Crowd noise

WEEK 1
Patriots 25, Bills 24 (9/14/09): A memorable season opener. The Pats are 1-0. Nothing surprising about that considering they were at home, against the offensively-challenged Bills, and Tom Brady was back. My thinking during the tailgate (What a tailgate! 78 degrees. Shorts. Giant inflatable beer bottle. Steak wrapped in bacon.) was a 34-13 Pats victory if the game played out as expected. Well, it didn't. But come time to decide who makes the playoffs and who doesn't... it counts as a W.

Lots of story lines after this one. Brady and the offense misfiring in the early going; then catching fire down the stretch for the dramatic win. The question-mark defense looking very much like a question mark, at least till the final moments. The introduction of the Pats all-time team at the half (big cheers for Troy Brown, Rodney Harrison, and, of course, Tedy Bruschi). The blood oath that coach Dick Jauron has with his good friend Bill Belichick to do whatever it takes to stop his Bills from winning when they play each other.

A storyline that won't be talked about, however, is the Gillette Stadium crowd. Or should I say the much-maligned Gillette Stadium crowd. The noise -- or lack thereof -- at Pats games in the "new" stadium has long been an annoying topic. One of those "Are we really talking about this?" issues. Perfect to kill time on sports talk radio during slow days. It goes back to 2005 when Richard Seymour (you remember him) said after a lackluster 16-3 win over the Jets: "It is really disappointing. The loudest they ever got was when there was a Victoria's Secret model on the scoreboard. They don't know when to cheer. You look up and see half the stands empty."

First: That Victoria's Secret model was Gisele. As in the future Mrs. Tom Brady. As in one of the hottest women in the world. So I would say that proves that Pats fans do know when to cheer. Second: I was at that game. It was boring. The weather was lousy. Both teams were lousy. It was cold. Snowing. Not every game has the atmosphere of a playoff game. It is what it is. Granted. It was against the hated Jets. But it was a bad game. During a season of several bad games. The Pats finished 10-6 that year. It was win one, lose one. Win two, lose two. One of those years.

Early in the season the Patriots were 2-1 (having come off a great road win against the Steelers) and were hosting the explosive Chargers. It was the game of the week. And the crowd was into it. Better than any regular season game at the old Schaefer/ Sullivan/Foxboro Stadium. If, like me, you have a large collection of videotapes (yes, VHS) of old Pats games go back and watch the first half of that game. It was electric. Both teams were playing at a high level, matching each other big play for big play. It was a beautiful late summer day. There was a moment late in the first half where the Pats were driving to tie the score at 17. Brady, coming off back-to-back 14-2 Super Bowl seasons, was looking more and more like the best QB to ever play the game. Everyone was on their feet anticipating a touchdown. I looked around and soaked in the moment. After all those years in a crappy stadium with a less than mediocre team, I almost couldn't believe my good fortune to be standing in this state-of-the-art building watching a team led by one of the best coaches and quarterbacks of all-time. I looked at Paul, another newspaper guy, and I could tell he was thinking pretty much the same thing. We were football fans and it didn't get any better than this.

Unfortunately the Chargers proceeded to destroy the Pats in the second half, rolling off 24 unanswered points. A real buzz kill in every sense of the phrase. Antonio Gates had his way with every DB and LB the Pats put up against him. It wasn't pretty. And the Pats never really recovered that season, struggling to stay above .500. By the time they got to the Jets game they also had been spanked by the Colts and the Chiefs. They hadn't lost a home game in the previous two seasons, this year they lost three. The Jets couldn't score. Their inept offense being as much or more the reason than anything the Pats D was doing. The crowd was cold and only mildly riled up when the Jets offense was on the field because there never seemed to be much threat of them suddenly doing anything. But on third downs, as is pretty much mandatory unless you have an injury, the fans were up and making noise. (If you're not gonna get up and make noise on third down plays to disrupt the other team's offense, please stay home on your couch.) The Pats won what was your run-of-the-mill regular season snoozer. One that I paid $135 to watch. And was glad to. Not sure how much Seymour had to pay to be there.

