship in my lifetime.  And the Fab Five, well the NCAA tells me I can't even brag about the fact that they are closer to the Bills dynasty of the nineties than to Michael Jordan's Bulls.  So I've latched on the Patriots and I'm riding this for a few more years while Brady is still at the top of his game in the hopes that he'll pass Joe Montana and Terry Bradshaw with 5 Super Bowl wins.

6) They overshadow another hated rival of one of my teams - the Pittsburgh Steelers.  What the Steelers have done over the past 10 years would be too much to take for this Bengals fan if I had to listen to their fans talk about being the best team in football.  But the Patriots have been able to keep the Steelers in their shadow and hopefully they will for years to come.

7) Brady and Belichick continually claim that they aren't out to break records - that they aren't even aware of their existence.  I don't believe them at all.  I think they both want to shatter the record books and I think they play for it.  I have no problem with that.  They are good, they win Super Bowls, they need to keep something in their crosshairs to maintain their dominance.  Does Google just sit back and say, eh, we made this sweet search engine that the whole world uses, guess we'll stop now?

8) I'm jealous of Brady's hair.  I grow my hair long and it grows out, not down.  I LITERALLY (there you go, Sara and Anub) look like I stuck my finger in a light socket.  There's probably evidence somewhere in my Facebook photos, though I probably erased most of those years from my profile when I started to play the "if I can't remember the picture being taken, it probably shouldn't be out their for public consumption" game.

9) I should probably include Robert Kraft in my praise of the Patriots as well, because if Mike Brown (the Bengals owner) was blessed with Bill Belichick and Tom Brady, he'd find a way to fuck it up.

10)  Ummm...struggling here...Belichick always looks comfortable?  Who else can go to work in a hoody with the sleeves cut off?  Who else can pull off the Gore-Tex jacket like the picture above?  And that's where we end the list, and cut to George Costanza - because Seinfeld relates to everything.