James Conway

Coffin Corner: The Five Things That Piss Off This Patriots Fan

September 30, 2017 by James Conway

My gears are grinding. So before we get to enjoy the game this week, I need to get a few things off my chest.

Let’s start with this article about Aaron Rodgers comeback to victory against the lowly Bengals. A performance that Rob Demovsky began with these stupid paragraphs:

Take that, Tom Brady.

Aaron Rodgers did Sunday what the New England Patriots quarterback did three hours earlier.

It’s what MVP quarterbacks do.

And Rodgers might have even one-upped Brady.

I mean, this article begs 3 questions:

Huh?
The Patriots played the Houston Texans, a team that happened to make the playoffs last year behind one of the best defenses in football that now has JJ Watt back. Aaron Rodgers played the Cincinnati Bengals, who suck donkey butts. Rodgers and Brady are both great QBs and are allowed to both have great performances.
On what planet was Aaron Rodgers’s performance better than Brady’s?
They both came back at the last minute, they were both hounded by a strong pass rush, they both had turnovers returned for touchdowns. But Brady completed 71% of his throws for 378 yards, 5 TDs, 0 INT and 1 fumble against the best front seven in football, while Aaron Rodgers completed 67% of his throws for 313, 3 TDs, 1 INT. Rodgers had the 15^th highest rating of the week for a QB (not counting Ryan Mallett’s fill in duty). Brady the 2^nd. If it was a competition, Brady did everything Rodgers did, just better.
Why do lazy ESPN writers do this dumbshit narrative ALL THE TIME?
In the take culture at (are they still?) the worldwide leader, the most pervasive media narrative is that Brady isn’t as great as you think he is. And Rodgers is a God. He is, just let it go. Rodgers is also great. They can both be great!

Coffin Corner: Patriots-Texans 2042 – Scouting Report from the Future

September 23, 2017 by James Conway

I’m writing you this exactly 25 years in the future on Sept 23, 2042. I know you’re thinking, “The year 2042 is only 25 years away!” That’s what I thought back then when I first read this piece that I’d written 25 years later from the future. Mind-Plosions aside, I’m sending this into the past as a warning to Bob McNair, if you’re reading this, this is mostly a scouting report to let you know what your future will be if you continue down this path, like the future ghost from the Bill Murray classic Christmas tale, Scrooged.

And before we get to the game between the “Gillette-Samsung Razorblade TVs” Patriots and the “Houston’s Steak” Texans (not that it should be that surprising, but teams no longer represent states or localities, they represent corporate entities) let me catch you up on what’s been going on around the NFL over the last quarter-century.

The good news: here in 2042, there is NFL labor peace. After a 2-year players’ strike that devastated much of the NFL’s stranglehold on American viewers, DeMaurice Smith negotiated a 99-year CBA in exchange for mandatory foot massages for every player after every game. In order to get this necessary concession, Smith was forced to negotiate away the players’ medical benefits, salaries and helmets. MMQB Scribe Peter King called the historic agreement a “Win-Win”.

Kill, Bill, Vol 3: The New England Patriots Schedule of QB assassins.

September 15, 2017 by James Conway

Let me start by saying: FUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUCK!

The Patriots got beat by Alex Smith.

Yes, Kareem Hunt and yes, the Chiefs and yes, Andy Reid, who previously prompted two overused soundbytes: “Tom Brady’s just not good anymore” and “We’re on to Cincinnati” (my least favorite of the Hoodie catchphrases). So I’m not saying FUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUCK! because they lost to the Chiefs. That’s fine, Andy Reid is as competitive with Belichick as Tom Coughlin was. The loss isn’t a problem, even welcome, if it focuses the team and pushes them to come together.

The reason I am saying FUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUCK! is Alex Smith. Alex Smith, the dink and dunk QB, who had a career 61% completion percentage. Alex Smith, the number 1 pick who has never amounted to that value, who had only 1 game with 4+ TDs in 142 Regular Season games. Alex Smith, who was being challenged by a rookie for his starting job in training camp, who had only two games ever where he amassed more than 311 yards. That Alex Smith torched the Patriots defense for 368 yards, 4 TDs, 80% Comp %, 148.6 Rating.

Coffin Corner: The Ringer’s “Patriots Week” Sucked For Patriots Fans And It Matters

August 17, 2017 by James Conway

Let me be upfront, I love Bill Simmons, I know it’s lame, but I love him. I love the Ringer, I loved Grantland. I love his editors. I love their podcasts. I love the Maester, I love Mallory Rubin. I love Tate. When my wife and I had our son, our brains were so stupid that we watched our first and last season of the Bachelor like a junkie needing a fix because of Juliet Litman’s hilarious Bachelor Party pod. The Ringer also has one of the best and most expansive rosters of writers on the Internet. It’s amazing!

So when Simmons announced on his podcast that they’d be running “Patriots week” on the gloriously insufferable “25 greatest Patriots wins” podcast, I was thrilled. Like an Indiana Jones fan going to a midnight screening of Indiana Jones and The Crystal Skull, I was left sneaking out before the Q & A with a stoned Harrison Ford and Steven Spielberg.

