That groan you heard around 3 p.m. on Monday afternoon was New England Patriots fans when the team announced that quarterback Tom Brady would have surgery on his injured left knee and miss the entire season.
That being said Matt Cassel is now the Patriots quarterback going forward. I don’t see Bill Belichick signing a veteran and then replacing Cassel with him unless it’s someone like Drew Bledsoe or Vinny Testeverde both who have experience in the system. More likely anyone who is signed will be Cassel’s backup with rookie Kevin O’Connell acting as the third quarterback.
As of Monday afternoon Belichick said contrary to media reports the team had not worked out any quarterbacks on Monday but he wasn’t ruling anything out during the week. He also added that people were contacting him.
In Friday’s Patriots-Jets game preview I have some background information on the man who will be, at least for now, leading the Patriots offense. As I note in the preview that game was supposed to be quite the quarterback match up. New York’s Brett Favre has the longest consecutive starts streak for a NFL QB, Indianapolis’ Peyton Manning is second and Brady was third. It was also suppose to match up two guys who between them have 4 championships, 6 Super Bowl appearances, 4 NFL MVP’s, 13 Pro Bowl appearances and 4 All-Pro nominations. It was suppose to match up two first ballot Hall of Famers. Now it’s a game between a savvy 18 year vet and a fourth year player making his first career start.
If you just can’t get enough info on Cassel (pronounced Castle) Tim Graham’s AFC East Blog has some stuff on him.
Alex Marvez of FOXSports.com claims the team wasn’t prepared to handle an injury to Brady. See that’s why Marvez writes for a website and Belichick and Scott Pioli evaluate NFL talent.
On Monday afternoon Brady and NBCSports.com Tom Curran swapped some email and Brady say’s he still likes the team’s chances.
Here is Belichick’s Monday afternoon press conference.
WEEI.com’s Mike Petraglia offers up the team’s “Band of Brothers” mentality.
Usually we start with this but today we’re going to close with Belichick’s weekly interview on WEEI with the Big Show crew and Matt Cassel’s post game press conference after Sunday’s win.
I will say this in wrapping up. The New England Patriots are much more than Tom Brady. Sure the offense goes through him but now he isn’t here and it will go through Matt Cassel. It doesn’t mean that Randy Moss and Wes Welker forgot how to catch or Laurence Maroney can’t run or Richard Seymour, Vince Wilfork and Ty Warren can’t stuff a run or that Rodney Harrison won’t lay someone out.
This team over the last seven or eight years has been remarkably resilient. We’ve seen Drew Bledsoe’s injury, Tedy Brischi’s stroke, the knee injuries to Rodney Harrison, the foot injury to Ty Law and Spygate. It likes, no it loves, to circle the wagons and say screw you to anyone who doesn’t stand with them. Win or lose regardless of record they will do that again.
I expect nothing less.
