Are the Patriots Vulnerable at Last? Don’t Bet on It

Are the Patriots Vulnerable at Last? Don’t Bet on It

FOXBOROUGH, Mass. — The New England Patriots domain is crumbling. Once more. 

Don't you see it? The signs are all there. 

Tom Brady is a testy 42-year-old, tired of pipsqueak partners a large portion of his age who over and again neglect to get a handle on the cunning complexities of his passes. Ill humored, depressed and flinching from a hurting elbow and toe, Brady looks as though he needs to resign with Gisele Bündchen to the $9 million, 12-shower manor the couple allegedly purchased a month ago in backwoods Greenwich, Conn. 

Or then again, he could do the incomprehensible as a free specialist the following spring and sign to play somewhere else. 

An injury would rot in Boston. Why not simply pronounce that the settlers lost at Bunker Hill? Goodness, pause, they did. 

Talking about misfortunes, the guarding Super Bowl champion Patriots have two in their last four games, and the standard group of haters have arranged to call attention to that New England's 8-0 beginning to the season was practiced against N.F.L. patsies: Giants, Jets, Redskins, Dolphins, et al. 

In eastern Massachusetts, even local people are asking why the Patriots offense has showed up overmatched and unpracticed against strong ongoing challenge like the Baltimore Ravens and Houston Texans. 

Simultaneously, a Patriots guard once esteemed powerful all of a sudden appears to be helpless. To such an extent that Bill Belichick, the unit's genius and the best guarded mentor throughout the entire existence of master football, admitted to a split in the shield. A day after his group's destruction in Houston on Sunday night, Belichick surrendered the Texans had outmaneuvered the Patriots once in a while: "They had us on several plan things." 

Hold up. 

At that point there's the 6-foot-6, 265-pound gap in the Patriots mind, the resigned Rob Gronkowski. 

Brady, whose group positions in the alliance in third-down proficiency, misses Gronk. The Patriots' grieved running match-up, 21st in the group, misses Gronk's blocking. The majority in the Gillette Stadium stands, however rambunctious as ever, miss Gronk in light of the fact that he encapsulated the regular fan. 

Who else would they be able to mobilize behind? Their long-lasting kicker, Stephen Gostkowski? 

No, Gostkowski is out for the season with damage. Truth be told, as of Thursday night, the Patriots had no kicker on their list by any means. They have attempted and cut three substitutions for Gostkowski. Punter Jake Bailey would be the main kicker in uniform, and he last endeavored a field objective in secondary school. 

You follow about the realm disintegrating? 

It could before long deteriorate. On Sunday, the upstart, skilled Kansas City Chiefs will come to Foxborough prepared to retaliate for their A.F.C. title game misfortune at home 11 months back. An annihilation against the Chiefs could essentially quicken the Patriots' winding. A misfortune in Houston on Sunday previously thumped the group from its roost as the A.F.C's. No. 1 season finisher seed. Falling against the Chiefs could cost the Patriots the subsequent seed and a first-round bye. The Patriots' outstanding timetable incorporates the weak Cincinnati Bengals and Miami Dolphins, but on the other hand there's a Dec. 21 date with the flourishing Buffalo Bills. 

It's not incomprehensible that the Patriots will wind up with the A.F.C's. fifth seed. 

O.K., time for a full breath, particularly for the individuals who might respect the Patriots' destruction as the best occasion present ever. 

In the first place, we've experienced this so often previously. The Patriots' end was anticipated in 2008, when they missed the end of the season games without precedent for a long time. It was additionally viewed as practically around the bend in 2009, and afterward in 2013 (with a 7-3 record in late November). They should topple from their platform in 2016 and a year ago when they gave up the top season finisher seed with consecutive thrashings in mid-December. 

In any case, everybody wasn't right. Since 2008, the Patriots have multiplied their Super Bowl triumphs from three to six, remembering titles for three of the last five seasons. So maybe we have to retreat on the rotting tradition talk. 

Or then again as Devin McCourty, New England's splendid cautious back since 2010, said at his storage after training Thursday: "All anyone needs to discuss is the end. We're in a business where no one considerations when you progress admirably. In any case, that is negligible to us as players. We have our own gauges and desires." 

A remarkable point. When the Patriots were 8-0 in October, did the football world, including journalists, exaggerate them? Perhaps, yet the New England players had no job in that. Perhaps the Patriots aren't in any way shape or form astounded their record is 10-2 after extreme tests in Baltimore and Houston that ended up being misfortunes. They're as yet tied for the best record in the N.F.L. 

"We as a whole realize that during this time, things get progressively extraordinary around here," New England wide beneficiary Phillip Dorsett said Wednesday when gotten some information about the discernable stress in the voices on Boston-zone sports talk radio this week. "That is not our mindset. We center around proceeding to improve. That is the means by which you end on a positive note." 

On the off chance that that seems like a platitude, think about the Patriots' phenomenal record at the end of late seasons, and not simply in the postseason. Since 2010, New England is 36-9 in December and January ordinary season games and 20-3 at home, where the Patriots have not lost a December game since 2015. 

At last, you nearly need to think about whether football fans in the 44 states outside New England truly need the Patriots' rule to disintegrate. What might the remainder of the nation manage without the Patriots to despise? Whom would the remainder of the N.F.L. measure itself against? 

Sometime Brady won't be so annoyingly gifted and achieved, and Belichick won't be the most intelligent mentor on any football field — with a smile that demonstrates he knows it. 

Sometime in the not so distant future, yet perhaps not this season. There's as yet two months of high-stakes games to go. Try not to be amazed when the Patriots are in any event up to the knees in trouble.