The Patriots Hall of Infamy, Part II
After the offseason the Patriots had, all reasonable, intelligent, rational, right-thinking people assume the 2007 season is going to be child’s play for them. A happy, challenge-free kiddie game where everything goes their way. No Chutes, only Ladders. A five month trip through Candy Land where they never get stuck in the Molasses Swamp, they just skip happily through the Candy Cane Forest to the end, where they get handed the Lombardi Trophy by Queen Frostine.
I still think that way, in spite of the bad news that hit this week on the eve of kickoff. With Richard Seymour out six weeks with a bad knee, and Rodney Harrison out four weeks with a bad masking agent, the Pats have to start the season without two of their least dispensable guys. But those setbacks haven’t made me flip the game board over, make a pouty face and run to my room crying. I still think they’re the overwhelming favorite to win it all. Yet it was a nice little reminder of the way things used to be for this team. How every season that showed promise (and none has ever looked as good as 2007 does) would inevitably blow up in their face like a cartoon cigar to injury, scandal, and in the end, utter defeat.
Which is as good an excuse as any to finish the column I started a couple of issues ago about what the new Patriots Hall of Fame (scheduled to open in 2008) would’ve been like if the Bradychick Miracle had never happened.
Inductee: Michael Jackson
Yes, that Michael Jackson. In the mid-80’s, Jacko was at the height of his powers and reuniting with his brothers for the Jackson 5's “Victory Tour.” It couldn’t miss; a license to print money. That is, until the Patriots got involved. At that time, the Pats were the world’s Eddie Mush; everything they touched went south on them. Inexplicably, Pats VP Chuck Sullivan won the bid to promote the tour, despite the fact he could name even one of Jacko’s songs. And he put up Sullivan Stadium as collateral. Nice move. He way overbid, ended up having to do business with Don King and Al Sharpton, and couldn’t make back his money because the Jackson’s used a stage roughly the size of the Space Shuttle hangar, which used up hundreds of premium seats. But Chuck paid $18 million for the exclusive rights to all the tour merchandise. Another nice move. Because that was the exact moment the world caught onto the fact that Michael’s only romantic involvement was for pre-adolescent boys. So all those T-shirts Chuck now owned might as well have said “I (heart) NAMBLA.” Legend has it that tons of worthless Victory Tour stuff sat warehoused in the team offices, while Chuck ended up living in one of the stadium’s luxury boxes. But in a precursor of good things to come, the stadium ended up being bought by a cardboard box maker by the name of Bob Kraft.
The MNF Chamber of Horrors
This exhibit celebrates the glorious tradition of Monday Night Football in Foxboro. Back in the day, the crowd for prime time games in the old stadium made the Gillette Stadium crowd look like Churchill Downs on Derby day. It wasn’t a football game, it was a complete breakdown of societal order. It was a hell Snake Plissken couldn’t escape from. So bad that Foxboro went 14 years between prime time games. The exhibit features a photo area where visitors can take pictures of themselves handcuffed to a chain link fence like the five dozen Pats fans who were held that way during a 1976 game because the Foxboro police were arresting people faster than they could haul them off to the station house. On that night, an EMT was treating someone for a heart attack when he was assisted by a Good Samaritan. And by “Good Samaritan” I mean “drunk” and by “assisted” I mean “pissed on.”
Inductee: Ben Dreith
Dreith called the hideous “Roughing the Passer” penalty in the ‘76 Wild Card playoff game against Oakland on “Sugar Bear” Ray Hamilton, one of the all time bad calls. And one which Pats fans have always chalked up to incompetence. But to this day the Pats players are convinced the officials were in on a Tim Donaghy style bag job. Pats TE Russ Francis got held so blatantly by Phil Villapiano on a crucial 3rd down play, and got no call on the play, that years later he had the Raiders’ safety on his plane over Hawaii and made like he was trying to push him out the door. “[His wife] thought I was trying to kill him” Francis said, “I guess I was.” It took a quarter of a century for the “Tuck Rule” call in the Snow Bowl game to give the Pats some much deserved Karmic Retribution.
The Game the Pats GM Bet Against His Team.
This exhibit consists of memorablilia, game programs, ticket stubs and stat sheets from the actual NFL game the Pats GM tried to lose. It was the last game of the 1971 season. Pats GM Upton Bell wanted to fire coach John Mazur, but Billy Sullivan told him to piss up a rope. So they made a deal. Bell could fire Mazur after the last game against the champion Baltimore Colts if the Pats lost by more than 7 points. (Note: to the rest of the NFL, this is known as “gambling” against the “point spread.” But to the Patriots of the day, it was a “personnel decision.”) With future Channel 4 windbag Upton rooting against his own team, they pulled a 27-17 upset out of their asses. So Mazur was brought back in ‘72. Then went 3-11 and was fired after losing the last game 52-0. Bell was then fired immediately afterward.
Inductee: SuperPatriot
This short-lived mascot was beloved by virtually no one. His costume consisted of a tri-cornered hat, cape, body suit and mask that made him look like an even more gender-confused member of the Ambiguously Gay Duo. His reason to exist was to motivate the Foxboro crowd, which he did. He motivated them to pelt him with snowballs at every opportunity.
East Providence: A Tribute
This exhibit is a tribute to that sacred patch of the Ocean State where the Pats of the early ‘90s carried out their drunken debauchery. Featured is the nightclub scene where Hart Lee Dykes got beaten with a guy’s crutches, prompting teammate Irving Fryar to run to his car, grab a gun and come to Dykes’ aid, only to be beaten over the head with a baseball bat. In mid-season.
Inductees: Bobby Grier’s Double Intial Guys
Given complete control over the Pats personnel moves, and a mother lode of Jets draft picks from the Bill Parcells deal and the Curtis Martin signing, Grier proved he was good at two things: drafting bad players, and drafting bad players with double initials. In 1998 alone he took Chris Canty, Sedrick Shaw, Chris Carter, Damon Denson, and Ed Ellis. And all these alliterative athletes were absolutely awful.
So before the season gets underway, don’t forget to count your blessings, Pats fans. This has been two columns now about how bad things used to be for the Patriots, and we still haven’t even mentioned Rod Rust. Go Patriots.