Hurts so good

WEEK 10
The Pats were bruised and battered.

Coming off two tough losses, with the Blabosphere howling at their door, with some of their key defenders on the sideline, in the aftermath of Phat Albert's release, and against the big talking team from New York at their stadium on a Sunday night ... the Patriots were faced with as big a regular season challenge as they've had in years. They responded by playing one of the gutsiest (is that really a word?) games I've seen in a while. Question their talent. Question their depth. Question the GM. (I have). But don't question this team's toughness and fight. And don't question the coaching staff. The Pats were hurting. They responded by doing the hurting.

The look on Mt. Ryan's face in his post-game press conference said it all. Big Rex's stated goal before the season -- other than the Jets winning their third Super Bowl in a row fir him -- was to knock the Pats off the top of the AFC East hill. With an improbable 37-16 win, the Pats had sent the Jets tumbling down again. The Patriots are once again in control of the division and the Jets are once again looking at a second half of the season spent scratching for a wild card spot. The last two years they managed to claw their way in (or in the case of '09 have the Colts let them in) but the Foot Doctor knows you can't pull that off every year. And they have to fly to Denver for a tough game Thursday night. It's a must win road game.

The schedule for the Pats, on the other hand, now sets up perfectly. The only winning team they face is the Bills at the end of the season and the Bills are toast. Every game is tough in the NFL (just ask Baltimore), but beating the Jets is such a monumental shift in the fortunes of the two teams that Ryan couldn't hide how crushed he was. Asked if the Jets could still win the East, he shrugged his shoulders and said "It sure doesn't look too good."

Rex wasn't alone at being stunned. Not many people in New York saw this coming. The Pats fans I knew were optimistic, if not confident. The Pats lost two tough games but had battled the whole way. They have come up big a lot the last two years. None bigger than last night.

The first half was stressful to watch. Brady couldn't get in a groove and both teams wasted opportunities to take control. The Jets opened the game by driving, quickly and easily, to the Pats 9-yard line in just four plays. The D was missing Spikes and Chung. A defense that was already pretty shallow in the depth department was just about empty and the Jets were taking advantage of it, throwing the ball easily. It didn''t look good. But the drive stalled thanks to two Sanchez incompletions and kicker Nick Folk missed a very short field goal. Big mistake #1.

Brady and the Pats drove to the Jets 32 but were stopped and Gostkowski came out and nailed a 50-yarder for the 3-0 lead. A few minutes later the Jets faced a 3rd-and-8 on their own 42 when what would become the story of the game emerged. A pass rush. That's right. A pass rush. By the Pats D. Andre Carter bulled his way through the tight end's block and recorded his first of a team record 4..5 sacks in the game. A pass rush. Wow. The Pats offense drove deep into Jets territory but had to settle for a field goal and a mere 6-0 lead. That was the pattern for much of the first half. The Pats D pressuring Sanchez and the Pats offense moving the ball but coming up short.

The Pats got the ball at their own eight with about five minutes to go and still up 6-0. An incomplete pass and botched shotgun snap brought up a 3rd-and-long from their own five. The Jets D trapped Brady and he had to dump the ball off to avoid the sack. Safety. 6-2. A score that perfectly captured the frustrating nature of the play. That's when the game really started.

Sanchez -- as he has often done in his two-plus years in the league -- shook off a slow start and led his team on a big scoring drive to take the lead. The biggest play of the drive was not a play at all -- it was a timeout called by Sanchez. After completing a second-and-goal pass down to the two, Sanchez called a timeout with 1:24 to play in the half instead of letting the clock wind down or forcing the Pats to burn a timeout. Big mistake #2. Mt. Ryan reportedly called it "the stupidest thing in NFL history." (I think that honor goes to yesterday's Falcons 4th-and-inches call in OT). The Jets scored on the next play to take their first lead but the timeout left the Pats offense with 1:20 to respond. Respond they did.

Brady -- who, even including losing causes, has led at least a dozen huge drives so far this season -- methodically moved the team 80 yards in seven plays, capping it off with an 18-yard TD pass to Gronk. It was a great catch by Gronk who had a monster game. Brady and Belichick used the clock and their timeouts perfectly. The Pats defiantly walked off the field with 13-9 lead. It was an ugly, frustrating half of football. The second half would be easier to watch.

Both offenses opened with three-and-outs as the defenses continued to dominate. The Pats punted away on their second possession, but returner Joe McKnight took his eye off the ball (big mistake #3), and the ball bounced off his chest, eluded the grasp off three Jets, and was recovered by the Pats. The offense added a field goal to push the score to 16-9.

Then the Jets marched inside the Pats 40 but on first down Sanchez's pass skipped through the fingers of running back Shonn Greene, off the hands of Mayo, and right into Ninko's lap. The linebacker returned the ball to the Pats 43. Big mistake #4. There would be no field goals this time. The offense went no huddle and the Jets D actually didn't seem prepared for it. Hernandez, Branch, Woodhead, and Faulk all made plays as if to prove the offense is so much more than Welker and Gronk. Which it is. Then Gronk proved he is the most important part, making another great touchdown catch. Pats 23-9.

Sanchez -- who seems to play better in the playoffs than the regular season -- answered with a 10-play touchdown drive to get the Jets and Fireman Ed right back into the game. There was a whole quarter to go. It was the Pats best quarter of the season -- so far.

The offense got the ball at their own 16 and -- using the hurry up again -- put together a 16-play drive that chewed up almost seven minutes of clock. Once again the ball got spread around. Welker. Woody. Hernandez. Gronk. Faulk. And finally Branch who took a quick out pass from Brady, put a move on the DB, and skipped into the endzone. The Blabosphere has been obsessing on how other than Welker and Gronk the Pats have no weapons. Sometimes I'm just not sure what games they are watching.

Three plays after Branch's TD came big mistake #5. Sanchez tried to hit LT over the middle at the Jet 10 but Ninko -- looking a lot like that other #50, or even old #54 -- stepped in front of the soon-to-be-retired running back and took it in for a pick six. Pats 37-16.

How did the undermanned, bruised, and battered Pats beat on the Jets so convincingly? By doing the one thing that really matters in football... protect the ball. I've said it time and time again. Turnovers is the only stat that doesn't lie. Two of the Pats three losses are completely because of turnovers. All of the six wins are because of lack of turnovers. The score may have been 37-16. Just as important was another score: Jets big mistakes 5, Pats big mistakes 0.

Another number of note. Tom Brady and Bill Belichick set the record (117) for most wins by a QB-coach tandem last night. What a way to set the record.