They suck because they are too good. From the POV of a spectator (and not a Patriots fan), there is absolutely no potential for drama. They are going to win each weekend, and they are going to win big. I’ve started to avoid watching their games, because the outcome is predetermined. They’ve had a grand total of one interesting half (against the Cowboys) - otherwise they’ve been a yawner.
Until this season, I’ve been opposed to efforts to impose parity in sport. The Patriots have turned me around on the issue. It is no fun to watch them, hence, they suck.
Different strokes, different folks. I enjoy watching the Patriots just to see an extremely efficient machine dismantle opponents. They are able to adjust to anything the other team tries in order to get an edge or uncover a weakness. They are setting the bar very high for all other teams to aspire to. Once another coach matches them (Dungy and the Colts?), you have a match-up to look forward to every year. Sort of like Walsh/Seifert and the 'Niners battling Johnson and the Cowboys.
I’ve always had a problem with using the pejorative “suck” to describe something or someone which is actually of very high quality, but which you don’t personally like. It doesn’t work like that.
I hate the Patriots too, but “suck” is the last term which would come to mind.
It is obviously too early to say for sure, but there’s a possibility that when you watch the Patriots play, you are watching the best football team of all time. It is possible that in fifty years, when you are very old, your grandchildren will talk about the '07 Patriots in approximately the same tones with which we presently talk about the Lombardi Packers. They will be jealous that you saw those games live. Watching the Patriots this year very well might be watching actual history happen - albeit the limited form of history that sports represents.
And they’re doing it all within the constraints of a system - the hard salary cap - designed to ensure that no team can do what they’ve done.
It’s awesome to watch, and this matchup with the Colts is one of the best stories in football in years. People will reflexively downplay it as a reaction against the hype, but this could be a really great game. Or the Patriots could blast the Colts into road kill, which would be, I think, confirmation of the historical goodness of the team.
Watching them operate is like getting a masterclass in play design and execution.
I’m sorry that anyone would think that that sucks. They’re beautiful to watch so far this year. Perfectly efficient. Probably the greatest show ever through 8 weeks of football.
Still, I think this weekend is a toss-up. I’m surprised at how heavily people seem to be leaning towards the Pats.
I’m just stunned at how much the Pats over shadow the Colts this year. Sure the Pats are great but the Colts are the returning Super-Bowl champs, undefeated so far this season, and are just awesome.
I think it’s going to be an interesting match up, to say the least.
Performance wise as a team they most certainly do not suck. They are good. Too good.
What they do suck at?
They suck all the fun out of football. No drama. No nothing. Booooring. Randy Moss used to get people all riled up. You either loved him or hated him. Now nobody cares.
They’ve gotten so good they just show up, do their thing, yawn, and go home.
I’m a huge Pats fan and I agree with this. Yes, the Pats have been dominating opponents, but so have the Colts. More quietly to be sure, but still winning every week, and they recently had a bye week to rest up, and they’re at home. I think this will be a very good game.
I was utterly uninterested in the Patriots until I read this description of them:
*All this is very well, but all I want to know is this: is it so very wrong of me to be supporting Bill Belichick’s New England Patriots, who are feuled by bitterness and hate to slash-and-burn their way through every football team in existence, possibly willing to break the time-space continuum to win every previous Superbowl in the process? *
Indy has no chance against the Pats. The Pats are just that much better. The Colts are good, the Pats are great.
I personally like seeing one team or individual utterly terrorize and dominate the competition. This thread reminds me of the people who complain that Tiger Woods wins by too many strokes. I find that kind of rarefied level of play to be exhilarating, not boring. Why anyone would prefer to see mediocrity rather than excellence is beyond me. I’ve never seen a team like the '07 Pats. They might be the single best team in NFL history. In any other year, the Colts would be the talk of the league. This year they are completely overshadowed by history in the making. The Colts are Phil Mickleson and the Pats are Tiger Woods.
I sort of agree with the OP. Sure, as a Pats fan the opportunities for gloating are untouchable, but if you’re looking for fourth-quarter drama, forget it. For someone like me who doesn’t have three-plus hours to devote to the game, the fourth quarter is often all I watch. And with the Pats, it’s sort of like watching the preseason – the real interest is in seeing what novel player packages the Pats can throw out there. Last Sunday, for instance, we saw Matt Gutierrez play both at quarterback, and in kick coverage. Randy Moss played at least one down at DB. I mean, it’s great if you’re Kyle Eckel’s mother, but for the rest of us?
I grew up within earshot of Foxboro/Sheaffer/Gillette/whatever Stadium, and have always been a fan. Agreed, watching them play right now can get a bit boring, but I also agree with storyteller0910 : I’ll be telling stories to my son about this team and what they’d accomplished.
You DO remember what happened to those high flying Vikings in 1998? The Vikings team that went 15-1 and scored more points than any other team in NFL history?
They went to the NFC Championship game and annihilated the Atlanta Fal…oh wait.
Say whatever you want to about the Patriots, but its WAY too early to determine anything.
Yeah, i must say that the rush to crown the Patriots as the greatest team ever, when we’re only half-way through the season, is a little puzzling. They are, without doubt, an amazingly good team, and watching them is to see brutal power and surgical precision combined on the football field.
But, to perpetuate a sports cliche, anything can happen, and there’s no guarantee that this team will go 16-0, nor that it will win the Superbowl even if it goes undefeated through the regular season. There’s a LOT of football still to be played.
That’s true, particularly considering where they play. It’ll be tougher to throw all these touchdowns during a blizzard in January. However it is fair to say that this is one of, if not the best first half of a season in history, so people are going to talk :).