COMMENTARY
It’s been 30 years since the last time the New England Patriots began an NFL season looking this wretched. But please, don’t compare this substandard collection currently fronting as a professional football team to the memory of that 1993 team’s significance. That group had hope and promise, two traits that might as well be accountability and resilience since they don’t exist in this year’s squad.
For these current-day Patriots, hope left the building somewhere around the time they kicked off in Dallas a fortnight ago. The slight scent of promise that hovered over quarterback Mac Jones following his (ahem, Pro Bowl) rookie season hasn’t been detected for more than a year.