Page 12 THE SAUGUS ADVOCATE – FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 5, 2021 Brady or Belichick? The Coach or the QB? Which one? It doesn’t matter! Strive for sanity, folks: Be content with all the joy, excitement and pride the Patriots have delivered through the years By Steve Freker I t started way back on St. Patrick’s Day, 2020, oh, about 1.72 seconds after Tom Brady confirmed the inevitable. TB12’s “other” size 13 cleat finally dropped. He was leaving – for real. Less than two seconds after, the New England Patriots faithful collectively sighed and exclaimed, in unison, “I can’t believe it! I can’t believe he’s leaving!” ...It began. “The Question,” we can call it. “The Question,” of course, is “Which came first, the chicken or the egg?” Bill Belichick or Quarterback Tom Brady?” For some people, who may have made a full-course meal out of all the ins and outs of The Question for the past, well, nearly a year now, it was an all-consuming, never-ending crusade. “We must know! We must have the answer! For the love of Tony Danza, who’s the boss? In the name of Reggie Jackson, who really stirred the drink?? For all that is sacred in the realm of Foghorn Leghorn, who truly ruled the roost? Who, WHO, WHOOO!!!!” How about this one: neither! It’s a tall order, but if you really Tom Brady (left) is back in the Super Bowl on Sunday, leading the Tampa Buccaneers against Patrick Mahomes (right) and the defending champion Kansas City Chiefs in Tampa. (Courtesy Photo) dirt parking lot (which turned to mud if someone so much as spit on it) days of the original Schaefer Stadium. That is, a dirt parking lot with no marked lines. They basically threw up a cement block, bare bones, no niceties football stadium in the middle of a barren section of land on the Foxboro-Wrentham line and called it an NFL stadium. We were happy for any wins. Forget about Bill Belichick. We thought that Chuck Fairbanks walked on water in the late 1970s. The 1980s were a nightmare, except 1985-1986, of course. The highlight of a least a couple of journeys to the then Sullivan Stadium was not winning or losing, it was watching one of our friends throw half of the Hibachi griddle through some random window in the parking lot. Again, Belichick who? Bill Par“The Question” arose nearly a year ago when former Patriots quarterback Tom Brady (left) announced he was leaving the team. Immediately, in some quarters a question arose: Was it Brady or head coach Bill Belichick (right) who was the main man in the dynasty? (Courtesy Photo) “The Question,” coming in on most charts at 1.72 seconds after Brady’s announcement (an undocumented report had it coming at 1.51 seconds) was, naturally, “Who was more important to the Patriots’ unprecedented two-decade dynasty of NFL dominance, Head Coach have even a modicum of faith, it is possible to imagine that lots of real Patriots fans could care less about “The Question.” In fact, they might find it more than mildly irritating that the line of “questioning” even exists. Take myself for instance. My Patriots roots come from the cells was soon regarded by many of us as the greatest coach in Boston sports history when he took over in the mid-1990s, bar none! For an entire generation, our life’s regret is that we did not purchase Patriots season tickets when they could still be had. After the Big Tuna’s first season, and people realized that there was something good on the way, forget about it. Bring on The Waiting List. So compared to the 70s, 80s and 90s, these past 20 years have been like going to Mardi Gras every fall season, for a lot of us around here. There are some kids born in the mid-1990s who know nothing else except Tom Brady and Bill Belichick... and winning – and winning Super Bowls. That brings us all the way back to “The Question.” So who was most important and “more responsible” for all the Patriots’ success? Can we have a big “Who cares?” I guarantee you most of us do not care one iota... and we bet you neither do TB12 and Bill Belichick. Once again, it is a media-driven exercise. Add in the keyboard warrior “fans” on Twitter and Facebook and you’ve got a party. So why all the fuss, anyway? Few people doubt that Brady is the Greatest Of All Time (GOAT) quarterback and that Belichick is the GOAT NFL Head Coach. But in this society of intense, continual comparativeness, the media, and in turn a segment of our population, just have to anoint one of these fabulously successful mega-achievers with another title, with Gillette being “The House that (fill in the blank) Built.” Of course, many in this camp feel they already have their answer, with Tom Brady once again having a remarkable season that has brought him all the way back to his 10th Super Bowl game as a starting quarterback. He did it by going to the Tampa Buccaneers, a different team with a different head coach and a whole different (except Gronk) supporting cast. It is easy to see that the common denominator between the Super Bowl and Tom Brady is, well, Tom Brady. When you look back up north, however, you saw Brady’s former team, the Patriots, flounder and sputter to a 7-9 record and no playoffs for the first time in over a dozen years. But they had the same head coach. There, plain and simple: Bill Belichick can’t win without Tom Brady. Case closed. It had to have been Brady all along, right? Brady leaves and the Patriots go into the barrel. Stink, stank, stunk... just like the Grinch. But Brady? All he does is win, win, win, win, win, like the song says! Of course, it was Brady all along, all those years with the Patriots, right? He was the main reason the Patriots won all those games, right. Heck, Danny Amendola said it on Twitter on Tuesday: “When you look up The Patriot Way in the dictionary, Tom Brady’s picture will be sitting there, no other. None of those coaches caught or threw a touchdown pass, none of the coaches tackled anyone.” Well, if you are a true Patriots fan, all of this year-long talk had to bother you at least a little bit. What’s the purpose of whittling 20 years of joy, excitement, pride and goodwill about all they have accomplished into a two-man seesaw of fake one-upmanship? I remember being so excited in 1986 that I ran out and grossly overpaid for one of those $28 trucker hats for the AFC Champions when the Patriots made their first-ever Super Bowl. Yeah, they got smoked by the Bears, but by that time we were all still happy to be there and were far from devastated. But to win all these titles and see our personal Patriots gallery of heroes grow, yearafter-year – it has been more than a memorable and magical ride. So how about we all just cease listening to the “The Question,” sit back and root for those Tampa Bay Bucs and our former field general Tom Brady to keep adding to his limitless success and win another ring Sunday in Super Bowl LV? We bet you Bill Belichick will be kicking back somewhere doing the same. Thanks Tom, thanks Bill. Thanks for everything! It’s been a great bunch of years. We will be rooting for you both next year, too!
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