BY DAN VALENTI

PLANET VALENTI NEWS AND COMMENTARY

(FORTRESS OF SOLITUDE, WEDNESDAY FEB. 6, 2019) — On Tuesday, Boston hosted another Rolling Rally, revving the Duckboats for another celebration of a World Championship. This one was to honor the 6th Super Bowl title of the NFL’s Greatest Dynasty, the New England Patriots. This one’s the best for the way the naysayers had to eat their words, especially on social media, the internet, and talk shows, those vapid padded-cells for the age’s unexamined rages.

These parades never get old, except, of course, for the haters, who ironically give the team the greatest tribute. To paraphrase Terrell Owens, “They don’t love to hate them. They hate to love them.” The difference, subtle but profound, provides a key to understand this outstanding run to glory in a league that schemes to make such dominance impossible. People who can’t love them flip the coin and find the inevitable on the tails. The brilliance of the Robert Kraft-Bill Belichick-Tom Brady monolith earns begrudging respect that comes out in the form of title-envy. If your team is NOT the Patriots, you wish it could be to know this feeling from something that will never happen again — a two-decade possession of football luminosity.

Former Patriots’ QB Scott Zolak, now the team’s color analyst on the radio network, put it best after the Patriots beat the Kansas City Chiefs in the AFC Championship game: “The Patriots are going to another Super Bowl. America’s worst nightmare is back, and there’s nothing you can do about it!” The team obviously thrives on the doubters and uses their energy as the fuel of motivation.

When the Patriots won title #5, the wise guys said the league needed to change the name of sports’ biggest game from the Super Bowl to “The New England Patriots Invitational.” They’ve been to the Game 11 times, four of the past five years. With title #6 in the bag, the wags dubbed our six-state region “New Ringland,” hearkening the titles of the Red Sox (4), the Celtics (1), and the Bruins (1) since the Patriots took their first crown in 2002.

It’s interesting to see how Belichick put this team together:

• Tom Brady, the 199th pick of the 2000 draft, considered too slow, too skinny, too lacking in elite skills to play for an NFL team at the single-most demanding position in sports.
• Julian Edelman, 7th round, undersized afterthought who was asked to play a position he had never played before. He won Super Bowl LIII MVP.
• Danny Shelton and Jason McCourty, who last year went 0-16 with the woeful Cleveland Browns. The Browns didn’t want them.
• JC Jackson, an undrafted rookie that no one wanted, who played his way into the starting lineup at corner.

Belichick doesn’t want superstars or prima donnas. He wants guys who are smart, willing to work hard, coachable, and willing to put personal interests second to the interests of the TEAM. Patriots teams are never the most talented, but they are always the best prepared. As Sean McVay, the Los Angeles Rams’ talented young coach admitted, he was “outcoached” by the master. He failed to make the in-game adjustments to keep up with Belichick in a low-scoring affair that resembled a physical chess match.

In the fourth quarter with the game tied 3-3, on offense Belichick went with his “jumbo” package: two tight ends, a fullback, and a big RB. The result often put a linebacker in single coverage on Gronk, who made two huge catches to set up the game’s lone TD. On defense, he dialed up the only all-out blitz on Rams’ QB Jared Goff, resulting in a rushed throw and a crushing interception by corner Stephon Gillmore.

We are witnessing a run of greatness that will not come again. If you can’t love it, at least appreciate it.

We aren’t smug. We’re grateful.

Gratitude, dude.

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“Tom Brady has WON more Super Bowls than any other player has played in” — TV analyst Tony Romo.

“OPEN THE WINDOW, AUNT MILLIE.”

Love to all.

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