2022 Wild Card Weekend Overreactions

 
Woo Hoo! The playoffs are here and we’ve got a team that has Super Bowl aspirations. Let’s not waste any time and just talk about it.
 
Last place: Jets, DNP.
 
Second to last: Fins, DNP.
 
Third to last: Pats, DN… Oh wait, the Pats did have a game scheduled last weekend. But they didn’t appear to have shown up at all. This was a pathetic end to a failure of a season. Just a few short weeks ago, the Pats were sitting atop the AFC standings and everyone was calling them the favorites the AFC. Then they faced actual NFL competition and were thoroughly embarrassed. The defense seems to have been a bigger fraud than the “Boogie Men” of old and the so called “Best Head Coach in Football” seems to have not been able to foster any development in the team from week 1 to the final humiliating defeat on Saturday night. The Pats were supposed to be a smart team that fights hard and protects their rookie QB, but what we saw was a team that completely quit on their season and begging to be led by the rookie. Mac Jones, although not very good on Saturday, was the best player on the field for the Pats. And that is quite frankly not even close to good enough. This team now has an NFL caliber QB, he’s probably not good enough to lead them to championships, but QB, RB and DT might be the only positions on the team that the Pats don’t need to be supremely concerned about heading into a long offseason. Back to that coach…
 
It’s time to move on. I’m sorry, I am truly grateful for all of the good times he helped bring us over the past two decades, but it’s now abundantly clear that the majority of that success was due to having the greatest player of all time at the quarterback position covering up all of his mistakes. The game has passed Bill by, his insistence on fielding a roster that would compete in 1988 and not adapt to the modern game is downright criminal. Kraft needs to evaluate his coach/ GM, just like said coach/ GM would evaluate any player. Bill painted himself into a corner by hiring his own son to coach the defense, Steven failed miserably and now Bill needs to fire his own child. Lastly, Bill’s salary does not match his production and I was under the impression that the Pats are not in the business of paying for past results, they invest in future championships. Bill Belichick makes around $20M to serve as coach and GM, the Krafts could easily get the same or better results for half that amount buy hiring a new coach and an actual GM. I’m sure the Giants would be more than willing to compensate the Patriots heavily for their head coach, it’s time to take that call. For years, we Pats fans made fun of the so called “Tomato Can” playoff teams that would come to Foxboro to get humiliated by the Pats. Now the Pats are that team.
 
Oh yeah, the guy the Pats cast out to keep the overrated head coach looks primed to reach the 12th Super Bowl of his career. Also, over the last two season the Patriots have lost to the Bills more times than they did in the entire Tom Brady era.
 
First place: Bills. The Bills entered Saturday night with a lot to prove and everything to lose. And they answered just about every question that anyone had about them. Josh Allen was excellent, now it still could be argued that he is still yet to face a real NFL caliber opponent down the stretch here, as the Patriots are awful, with an ancient defense that probably couldn’t compete in the SEC, but to so thoroughly dominate any team, I’ll give him credit. Once the Bills scored their first TD on a play where Josh Allen held the ball for literally 9 seconds in the pocket with zero pressure, then just tried to throw the ball away and happened to accidentally score a touchdown, the game was over and the Bills really just got to go out there and have a nice practice for next week when the playoff actually start. It’s tough to really evaluate the Bills’ defense on an evening where the opposing head coach was just trying to get the game over so he could go boobs out in Aruba, but that first interception by Micah Hyde was something we haven’t seen since the days of Ed Reed. The Bills are rolling, there’s no reason they shouldn’t reach the Super Bowl have the opportunity to be a trivia question answer when people in bars are being asked to list the teams that Tom Brady beat in the big game.