Brady’s Patriots Prove it’s Better to Be Lucky AND Good Against Bengals Sunday
By Rich Bergeron
NFL Betting Results:
Final Score: New England Patriots 43 – Cincinnati Bengals 17.
Betting Recap: The Patriots crushed the point spread last night (they were getting 1.5 points at home) and the Over/Under (46 points). Cincinnati was previously 3-0 ATS and New England was 2-2 ATS going onto the game.
The New England Patriots know firsthand what it’s like to see an undefeated streak stopped. Just ask Tom Brady (104-162, 1,083 yards, 6 TDs, 2 INTs) sometime about The New York Giants and how they stole his legacy of leading the second undefeated NFL team to a Super Bowl title. You’ll find out that Brady and his Patriots understand how the shattering of perfection unfolds, and they still feel the pain of what-ifs.
There’s an old saying that it’s better to be lucky than good, and Tom Brady proves it’s even better to be both lucky and not only good, but great. He surpassed 50,000 career passing yards Sunday night, a historical achievement for the former backup QB. In the process, he handed the Cincinatti Bengals their first loss of the young season. The Bengals were the last undefeated team in the league thanks to Arizona’s loss to the San Francisco 49ers earlier in the day.
Nights like Sunday involve a certain rhythm and energy where everything for your team goes right while everything for the other team is going wrong. That takes skill on a winning team’s part, but it often also hinges on luck.
That Super Bowl XLII game against the Giants that destroyed the perfect season was a night when luck was not on Brady’s side. It was nothing like the last game played at the old Foxboro Stadium when “The Tuck Rule” helped catapult Brady into an improbable Super Bowl run. That 2001 playoff game happened in the midst of a snowstorm, and it defined Brady’s characteristic resilience as he shook off a near disaster for his team to win on an Adam Vinatieri field goal. Yet luck was also certainly a factor in Brady getting that break on what might have been ruled a fumble.
Games like this season’s week 4 trouncing by Kansas City are examples when everything that could go wrong does go wrong for the Pats, and those games always end up being catalysts for improvement under Bill Belichick’s leadership.
While luck is fickle, skill is forever. One of the only things separating Tom Brady from another wild, undefeated run is his age. He’s simply getting older, and he may still be on point some nights and better than ever, but every now and then he takes the field a step slower and a bit more easy to rattle. He tends to need a little more of that luck now than he ever did before. At the same time, he has just enough of that skill left to make people forget he gets lucky every once in a while.
Still, there is no questioning the leadership of the most famous face on the team. He takes blame when things go wrong and gives credit to the other players who help make it happen whenever he has a great day on the field. If Brady starts out strong, it also seems to bolster the defense, which was certainly the case Sunday night against the Bengals.
Brady threw for nearly 300 yards and notched two touchdown passes Sunday night in a 43-17 rout of Cincinatti. He also helped engineer 5 field goal drives. There was no trace of the inaccuracy that plagued him the previous week as the Bengals failed to intercept him in this game.
The Patriots were able to complete such a massive turnaround this week thanks to the organization’s commitment to winning and their innate ability to adapt under pressure. During the team’s best seasons, Coach Belichick put together strategies and game plans that would have his team ahead by a field goal at the end in many cases. It didn’t matter if the margin of victory wasn’t huge. The W proved to be most important factor for the team, and the Pats still keep notching them faithfully, so much so that fans expect their team to be Super Bowl contenders every year.
Recent seasons have been disappointing for the team and their fans. Something’s been missing. The defense that used to define the team began to become a scapegoat for the whole squad’s failure to get back to the Super Bowl. It’s been a difficult learning curve as Belichick struggles to rebuild that dream team he once had. Their old bend-but-don’t break style confounded so many great teams, whether it was stuffing Peyton Manning’s Colts on a goal-line stance to end a game in late November of 2003 or shutting down Kurt Warner and “The Greatest Show on Turf” in Super Bowl XXXVI.
Yet, the Patriots defense is not the same animal over the course of the last four seasons, ranking in the bottom quarter of the NFL in that span. This year could be different if Sunday night’s defensive gem is any indication. The Patriots managed three turnovers, all of them from fumbles. Patriots Cornerback Kyle Arrington returned one of the Bengals’ drops 9 yards for a touchdown. One interception for the Pats was also negated early in the game by off-setting penalties. It was a good day for the defense, and an even better one for the offense.
This game proves beyond a doubt that the Pats perform best when teams expose their weaknesses in a bad way, especially when it happens early in the season. It’s been said that it’s better to lose and learn a lesson than win and learn nothing. Thanks to a bit of luck and a ton of skill, the Patriots are learning fast as they go through this rebuilding year. What a difference a week makes.
