The Student of the GameGoing Beyond the Stats

The 4th Thursday of every November in the US is drenched in tradition. With this day comes Thanksgiving, with Thanksgiving comes Detroit Lions football and with Lions football comes another tradition . . . Losing. While the youth movement has been trying to break this tradition, the efforts against ‘Golden Boy’ QB Tom Brady and the New England Patriots proved futile as the Pats topped the Lions, 45-24.

It was only a matter of time before we featured QB Tom ‘Golden Boy’ Brady and his Patriots on Monday Night Football as they faced the Miami Dolphins at Sun Life Stadium. While this divisional matchup was between the 2nd place teams in the AFC East, it wass important to keep from falling 2 games back behind the divisional leading New York Jets after considering division records. In this battle to stay in the race it came down to 27 points in turnovers and special teams plays as the Patriots won 41 - 14

Despite all the disappointments during Turkey Day football and ups and downs of Sunday match-ups, all I heard about over Thanksgiving was this Monday’s game featuring the New Orleans Saints vs. the New England Patriots (in fairness I was in New Orleans with my fiancée’s family). Bias aside, as the talk of the NFL, it was the billed as the battle of 2 NFL offensive juggernaughts where the score was predicted to be around 49-48 by analysts everywhere . . . until it all went horribly wrong.