“Patriots Week” Sucked. For Patriots fans at least.

Coffin Corner: Introducing The A-Team The NFL’s New Best Secondary

August 2, 2017 by James Conway

The Seahawks have the Legion of Boom, the secondary that defines excellence in the modern NFL. The unit helmed by Earl Thomas, Kam Chancellor and Richard Sherman instills the fear of Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy on receivers on a weekly basis. The duo of safeties uses solid and technically sound acts of violence to intimidate opposing pass catchers who seek refuge over the middle of the field. It’s an impressive scheme that requires outstandingly athletic and brutal safeties and opportunistic corners to be successful. Pete Carroll has invested heavily in this unit, using almost 1/5 of his cap space on those three players. That may seem like a sustainable allocation of resources on arguably the best three players on your team, but as we saw last year they completely cratered after suffering the Earl Thomas injury because they could no longer serve their mantra “every last blade of grass” without depth at the position.

The Patriots secondary unit are waiting in the wings to take the mantle of best secondary in the NFL and Belichick spends a similar percentage of his cap on their core secondary. Though, because we’re talking about the Patriots: they employ the same amount of money roughly $18 million on FIVE core players in the defensive backfield rather than Seattle’s three stars. This unit is set to make a splash and should rival the best secondary in football and to do that they need a nickname – That’s where – huh? Do you hear that? Wait, what’s that sound?

Coffin Corner: Analytics-hating Patriots Will Break Football Outsiders Database

July 19, 2017 by James Conway

In March of 2014, when Bill Belichick signed Darrelle Revis to a one-year deal, I was so convinced of the Patriots defensive dominance that I bet my boss, an extremely successful TV writer, $20 that they would go undefeated.

This same writer has written scores of televisions shows, including one of the most lucrative of the last two decades, won the most prestigious awards in television and has had success few could dream of, but give him truth-serum and I’m sure the $20 he won off of me after THE FIRST GAME was the most satisfying victory he’s ever experienced. Not to mention the slaughter in Kansas City that came a few weeks later. Not a meeting or chat goes by that he doesn’t remind me of my overconfidence. Because there is no more relished feeling in the world than schadenfreude, the pleasure in an enemy’s pain or loss.

If you need proof, just remember how many replays you watched of Roger Goodell’s disappearing act at the podium last February: “Where did he go? Back and to the left. Back. And to the left.” Anyway, you know why I made that bet with my old boss? I thought because ’07 happened that it could happen again, ignoring the fact that it was a statistical anomaly, because I bore witness to it.

You’re already seeing the Boston sports landscape head in this direction before training camp even begins, which should worry us all.

Hot take: I hated ’07. Not simply because it cost me $20 7 years later. Not simply because the gut punch Super Bowl. Not simply because I couldn’t sleep for like 5 nights after that game because the alcohol was still draining from my body. I hated it because a win never felt like a win, even by 40 points, it felt like an escape. It’s a bad thing to be a fan and simply rooting for the best team in the league is not enough, or the best team in the decade, no, it has to be perfect. Which sucks. And Bill Belichick and Tom Brady make fans feel justified, because they have created a statistical anomaly, they make numbers their bitches (see here, buy the sweatshirt).

Plenty of fans loved the Moss season, but to me ’07 was the height of hubris in Patriots nation. Thankfully, the “do your job”, “no days off” humility returned and produced two Super Bowls.

Anyway, I’ve learned my lesson. I’m going to go out on a limb and predict, they do NOT go 16-0… and add that I hope they don’t. Because competition and struggle are the only ways we humans get better at things. Besides, too many fluky things happen: fumbles, penalties, injuries, ‘integrity’-driven suspensions, etc…

Now, all that out of the way. I think the 2017 New England Patriots will have the most efficient offense in NFL history and could break Football Outsiders database in two.

Sorry Bill, but we’re talking about advance metrics.

Coffin Corner: Happy Two-year Anniversary, Rog! Seriously. Thanks.

May 11, 2017 by James Conway

This Coffin Corner is to honor the two-year anniversary of Roger Goodell’s verdict (5/11/15) as it related to Ted Wells propaganda-for-hire report. And to celebrate the fact that with the ’17 draft in the books, Deflategate’s “punishment” is too. The reason I put punishment in quotes is because it really has been nothing but gravy since the Sheriff shot his six-shooter til it was spent. Today, we will look back and laugh at what horseshit they put us all through and thank the people… er… the person that’s responsible.

As of today, the New England Patriots sit on the precipice of the 2017 season, fully loaded with a real chance to repeat. I want to take a moment to thank the architect of this latest iteration of the greatest modern sports dynasty. No, not Robert or Jonathan Kraft, or Bill Belichick, or even Ernie Adams, there’s a man whose responsibility has gone unsung in these parts. Because two years after he tried to cripple Bill Belichick, the Krafts and Tom Brady, the New England Patriots are now loaded with talent on both sides of the ball. Patient Zero of HPV (not the STD that causes cervical cancer, though I am not sure how Hate Patriots Virus is transmitted, so maybe it is an STD). I digress, it’s you, Rog. Thank you, Roger Goodell. Okay, let me explain…