Patriots Fanatic

So, ya think that Belichick may have been amused at how Vick was listed as probable all week and then didn’t play? Then check out today’s injury report:

Offensive tackle Matt Light — out
Running back Kevin Faulk — out
Outside linebacker Tully Banta-Cain (knee) — probable
Quarterback Tom Brady (right shoulder) — probable
Receiver Troy Brown (foot) — probable
Outside linebacker Matt Chatham (knee) — probable
Running back Corey Dillon (ankle) — probable
Cornerback Randall Gay (ankle) — probable
Defensive lineman Jarvis Green (shoulder) — probable
Defensive lineman Marquise Hill (ankle) — probable
Linebacker/special teams ace Larry Izzo (thigh) — probable
Outside linebacker Willie McGinest (finger) — probable
Cornerback Tyrone Poole (ankle) — probable
Safety James Sanders (ankle) — probable
Safety Guss Scott (knee) — probable
Defensive lineman Richard Seymour (knee) — probable
Cornerback Duane Starks (thigh) — probable

(via)

Mrs’s B’s podcast page now has her San Diego ‘cast. Here’s hoping the Atlanta road trip podcast will be up soon, so we can have something more positive available 1/2 .

Zip’s got his San Diego stuff up:

• Review
• Awards (scroll to bottom)
• Doghouse (scroll to bottom)

The bad news keeps on coming, this time with this distressing bit in Felger’s notebook column in today’s Herald:

According to sources with knowledge of the injury, the broken foot suffered by running back Kevin Faulk is very serious and could potentially affect his career.

Faulk suffered a broken bone in his heel. He still hasn’t been placed on injured reserve, which would officially knock him out for the season, but the expectation is Faulk will take longer to come back than Light.

Whew! Nothing’s gonna be easy this year.

It also looks like they’ll have to win it with offense, since at least for now, the defense appears to be cooked. Sure, there are all the injuries (and Seymour missed the Falcons game, and McGinest reportedly broke his hand during the game), but that doesn’t excuse the lack of physical play and missed tackle after missed tackle. It doesn’t excuse Chad Brown being a waste of space out there. It doesn’t excuse mistakes like Asante Samuel buying a vanilla fake and giving up the tying touchdown. I could go on. Speaking of Seymour, that’s the second time in his career that Seymour’s been injured while playing as a short-yardage fullback. I think Belichick needs to stop the experiment. Put in a real fullback (Pass) or use one of the tight ends. Or Klecko. But it was/is foolish to risk perhaps your best defensive player like that. And it’s happened twice. Please — let’s never see Seymour as a fullback again.

Thankfully, the offense came to play. Brady was on fire. The tight ends were finally given a chance to do something, and WOW. Favorite play of the day has to be Graham’s 45yd TD which included the hurdle over Neal, swatting a safety away, and dragging three people into the endzone. The running game also got going, with Dillon breaking 100 on close to 5 yards/carry. Now we have to hope that whatever his injury was, it’s nothing serious. Even had a couple of hard-nosed runs by Patrick Pass.

The play-calling made a recovery from last week’s debacle, which was nice to see, though Belichick deserves a Football Outsiders Martz Award for having Vrabel call that timeout on Koening’s kick. This is the NFL. Kickers don’t get worn out on a single kick, so why (in effect) give them a warmup/calibration kick?

Anyhow, while I’m glad for the win, this year still has way too much of a 2002 feel to it.

Tampa Bay has another one of their hilarious site intros up. Needs flash.

This weeks Any Given Sunday feature at FO is all about the San Diego debacle. A good read.

I think the play that perfectly summarized the entire day was that garbage time rushing TD by SD that got called back for holding. The running back broke at least three tackles at the LOS, and then while running down the sideline all of 6 inches from the sideline, Asante Samuel tried to knock him out of bounds and merely bounced off.

Because (1) I think that’s the best the Patriots will do this year, and (2) because they aren’t going to be able to get in as a wild-card.

I’m giving Pass my player of the game award. He was one of the very few to play hard today and he had that amazing catch off the tipped ball. He’s come a long way since Weis complained about his very existence back in 2002.

I’ll also give a little love to the punt and kickoff coverage teams. They really kept Sproles in check.