Nitpicks & Nitwits: Reality Beats Expectation Every Day

Sunday in Miami wasn’t what anyone was looking for, from a New England perspective. But really, considering the result of an excruciatingly laborious preseason, why is anyone surprised by the Week One outcome?

Expectations. That’s why.

The regular season is a clean slate. Preseason games are nothing much to see, as tedious and tiresome as they’ve ever been. We can’t wait until the “real” football kicks off.

And this is what we get?

Let’s be reasonable. Expectations are always high, particularly here in New England. It’s the lasting legacy of twenty-plus years of competitiveness and dominance within the AFC East Division and the AFC itself that brings these expectations to such high levels, they’re inevitably harder to meet every year.

And that includes this year, with expectations that these Patriots can always find a way to ‘flip a switch’ and jump into the fray with Miami, or with Buffalo or whomever, and simply compete and win their fair share.

Don’t be so sure that mantra is set in stone here. While the outcome in the 20-7 defeat at Miami wasn’t as lopsided as the final score might indicate, the Dolphins do look improved over recent previous versions. You know Buffalo is better – or did you not get a look at their pounding of the defending Super Bowl champs last week?

Where does that leave this Patriots team? Maybe not in the dumpster, but there is a lot of work to be done as the season advances. Or did you not get that sense before Miami, after watching that fatiguing preseason?

This team is not a contender today. It could be tomorrow, but that switch is tough to flip.

Open your history books to 2003 for a moment, and consider the 31-0 Week One beatdown suffered at the hands of the aforementioned Bills…the infamous “they hate their coach” game, as ESPN’s Tom Jackson opined at the time?

The Patriots certainly bounced back nicely from that start. That doesn’t mean the same thing is in store here. What it does mean is that expectations are always high, and the season will always be a work-in-progress. There’s a long way to go.

Expectations are built upon what we think might happen, based upon previous reality. And the reality for today isn’t what we’re looking for. 

It starts with Pittsburgh, for Week Two.

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BIG PLAYS

Bill Belichick said after the game, and again Monday morning, that two plays pretty much did his team in – the strip-sack fumble from Mac Jones for a score and the Tua Tagovailoa bullet to Jaylen Waddle for a 42-yard touchdown (on a 4^th and eight play!) at the end of the first half.

“Two big plays that we gave up were the difference in the game,” Belichick said. “Otherwise it was a competitive game, but we have to do a better job of playing better all-around football.”

Agreed. In a close, competitive game, mistakes are usually the difference between winning and losing. Those two breakdowns, on both sides of the ball, were costly. That the Patriots never saw them coming is alarming.

NO BIG PLAYS

Maybe it’s just me, but did anyone else get the sense that the game was a g-r-i-n-d for the Patriots’ offense? They kept chiseling away, but the really big play, or big break, never came. The biggest offensive play of the game came on Kendrick Bourne’s second offensive snap – in the 4^th quarter – a 41-yard reception.

The Patriots fumbled away an opportunity shortly thereafter. But for Bourne to get in the game THAT late? With the team struggling to break anyone or anything free?

Either Bourne is still in the doghouse for his preseason dustups against Carolina, or the coaching staff whiffed on this personnel decision.

TUA WAS TOO TERRIFIC

Yes, Tua is 4-0 against Bill Belichick-coached teams, even if every pass he threw looked like a wounded duck looking for a place to land. Confoundingly, his best success continues to come from the slant route, and for the Patriot defense NOT to recognize that? Or limit that?

What is this team supposed to be doing here?

That’s a question that needs serious consideration this week, on both sides of the ball, moving forward.