![]() With 5:03 remaining in the fourth quarter at Foxboro Stadium, Lewis changed all that. With that sort of commitment in place, the team had no intention of giving key reps to its sixth-round pick from the 2000 draft. The guarantees in the extension financially tied Bledsoe to the Pats for at least the next four seasons. Barely six months before New England’s Week 2 clash with the Jets in 2001, the Patriots handed quarterback Drew Bledsoe a 10-year, $103 million contract extension that was then the richest deal in NFL history. Lewis never played for the Pats, but it's impossible to leave him off this list: He delivered the hit that started it all. It wasn’t easy, but something tells me Vince is enjoying retirement too much to notice. To pare this down to 16 names, Wes Welker, Romeo Crennel, and Vince Wilfork just missed the cut. Beyond those future Hall of Famers, who deserves the most credit for the Patriots’ remarkable reign? To commemorate the start of the 16th season since New England lifted its first Lombardi Trophy, I took my best shot at ranking the 16 most important figures in its dynasty.īefore we begin a quick recognition of some honorable mentions. The period from New England’s first Super Bowl run in the 2001 season to now is known as the Belichick-Brady era, and it goes without saying that the pair has had more to do with the franchise’s sustained success than anyone.įootball is a team game, though, and Bill Belichick and Tom Brady didn’t win five Super Bowls by themselves. The two names most responsible for bringing about this golden age of Patriots football are obvious. So, welcome to - ugh, yes - Patriots Week ! Ahead of what could be the most dominant New England season yet, read along as we take a look at the good, the bad, and the Jets-y of modern football’s defining dynasty. Sixteen years since their first Super Bowl win and 10 since their 16–0 regular season, Tom Brady and Bill Belichick are still the class of the NFL. But here’s the thing: Can anyone stop them? Five weeks before the season kicks off, New England is favored to win every game it plays in 2017. Here are ten players the Patriots should have kept longer and ten they released too quickly.We all - well, most of us - agree with you: The Patriots are an insufferable football machine that must be stopped. ![]() They make the same mistake many teams do and keep players for the one season too long. That also doesn’t mean the Patriots are always this cold-blooded machine. Years that the Patriots could have used on their teams and gone up another level. Not all of them have been right and sometimes the players go on to show that they still have big seasons ahead. This doesn’t mean that fans and analysts alike don’t have the right to question some of the moves that Belichick has made. If not Super Bowls at least they win the division and have a shot every season. Players like Richard Seymour have been let go to everyone’s surprise but then the Patriots just continue to win. ![]() They know that it’s a team game and can correctly evaluate how much value a player has in their system. ![]() The Patriots have been letting players go for years before it comes time to pay them that monster contract. It is a system which had worked ever since Bill Belichick started coaching the team in 2000 and has survived a lot of changes in personnel. ![]() Of course, that still doesn’t stop anyone from taking them to win at least 12 games and be in contention for the Super Bowl every single year. According to most people the Patriots are awful on defense, have no wide receivers, will struggle on the offensive line and don’t have a dominant running game. People begin to doubt the New England Patriots and what they are doing with their roster. Yes, it’s football season of course but something else happens at this exact point every season. ![]()
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