The New England Patriots & The Super Bowl
As I write this, it is two days away from the Super Bowl. If you’ve been in my office or know me at all, you know I’m a big New England Patriots fan. My dog wears a Patriots bandana, I have a Pats hat in my adjusting area (both will be replaced by Red Sox stuff when their season starts), so many people who have come into the office the past two weeks have asked me my thoughts on the whole “Deflategate” situation or have made their share of jokes. No worries, I can handle it. So, what are my thoughts?
Well they range from “innocent until proven guilty”, to “I hope Tom Brady isn’t lying” to “is it really that big of a deal, who cares?”. I can see how people hate the Patriots, after all they are a good team and people do not like the same team winning over & over (yet their last Super Bowl victory was 2005). Bill Belichick is a really good coach, one that will outsmart other coaches & teams to win, as any coach should. Tom Brady is really good looking (no problem admitting that), he’s married to a Super Model, he is (appears to be) squeaky clean & healthy, so it’s easy to be jealous of him and not like him. They are the team to pick on.
A few weeks ago against the Baltimore Ravens the Patriots had two trick moves that helped them win the game. A non-quarterback threw for a touchdown and then there was something about eligible/ineligible receivers. Both legal but tricky, and the Ravens and other teams didn’t like that, they say it wasn’t fair. Boo hoo I say. So what if Belichick is tricky, I think it’s being a pretty smart coach.
Is this a sign of what’s to come? Maybe in baseball the 1st or 2nd basemen won’t be allowed to hide the ball in their glove and then tag the runner when they stepped off the bag. “I didn’t know they had the ball, it’s not fair” they’ll cry out. Soon they will tell NBA players that it’s not fair to look left and then throw the ball right, that its too tricky and just not fair. Back in 1988 when Greg Lemond rode all aerodynamic for the first time, and came back in one day to win the Tour de France when his main competitor was on a road bike with his pony tail flailing, they didn’t say it was a trick and wasn’t fair. They said it was smart.
As for ball inflation, I have no idea what happened and neither does anyone else at this point. Was it weather or a person that deflated them, or did they just start out that way & get ignored by the refs? Maybe the Colts had their balls inflated to 13.5 PSI and they went down to 12.5. Maybe the Patriots had theirs at 12.5 and they went down to 11.5. Is that possible? If not, then someone had to have deflated the footballs, was it some buddy in Tom Brady’s corner, or was it someone from the Ravens or Colts trying to set them up? Or was Tom Brady doing it all season long and the referees being okay with it, just ignoring it because ALL teams cheat to some extent? The Patriots just are hated and thus get caught. Soon enough we will know, since the NFL will come out with their decision after the Super Bowl. Until then, it’s all speculation.
What does this have to do with chiropractic & health? This week while preparing for the Super Bowl, Tom Brady has come down with a bad cold and flu-like symptoms. It certainly doesn’t surprise me. Stress simply weakens the immune system and makes a person more vulnerable to getting sick. Whether he’s guilty or not, this situation is most likely stressing him out. Have you ever been accused of something and know you are totally innocent, yet you still don’t sleep well? You are worried about all the “what ifs” and end up not sleeping. I’m sure that’s happening to Brady. Guilty or not, he has a clean image and that’s in the process of being tarnished and I’m sure that doesn’t make him happy. I’ve heard he’s eating a lot of garlic to help fight this. After all, he’s a pretty smart guy and has always been known to do healthy alternative things rather than medication. I know he gets adjusted, so hopefully he’s been getting adjusted this week and letting his body heal up.
So what are you stressed out over? Do you get sick when stressed? Do you get less sleep? What do you do to take care of yourself? For me, my answers are chiropractic adjustments, drinking a lot of water, eating lots of greens and getting a lot of sleep. Those things are pretty magical and usually do the trick. I hope it works for Brady.
Whether or not the Patriots win on Sunday, they still will basically lose. There will always be a question about this game, even though there really shouldn’t be. If they lose it’s because they weren’t allowed to cheat. If they win it’s because they cheated. People don’t like winners and that’s a shame. I just hope we don’t find out years from now that Tom Brady was lying. It will remind me of Lance Armstrong, Roger Clemens, Alex Rodriguez, Barry Bonds….guys who swore they weren’t cheating and then admit to it (though some still haven’t admitted). That will be sad.
However this moment in time, it’s about Brady and the Patriots. They are a good team and they win, and their fans love it. People loved Bonds when he hit all those homeruns. People loved Armstrong when he won all those tours. You can’t take away “the moment” and that moment is now for the Patriots, regardless of what happens in a week, five months, or five years from now. For now I’ll cheer them on as a team and will live in the moment.
Go Pats!
