OPINION
By Mike Celizic
NBCSports.com contributor
updated 4:51 p.m. ET Dec. 10, 2007
 | Mike Celizic |
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The Patriots need one win now to achieve every goal they set their sights on when this season began — get in the playoffs, win their division and secure home-field advantage for the duration of the playoffs.
I’ve got a feeling they’ll figure out a way to sneak past the Jets at home next Sunday to run their record to 14-0 and render their next two games meaningless. At that point, the voices of reason will start telling them that the best strategy for their final two games is to sit their starters, don’t worry about winning, and get everybody healthy for the playoffs.
And let’s face it, finishing the regular undefeated is meaningless in the grand scheme of things. The Colts have had a couple shots at it and said, “Thanks, but no thanks,” and ended up winning a Super Bowl.
That’s the object of any season — to win the championship. You don’t get a bigger trophy for finishing undefeated, and the bonus checks aren’t any bigger, either. And to keep going all-out in meaningless games is to risk blowing everything with an injury to a key player.
My advice to the Pats is to not even thank the experts for their advice, but to do what they’ve done all year, which is to say to hell with common sense, screw reason and keep right on showing no mercy. Keep the pedal welded to the metal and blow ‘em all away.
Patriots pursue perfection |
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The Patriots have become the feared and hated team they are by playing the game one way. They ask no quarter and give none. It doesn’t matter if it’s 0-0 in the first quarter or 42-10 in the fourth, they’re not giving you a break.
And backing off just because there’s no meaningful difference between 16-0 and 14-2 would be to stop being what they are. You could no more expect them to stop trying to beat the stuffing out of everyone than you could expect a baby to stop drooling.
And if somebody gets hurt in a meaningless game and they don’t win the Super Bowl, so what? They’ve gotta do it like Sinatra — their way. And their way is to win every snap, every series, every quarter, every half, every game. Putting it in neutral and coasting to the line was fine for the Colts because they aren’t the same kind of team.
The Patriots are chasing history here, and they’re either going to win them all or lose in some gruesome way. The trophy may not care what your record was during the season, but history does. And while every trophy looks the same, not every winner of a trophy is viewed the same.
Things that no one has ever done before are worth doing. And this is beyond even the 1972 Dolphins, who had to win 14 regular season games, not 16. The Dolphins finished with the trophy at 17-0; the Pats have to go 19-0.
Accomplishments like that have no intrinsic meaning, which makes them that much more valuable. It’s like climbing Mt. Everest. There was and is no reason to do it, no prize for doing it, no value added to the planet for having stood on the summit of the world. And still you do it, as Sir Edmund Hillary explained, because it’s there. People juggle chain saws for about the same reason.
For the Patriots, 19-0 is there. It’s hardly a given. Three games in the regular season when people can get hurt. Three games in the playoffs against teams that are capable of one perfect performance that can blow it all to kingdom come.
Others can say it’s not worth it, but not the Patriots. They’re on a mission, and playing safe isn’t part of the game plan. They haven’t backed off late in games in which they had 30-point leads, and they aren’t going to back off against the Jets, Dolphins and Giants just because they can afford to lose.
The Steelers were supposed to give them a battle Sunday afternoon, and they did for 30 minutes. But while Pittsburgh was running the ball and grinding out yards, the Patriots were leaning on the big play. Two plays really decided the game, a 63-yard bomb to Randy Moss and a 56-yarder on a trick play to Jabar Gaffney.
Ben Roethlisberger is a terrific quarterback, but Brady and his offensive line totally outplayed Big Ben and his — 399 yards to 187, zero sacks allowed to three, four touchdown passes to one. So much for the last team with a chance to stop the Patriots.
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Early in the fourth quarter against Pittsburgh, they were leading 31-13 and somehow allowed the Steelers to get to within a whisker of their goal line. Giving up a touchdown at that point wouldn’t have meant much, but the Patriot defense didn’t see it that way. They stuffed the fourth-down running play, preserving the 18-point lead, and then handed it to the offense to tack some more points on the lopsided score.
In most ways, this has been a rather dreary NFL season, with both conferences mired in mediocrity. But the Patriots and their quest have made it special, while in the NFC, the Cowboys, who have beaten everybody but the Pats, have added their own drama. Brett Favre has been a great sidebar, but the rest has been less than riveting.
If the Pats weren’t undefeated, we’d be out of reasons to pay close attention by now. But we’ve got to watch them, even against the Jets and Dolphins, because we know it will be a long time before we ever see another season like this again.
Let someone else be sensible. For the Patriots, it’s got to be all or nothing.
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Mike Celizic is a contributor to msnbc.com and a freelance writer based in New York.
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