PatsPropaganda

An Independent Patriots Blog

Super Bowl 51: Superstitions and Feels

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I woke up Sunday Morning, February 5 to a suggestion:

“Can we rearrange the living room today?”

I tried to remain calm. In nearly all facets of life, I’m not a superstitious guy, or believer in ghosts, or luck, or anything of the sort…except in football.

“You think I’m rearranging the furniture, where I watch the games, on Super Bowl Sunday? No.”

“Why?”

I blame my dad (he’s alive and healthy. I’m not Futurama Dog Episoding you, here). When I was a kid and he played bar league sports, he always needed to have the same number. The four years that I played youth football, we’d have the same breakfast every gameday until we lost (which was infrequent), and then start a new breakfast plan. It was little things like that all over the place that added up into some lunacy. After the final game of the 18-1 season, one of my dad’s laments was “We forgot to make the venison chili this time!”, which we had made for every previous Brady/Belichick Super Bowl, as if that lack of preparedness was a contributor to the final score. I still bought in, even in my 20s.

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Breaking Down Trey Flowers’ Clutch Super Bowl Dominance

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Everyone’s favorite storyline involving the New England Patriots’ defense headed into the Super Bowl was that they hadn’t played anyone and would be exposed by Matt Ryan and the potent Falcons offense. Ryan certainly made his share of plays, but after giving up a third quarter touchdown that made it 28-3, the Patriots defense went into shutdown mode, cementing their place alongside the four other Super Bowl-winning Patriots’ defenses that came through in the clutch.

2016 breakout star Trey Flowers had a lot to do with it.

Most surprising was that a defense that had just 34 sacks in 16 games this season, just a little over two per game, the Pats defense had five sacks and 12 QB hits on just 23 pass dropbacks by Ryan. Trey Flowers led the way with 2.5 sacks and a staggering five quarterback hits.

Where was this kind of pass rush all season? Let’s take a closer look at how Flowers’ performance in Super Bowl 51.

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Breaking Down the Clutch Play from Patriots’ Pass Catchers

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There’s been plenty of attention on James White, the Julian Edelman impossible shoe catch and the Dont’a Hightower strip sack that quickly opened the door for an impossible Patriots comeback in Super Bowl 51.

But what stands out to me most aside from these headliners, was how each and every Patriots weapon came through with a huge clutch play, without which, the comeback likely would’ve fallen short.

Here’s a rundown of the key receiving stats:

Passing, Rushing, & Receiving Table
Player Tgt Rec Yds TD Lng
Julian Edelman 13 5 87 0 27
James White 16 14 110 1 28
Danny Amendola 11 8 78 1 20
Malcolm Mitchell 7 6 70 0 18
Martellus Bennett 6 5 62 0 25
Chris Hogan 7 4 57 0 18
Provided by Pro-Football-Reference.com: View Original Table
Generated 2/7/2017.

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Coffin Corner: The Foxboro Redemption

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A wrongfully accused man is harshly sentenced for a crime he didn’t commit based entirely on shoddy circumstantial evidence. Despite his innocence, he refuses to relinquish the high road for the very sake of his soul.

Hope is a good thing, maybe the best of things, and no good thing ever dies.

Our hero refuses to let the anger in, he offers hope to those who surround him in the prison, he finds power and conviction in his desperate situation. His final appeal for exoneration is destroyed when his warden literally kills his only shot at getting out.

Apologies to the Hoodie, but the best movie to describe Deflategate isn’t “My Cousin Vinny”, it’s “Shawshank Redemption”. And Tom Brady is Andy Dufresne.

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Pats Posits: Saving Their Best for Probably-Not-Their Last

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In their most thrilling Super Bowl yet, the New England Patriots came back from 25 points to beat the Atlanta Falcons in overtime, 34-28, cementing Tom Brady and Bill Belichick’s place as the greatest Coach-QB duo in history.

A ton of new records were set or tied, including Most Super Bowls Won by a Head Coach (Bill Belichick, 5) Most Super Bowl Games (Tom Brady/Belichick, 7), most receptions (James White, 14), and Largest Deficit Overcome (25 points).

It’s taken me hours to wrap my head around this incredible victory and who knows how long it will take to fully grasp what unfolded. I never would’ve thought Brady’s performance in the fourth quarter of Super Bowl 49 could be topped, but topped it was. But not before I had just about thrown in the towel.

At 28-3 in the middle of the third quarter, I dug into what I had hoped would be my Super Bowl victory cake. I was resigned that the Pats just met up with a red hot Falcons team and played their worst game of the season. Maybe they were bound to get blown out in one?

But like they always do, the Patriots never flinched. Once they cleaned up the mistakes — drops, ill-timed penalties and worst of all, turnovers — and figured out the Falcons’ coverage, Brady moved the ball at will.

Most impressive was that the legendary comeback was such a group effort. So many guys came through with clutch plays — White, Edelman, Hightower and Flowers are just three that jump out to me right away, but it was a team comeback, as much as it was Brady’s brilliance.

I can and will write thousands of words about this game, so let’s get a jump on all the analysis to come with the Posits.

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Patriots Gameplan: Super Bowl 51 vs. Atlanta Falcons

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Here we go again. The Patriots are headed to an NFL-record ninth Super Bowl, their seventh under Bill Belichick and Tom Brady, and have a chance to firmly place themselves atop the history books in almost every regard.

Going to the Super Bowl never gets old. It’s wall-to-wall media coverage of your team as their season is dissected by all the best analysts. The nerves this week have been pretty tame. There’s not much to hate about the Falcons, but I’m still looking very forward to smashing them.

It’s a truly formidable test for the Patriots defense. This was supposed to be a culmination year, when all the great drafting on the defensive side of the ball since 2012 really paid off. And in a roundabout way, it still might be.

Plenty of Boston media jackasses who would love nothing more than to see the Patriots’ defense collapse so they can spend all offseason saying “toldya!”… I don’t believe the defense will let us down like that.

If they shut down this Falcons attack all that talk will be put to rest forever, along with countless other horrible takes and doubts. Unless Brady goes ham and then it doesn’t really matter how the defense plays. Because barring a couple weird turnovers, the Patriots offense should have their way with the Falcons’ defense.

I haven’t researched an opponent more in-depth than I have with the Falcons these last two weeks, and, as BB would say, the hay is in the barn. Let’s break it down in the final gameplan of the 2016 season!

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