Jets-Pats rivalry transcends games

Their history involves stealing players, reneging on contracts, tattling to the commissioner, suing their bosses and then playing some football. All of it happens in the sports crucible that is Boston-New York contempt.

Now that's a rivalry.

The New England Patriots and New York Jets have established their series as the NFL's most intense.

They'll meet Sunday at the Meadowlands in a game that could symbolize a shift in the AFC East. The Patriots don't have star quarterback Tom Brady anymore and are considered the underdogs. The Jets have another first-ballot Hall of Famer in Brett Favre.

"The New England Patriots are the standard bearers in the AFC East," said former Patriots and Jets running back Keith Byars. "But the Jets smell a little blood in the water."

Sunday's matchup is compelling, but it's merely another episode in a series that has been nothing short of fascinating for a generation.

Head coaches Bill Belichick and Eric Mangini, sharing professional lineage and mutual disdain, have worked for both teams and accused each other of various transgressions (see the Spygate chapter in your Rivalry Handbook). Several assistants and 51 players have jumped back and forth since Bill Parcells became Patriots coach in 1993 and Jets coach in 1997.

"When Joe Walton was coaching the Jets, we weren't taking Jets-Patriots calls," said legendary New York sports talker Chris "Mad Dog" Russo. "It wasn't Boston versus New York like Red Sox-Yankees, but when Parcells got in the mix, that's when the Jets-Patriots rivalry began in earnestness and spiraled out of control.

"It's all off-the-field stuff. It transcends the actual games."

While Byars contended the rivalry is fueled more by franchise or coaching animosity, Curtis Martin, who also ran for both teams, said "it was more like competing against your brother. When you're competing against people that you know, it just brings a little extra out of you."

Going into a Patriots-Jets game, the players are fully aware of the added importance. They're well-versed on the story lines. They look across the field and see so many familiar faces. They feel the added hostility swirling around the stadium like a nasty wind.

"It almost feels combustible," said Martin, who bolted the Patriots for the Jets to reunite with Parcells. "You almost expect fans to get into a fight in the stands. There's that type of tension.

"You know the history. You know where both coaches come from. You know what's going on. You don't necessarily feed into the media, but you understand and you're not oblivious to it."

The Patriots-Jets blood feud has been rehashed often enough, but here's the CliffsNotes version:

* After 30-plus years of coexisting in relative harmony as AFL brothers, the Patriots hire lightning rod and former New York Giants head coach Parcells in 1993.

* Parcells, upset over being overruled by Patriots owner Robert Kraft in the 1996 draft, defects to the Jets at the end of the season. Kraft demands draft compensation. The NFL orders the Jets to surrender four picks over the next three years.

* Parcells signs Martin to a six-year, $36 million offer sheet in 1998, knowing the Patriots can't match. The Jets give up first- and third-round picks as compensation.
* Parcells leaves the Jets sideline after 1999 and abdicates to Belichick. On his way to the podium for his introductory news conference, Belichick scrawls a resignation note on a napkin.

* The Jets forbid Belichick from pursuing other jobs. Belichick responds by filing an antitrust lawsuit against the NFL.

* Belichick becomes Patriots head coach in 2000 and goes on to win six AFC East titles, four AFC titles and three Super Bowls.

* In September 2001, Jets LB Mo Lewis delivers the sideline hit that changed the Patriots franchise. Drew Bledsoe suffers internal bleeding, and virtual unknown Brady takes over.

* Patriots defensive coordinator Mangini leaves to become Jets head coach in 2006. He tries to pick up his things the next day, but he's locked out of Gillette Stadium.

* Patriots file tampering charges against the Jets regarding WR Deion Branch.

* The Jets report Patriots videotaping violations to the NFL last year, and Spygate becomes an obsession well into the offseason.

The Patriots-Jets series, however, is more than good theater. These games have counted.

The Patriots have won six of the past seven AFC East titles. The Jets won the other one in 2002 in a three-way tiebreaker with the Patriots and Miami Dolphins.

They met in the playoffs two seasons ago. That year, they split in the regular season (the road teams won each time), and the Patriots beat the Jets 37-16 in the playoffs.

"It's always serious," Martin said. "One significance to this is that it seems the winner of these games usually wins the division. It's really taken serious. There's a lot at stake with these games."

Pats season IS NOT OVER

I completely get the national venom for the Patriots. I'm not surprised by all the anecdotes we're hearing about fans in bars in New York and Indianapolis and in all the other football cities the Patriots have pillaged the past seven years erupting in gleeful cheers as Tom Brady writhed on the ground Sunday.

And how predictable that the ESPN clowns would climb all over each other to declare the wicked witch in the gray hoodie dead. They can barely repress their smirks as they wait for the Patriots to get their comeuppance, as if the Super Bowl shocker wasn't enough.

They hate the Patriots, for their success, for all they've denied them. They feel it. I know where they're coming from.

But a word of warning are drop-kicking the Patriots while they're supposedly down: In your bloodthirsty, envious desire to see the fatal blow delivered to the wobbling dynasty, you are severely underestimating the remaining 52 men on this team right now.

Now, let's get this straight right now: I'm am not in a state of grief as I write this. I am not a basement-dwelling fanboy in denial. I am not looking for hope anywhere I can find it. I simply believe this to be true:

The Patriots, even without the best player in the NFL, are still going to be a tremendous football team this season. They may not light up the scoreboard, and they may not dominate from the first minute to the 60th, but more often than not - much more often than not - they will win.

