We’ve all been there, many of us at some point in 2020, actually.
Life kicks you in the groin time after time. After shaking off a few of the proverbial cup-checks, you finally crumble into a pile of pain and mental anguish on the ground. Or maybe on your living room carpet. It’s a temporary breaking point.
That’s kinda what seemed to happened to Bill Belichick’s Patriots Sunday afternoon at a sunny but far from bright Gillette Stadium as New England fell 18-12 to the Broncos. The Patriots dropped to 2-3 on the still-young season and are under .500 in October or later for the first time since November of 2002, the infancy of the dynasty. The post-Tom Brady team – I’m contractually obligated to include that description in every postgame game analysis this season -- is very much looking up at the Bills in the AFC East and buried in the middle of the mediocrity of the conference with teams like Denver.
It’s almost like a boatload of injuries and a lack of practice time, mixed in with the uncertainty of the coronavirus and a handful of teammates residing on the COVID-19 reserve list finally caught up to the Patriots.
Probably because that’s exactly what happened.
A makeshift offensive line that had to once again play without an inactive Shaq Mason with captain David Andrews still on IR also lost veteran right tackle Jermaine Eluemunor to an ankle injury early in the game.
Earning a fill-in start at left guard, Isaiah Wynn struggled before returning to his usual left tackle spot. Unproven second-year backup guard Hjalte Froholdt got into the fun as well, while usual left guard Joe Thuney saw his second start of the year at center, action that included one high-and-wide shotgun snap among the day’s many poor plays.
Belichick even told CBS at halftime that his new-look line lineup had never practiced together.
That’s not good. And it wasn’t.
New England turned it over three times, at least one directly resulting from the line struggles, and was fortunate to lose only one of four fumbles on the afternoon.
Meanwhile the Broncos marched up and down the field, finding success on the ground and through the air to put points on the board on each of their first six possessions. But those points were field goals, as the Patriots porous defense bowed its collective neck when it mattered to keep the game from being a blowout.
And in his return to the lineup after a stint on COVID-19 reserve that kick started New England’s two weeks of coronavirus concerns, Cam Newton had the ball in Broncos territory down six with a minute to play. Drew Lock’s pair of ill-advised fourth-quarter interceptions combined with Newton’s legs gave his team a late comeback shot, but his final throw of the day fell incomplete on fourth down in the direction of N’Keal Harry, who didn’t record a catch in the loss.
It was all too much and too little at the same time. Too much adversity. Too many injuries. And too little practice time to execute with enough efficiency to win.
“We didn't do anything well enough today to win,” Belichick said to open his postgame video call with reporters. “So got a lot of work to do and just need to get back to work and improve and perform better than this. That's really all there is to it.”
That’s not just his usual cliché answer in a loss. It’s back to work in a literal sense. As anyone who watched the CBS broadcast knows, the crew reiterated endlessly that New England basically had two practices in two weeks due to COVID-19 shutdowns.
That left a seemingly rusty, ill-prepared team that just couldn’t do enough to beat even a middling Broncos squad dealing with its own injuries.
“Well it was a big challenge,” Belichick said of the shook-up offensive line, but alluding to the team in general. “Playing without guys, getting guys hurt, moving around, had some guys that haven’t played together much, hadn't practiced together much. So we need to get on the field, we need to practice, we need to develop some continuity as a team, but especially there.
“We need more time together, we need to practice together, we need to execute and do everything better.”
And while Belichick’s Patriots rarely acknowledge challenges or make excuses, Newton admitted to feeling rusty on a day when he held onto the ball far too long far too often.
“Without a doubt, but we're still professionals and we're expected to do our job and play at a high level and we didn't do that today,” Newton said. “The time off showed, but yet like I said, I have to be better and I will be better.”
He’s not the only one, though.
To be clear, since we’ve been keeping track of such things in New England over the first five games of 2020, this was nowhere close to a moral victory just because it was close in the end. It was a loss. A dismal one. A breakdown if you will.
One maybe we should have seen coming. The reality is that the Patriots aren’t an overly talented team right now. They aren’t elite. They aren’t healthy. They’ve had limited practice time for their GOAT coach to coach ‘em up. They aren’t really playing all that well.
Adversity is in the cool fall air in Foxborough.
“In life you are going to face adversity, you hear so many people talk about adversity whether it’s in sports or life. Adversity is a part of life. Certainly when it comes to football and the way this year has gone, adversity is something we’ve experienced quite a bit of,” Matthew Slater said. “I think adversity can do one of two things. It can break your spirit or bring out the best in you. It’s just about how we respond at this point. There is not much else to say. We certainly can’t feel sorry for ourselves.”
In other Belichickian words, it is what it is. And on to Jimmy Garoppolo and the San Francisco 49ers.
“There's no need to panic. But we for sure have an opportunity here that we just can't, we just cannot allow ourselves to just go through the motions and expect, us being who we are is going to take care of itself, because that's not the case. We're not that good at that particular point yet and we need, obviously, practice and hopefully everything else is halted from the COVID situation and which will allow us to do that. Whatever the situation is, we know we're not going to be the only team that's being faced with it and we just have to be ready to go here moving forward,” Newton concluded.