Back to opening night. Brady's return. Lots of questions and lots of promise. And even though the somewhat lowly Bills were playing the Pats even and then playing the Pats ahead by 11, a good 85 percent of the fans were still there, still cheering, still believing. Because they've seen Brady do some amazing things and you don't want to be in your car when he pulls off another miracle win. The Pats drove down the field and scored to cut the gap to five and the place went nuts. Still down by five with less than three minutes to go and the crowd that doesn't know when to cheer was behind their team as they had been all game. As they have been all decade.

ESPN's Bill Simmons, the go-to sports columnist of the day if you are a Boston fan and even if you aren't, wrote a piece last year about the lack of crowd noise. How the new stadium is the "Gillette Mausoleum." How loud and into the game the fans at the old stadium were. How his friend Bug didn't have as much fun at Gillette. Oh, how good things look through the golden haze of nostalgia. With all respect to Mr. Simmons, it doesn't sound like he's been to too many games over the years. Certainly not too many at Gillette. I've been to close to 200 games over the last 20 years. Is it different at Gillette? Of course. But the fans are more into the game. The other night the guys in front of us were talking about possible LBs they could bring in to replace Mayo in case he was out for weeks (which turns out he will be). A few others were debating Maroney vs. Fred Taylor (my vote: Taylor). In other words, when not cheering we were talking about the game. Except for when the woman in the tight pink Welker jersey and very small skirt stood up to wave her sign. But then we would go right back to talking about the game.

There wasn't too much of that in the old stadium. Lulls in the games usually meant fights in the stands. Or beer getting spilled all over you as someone tried to wedge themselves along the rows of people jammed into the aluminum benches. Or having crap hurled at you from the seats behind you which was surprising in our case since our seats at the old stadium were only about 10 rows from the top. Sure it was fun. As I said in a "Tales from the Tailgate" post ("The Snow Bowl"): The place was a pit and sometimes I miss it. But there were more games there where the crowd was asleep. Well, mostly passed out. Everyone thinks of the old stadium and thinks of the Snow Bowl. Or the '96 AFC title game. Or some of the great Drew Bledsoe led victories. But for every one of those games there were 10 where the game was bad, or boring, and the crowd was out in the lot grilling by the end of the third quarter.

The idea that Pats fans are spoiled by the success of the past decade has never made sense to me. There were always fair-weather fans and there always will be. And if you are under the age of 30 I guess you might think that if the Pats don't win it all then the season is a failure. But not me. And not the people I talk to. The beauty of the NFL is that each game is an event. In baseball when the Kansas City Royals (out of contention before the season starts) knock off the Twins or some other division rival late in the season it's no big deal. Just one of 162 games. But go to a Chiefs-Raiders game in Week 14 with both teams out of the playoff hunt and you will think you are at a playoff game. Pats fans are no different. If the game is exciting the crowd is into it.

Sometimes the games just aren't that good. That was true in the old stadium, and it's true at Gillette. But the crowd still drinks (Don Julio margaritas in the snow! Nice call Mr. Kraft), still has a good time, and still cheers the D to make a three-and-out and still yells "first down!" after another Brady-Moss hookup. Gillette isn't as good a home-field advantage as the old place? The team's record at Gillette: 52-12, with two 14-2 seasons, a 16-0 season, and two Super Bowls. 52 and 12! So much for that. Gillette has seen the two classic playoff battles with the Colts, the game after Spygate broke when the stadium rallied behind their coach and the team destroyed the Chargers, and the great snowstorm game against Miami where the snow was used like fireworks by the fans to celebrate Bruschi's pick-six. Just to name a few. I don't know about Bug, but Gillette felt alive to me on those days.

Some might say that a regular season game like Pats-Bills would have been a lot louder in the old stadium. They would probably be right. During the third quarter when the Pats were losing and the Gillette crowd wasn't all that loud, the highly-intoxicated crowd at the old stadium would have been much rowdier and noisier. No doubt about it. They just wouldn't have been paying too much attention to the game.