They will win because of Randy Moss and Wes Welker. They will win because of Richard Seymour, Vince Wilfork, and Ty Warren. They will win because of Adalius Thomas and Mike Vrabel . . . Dan Koppen and Logan Mankins . . . Laurence Maroney and Sammy Morris . . . Rodney Harrison and Deltha O'Neal . . . Dave Thomas and Ben Watson . . . Jerod Mayo and Tedy Bruschi . . .

They will win because of Matt Cassel. And most of all, they will win because of Bill Belichick.

I came into this season believing that Belichick and the Patriots needed to win the Super Bowl to secure their legacy, or at least the perception of their legacy. It's difficult to admit if you're a fan, but the painful truth is that SpyGate is a stain that will be removed only with another championship.

Suddenly, Belichick has another way to restore his and his franchise's good name: he can succeed, and greatly exceed expectations, without his superstar quarterback. And I'm convinced Belichick is already invigorated by this challenge.

The coach has seemed weird the last couple of days (well, weird-er). You thought he'd be black-cloud gloomy during his weekly appearance on the Big Show; instead, he chuckled at all the sycophants' eighth-grade level jokes. He appeared to even crack a smile while stonewalling the media during Monday's press conference confirming Brady's status.

I'm certain he knows something we don't, probably concerning his new starting quarterback. Maybe Phil Simms is right, and Belichick thinks he has something special in Cassel, who looked more than competent Sunday after an uninspiring preseason. Maybe he likes his team's chances in a league in which a team led by the likes of Tavaris Jackson is considered a Super Bowl contender. Maybe recalls 2001, and the greatest coaching job most of us have ever witnessed, and thinks he just might be capable of a sequel.

I don't mean to downplay Brady's injury, or to suggest Belichick would prefer anything but having his franchise QB for all 16 games and all the way to Tampa. Of course losing Brady is devastating. Devastating. It's terrible when any great athlete loses a season of his prime, and so much worse when it's one of Your Guys. But there's no sympathy in the NFL. There are 15 games to play, hopefully more. The schedule waits for no one.

Despite 0-3 record, Pats not concerned about preseason

Cause for concern or just a summer swoon for the Patriots?

Three exhibition games and three sorry performances. The latest: a 27-17 loss to the Philadelphia Eagles on Friday night in which New England's offense, defense and special teams put together a complete team effort, but not the kind coach Bill Belichick wants.

Preseason results in Patriots' title years:
Year

Record 2005...2-2

Record 2004...1-3

Record 2001...3-1

"We still have a lot of work to do," he said.

Their best performance may have come in the postgame locker room, where there was no panic on a team that was almost perfect last season.

"We'll get it together," safety Rodney Harrison said. "I'm very optimistic."

"The season hasn't even begun," cornerback Ellis Hobbs said. "We're 0-3 in the preseason but we're still 0-0."

The exhibition season isn't an accurate predictor of regular-season success. The last two Super Bowl winners were 1-3 in exhibition games. But the last time a team won the championship after going winless in the preseason was in 1982, when the Washington Redskins won the Super Bowl.

There are good reasons for New England's problems.

Quarterback and NFL MVP Tom Brady is nursing a sore foot and sat out all three games. So did ailing starting offensive linemen Matt Light and Stephen Neal. On defense, starting safeties Harrison and James Sanders played their first game Friday night, while linebacker Adalius Thomas and end Ty Warren sat it out.

The Patriots wrap up their preseason schedule Thursday night against the New York Giants, the team that ended their hopes for a perfect 19-0 season by beating them in the Super Bowl. There's a chance Brady's first game action will come in the regular-season opener Sept. 7 against Kansas City.

Matt Cassel played poorly for the third straight game and his status as the No. 2 quarterback could be in jeopardy. Second-year pro Matt Gutierrez did much better when he came in early in the second half, completing 14 of 20 passes for 217 yards and two touchdowns.

The Patriots clearly miss Brady.

"He's Tom Brady. That says enough right there," running back Sammy Morris said. "Regardless of who's out there, it's up to us to execute and do our own job. It may come out where we may have to be without Tom."

In the first half, the defense and special teams executed poorly.

Donovan McNabb led three drives of 70 yards or more and the Eagles returned a punt and a kickoff for touchdowns in the final 1:35 to take a 27-3 lead.

"We only have another week before we get started, but we take a lot of pride in our special teams unit," said Kelley Washington, a special teams standout for New England last season. "There's just no way we can have returns going back on us, putting our defense in a tough situation and putting our team in a tough situation."

In 2004, the Patriots went 1-3 in exhibition games, losing the last three, then won the most recent of their three Super Bowl championships.

And they know they've been missing key players this summer. So Belichick and his players were calm after Friday's game.

"It was a good learning experience," he said.

Regulars usually play very little in the last exhibition game. Last year, Belichick used only 42 of his 75 players, none of them first-stringers, in the final game, a 27-20 win over the Giants.

He may have more reason to play his regulars against the Giants on Thursday, if only to get them to jell on offense, defense and special teams.

"We'll get better. We'll watch film and we'll get better," said Harrison, but, for now, "of course, it's frustrating."