How did the Patriots maintain a top team for 17 years?

[97bills]

Brady and B.B got the best out of guys , you remember the saying the patriot way. Now we get to watch Mahomes go to the Super Bowl every year. Because McDermott doesn’t stack up well against the other teams that have OC as coaches. All I keep hearing on nfl network is how KC got all that help out of there rookies. We can’t even get ours on the field lol. I guarantee you cooks and Shakir would’ve shown out. With KC!!!!

[HugeHeffner11]

Very Simple!!! The BEST quarterback and HEAD COACH ever in the history of the NFL!  They very best and no one else was even CLOSE!  No team will ever dominate the league for 20 years in a row.  That is unheard of and impossible to repeat.

[TheWeatherMan]

28 minutes ago, HugeHeffner11 said:

Very Simple!!! The BEST quarterback and HEAD COACH ever in the history of the NFL!  They very best and no one else was even CLOSE!  No team will ever dominate the league for 20 years in a row.  That is unheard of and impossible to repeat.

They had the best QB (not coach) in the history of the NFL taking a 50% pay cut to keep his team together (long term continuity/chemistry is huge).  Take this and couple it with exploiting rules / cheating to gain a competitive advantage is why this dynasty existed.  

[GunnerBill]

They had the best QB and best HC in football, together, at the same time. 

 

And they had a weak division that meant they could experiment early in the year and try stuff out safe in the knowledge the division was in the bag. That is why they were always able to peak late.

[Nihilarian]

All the other AFC East teams were beset by fools at ownership, GM, and head coaches for all those years.

 

Now, it's just weird that the Jets and Dolphins finally found somewhat decent GMs, and HCs and could be competing for that AFC East title this year. 
 

 

I suppose we have to thank the Jet's ownership and Dolphin's ownership for some stupid moves recently. Like the Miami owner wanting Tua over Justin Herbert!

Also, the stupidity of the Jets GM for going after a QB who only played well in one season.

Both the Dolphins and Jet's GMs seem to have a handle on drafting the right players and making the right trades. Miami for Tyreek Hill and Jalen Ramsey. yowie! Imagine Herbert throwing to Hill. 

 

Anyway, gonna be tougher for Buffalo to win the AFC East going forward unless Buffalo upgrades that offensive line, and run game this year. JMO 

[Xwnyer]

You forgot to add cheating multiple times, radio feeds to opposing teams qb cutting out, their qb feed staying on……

[boyst]

3 hours ago, HugeHeffner11 said:

Very Simple!!! The BEST quarterback and HEAD COACH ever in the history of the NFL!  They very best and no one else was even CLOSE!  No team will ever dominate the league for 20 years in a row.  That is unheard of and impossible to repeat.

 

2 hours ago, TheWeatherMan said:

They had the best QB (not coach) in the history of the NFL taking a 50% pay cut to keep his team together (long term continuity/chemistry is huge).  Take this and couple it with exploiting rules / cheating to gain a competitive advantage is why this dynasty existed.  

as he said

 

he didn't get the pay cut because the actual money to him came for his TB12 thighmaster gimmick where he did his sports therapy crap contracted to the team. i'm surprised more players have not tried to go this route.

 

tom brady was a crocked dirty player and is the same as a person. some can call that shrewd but he ruined the fun of the game acting like the perfect example of a entitled millennial beach. 

[Ethan in Cleveland]

Brady taking less is so overblown. He was always paid in the top three or four QBs he was just never the top paid guy. Ans that was mainly because he had contemporaries like Manning and Breese who were of near equal HOF status.  Yes that saved them a few dollars in cap money but not really that much. 

Bills will soon be no different.  Allen is already below Mahommes and within two years Herbert and Burrow will both be making more. 

[filthymcnasty08]

U mean besides the cheating?

 

 

[Big Turk]

Their QB took way less money than he could have gotten allowing them to keep other pieces.

 

Belichick was a master at letting guys go a year too early rather than a year too late. Aging vets got replaced right around the time they fell off a cliff most times.

 

Tom Brady covered up for a ton of missteps in the draft.

[Low Positive]

They weren’t really a dominant team for 17 years. They had 2 waves at the start and towards the end of the Brady years with the Randy Moss blip in the middle. There were roster reset years, it just didn’t seem like it because they made the playoffs due to a weak division and Tom Brady. 

[JimmyNoodles]

They were practically gifted 6 wins a year because the division was so bad. Refs and cheating carried them too. 

[Low Positive]

The question really should be “how in the heck were the Bills, Jets and Dolphins that bad for that long?” All of those teams got high draft picks year after year and just kept whiffing. 

[Gregg]

I wish Bill was the Bills HC. Nine Super Bowl appearances with six Championship wins with an elite level franchise QB. He would definitely bring a Lombardi to Buffalo with Allen.

[Ga boy]

On 2/10/2023 at 9:43 AM, Big Turk said:

75% of it was Tom Brady covering up for all the deficiencies on the roster. Don't get me wrong, they had good players and good teams, but it wasn't often you looked at their roster and thought "Damn, this is the most talented roster in the NFL!"

Yes and we got the guy to do the same.  If JA17 learns to throw in 1.5 secs, we will win a few pretty trophies 🏆 

[Don Otreply]

   A combination of a really weak AFCE, offensive and defensive schemes that actually worked, the QB to implement it, and two decades of constant cheating that was so prevalent that they got caught doing so every four and a half years on average, the sad part is that so many fans worship a team that constantly cheated during that period, and the league celebrated them even though they knew they were cheating, did essentially nothing to stop it. 

[McBean]

Built yearly around Tom Brady.

[Boatdrinks]

Most NFL games are close. Their QB - as much as I hate to admit it - almost never made mistakes. That’s the biggest factor imo. 

[John from Riverside]

3 hours ago, GunnerBill said:

They had the best QB and best HC in football, together, at the same time. 

 

And they had a weak division that meant they could experiment early in the year and try stuff out safe in the knowledge the division was in the bag. That is why they were always able to peak late.

Not quite sure why anyone would disagree with this
 

The patriots were way out in front of every other team in the AFC East, and it wasn’t close

 

When you’re able to come out of your division every year, you’re gonna have a good record every year. Kind of like with the bills are doing right now.

[May Day 10]

It was a perfect storm.  Good coach and good QB.  Good QB was willing to commit his entire being to winning.  Coach paid attention to every single detail and every single opportunity to gain an advantage.  Even if that entered into gray areas of rules.  Stayed ahead of the curve at certain points, like when they had Gronk and Hernandez as dual tight ends which was a nightmare. 

 

The Division had the three stooges residing in it for most of the entire run.  The Jets had a small run with Rex.  The Division was of no concern for New England and offered little resistance.

 

Players willing to sign there for less than full market value to win

 

Expert level ability to allow players to leave, not paying them, and replacing them with cheaper options who rarely missed a beat.  Maximized the comp picks as well as trading down in the draft for quantity of picks.  

 

Luck.  Honestly, I have never seen a franchise get so lucky at various times in crunch time.  Other teams would somehow become possessed and either make terrible decisions or physical failures.  You also have to get lucky to some degree in order to get to a Super Bowl, let alone win it.  To do it on a regular gait is incredible.