Letters to the Editor
kevred
Published Letters: 92 Editor's Choice: 8
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Looking back on Colts vs. Pats, & hello again NFC?
[Read the article: King Kaufman's Sports Daily]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]After the dust of a week has settled, the most interesting takeaways from that game for me are the following:
- It made the Pats look human. The Colts made them look thoroughly ordinary for most of the game, so we got to see them struggle, fail, and have to keep at it. For me, anyway, their "mystique" is gone--playing them is now a wall-to-wall tenacious fistfight where you just can't let up. It's going to make their game vs. the Steelers much more interesting, especially if the Steelers are healthy.
- It made me further appreciate how tough the Colts are. No one can out-tough this team. It seems like they just wore out due to a few key depletions. Would the Pats have won without Randy Moss? Then how much can we count it against the Colts for losing without Harrison? We'll never know. All we know is that until the last few minutes, they took everything the Pats had and gave it back, better. Here's hoping for a rematch, whoever wins it.
I'm also loving how the NFC is starting to toughen up, and in ways that will create lots of drama. Unlike, say, the Pats, the best teams in the NFC are in close, tough competitions with their own divisions. Cowboys-Giants, Packers-Lions (maybe even Saints-Bucs, if they improve). They may not be as good as their best teams of old, but they're good enough (and have enough personality) to make for some damned fun games. And if the Cowboys stay healthy, I maintain they will provide serious competition for the AFC.
What started out as a bit of a crummy season (way too many injuries, top teams tanking) suddenly looks like it will have some of the best playoffs in a long time. (Now if only there was some way to not give a playoff spot to the NFC West...)
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Perfection is boring
[Read the article: What's worse than watching your teams lose? Watching them win]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]The Patriots winning every week by 40 points and being successful on almost every play is boring.
Sweeping the World Series in 4 games is boring.
It's not an indictment of Boston at all--it's just human nature.
Think of all the great stories, not just sports stories, but legends, fables, biographies. Which have captivated us, become part of our common language?
Answer: those that involve struggle. There's simply no drama, nothing to hang your hat on, if there's no competition, no chance of failure. If Luke Skywalker was a rich, spoiled kid who heard about this thing called the "empire", hopped in his personal star cruiser, flew straight to the Death Star and blew it up with no interference, then got the girl, we'd never have given that story a second look.
Blowing out all opposition may be fun for the home-team fans, for a little while anyway, but who else can possibly find anything in it to care about?
This isn't to say that losing is fun and the preferred state. Athletics is about competition, and competitions have winners. But being too good is simply boring.
Let's go back to the NFL and think about those perfect '72 Dolphins. Most people can't name one player on that team. But the greats--the Steelers and Cowboys of the 70s, the 49ers of the 80s, the Bradshaws, Namaths, Paytons, Staubachs, Elways, Browns, Montanas, Rices, etc--they're the beloved, remembered legends. None of them ever had a perfect season. They had drama, missteps, doubts, and personality. They weren't machines, they were real people who played with passion and won.
Sure, everyone has different opinions on this kind of thing. But when I see the Pats get first down after first down and score 50 points on some hapless opponent (who's either a weak team or one hobbled by injury, which has benefitted the Pats greatly this year), it's just as boring for me as watching the Rams and 49ers exchange punts all day.
Because there's no mystery, no intrigue, no drama. Give me Cowboys-Redskins, Packers-Bears, Chargers-Broncos, Colts-Jags anyday over the Pats.
Again, this is nothing personal against Boston. They just happen to be wearing the dominant hat at the moment. But who wants to watch when you already know the outcome? That's why people are asking things like, "are the Patriots bad for football?" Take away the Pats, and you have a league full of drama, close struggles within divisions, and potential great teams emerging in both conferences. (Alright, and lots of crummy teams this season, too.) But with the Pats, there's no drama. Just a well-built machine.
Ho-hum.