The second ring makes all the difference in the world, though Peyton Manning already knew that. And as of today, solely with regard to winning, there is no point in comparing Manning to Tom Brady when Peyton is having enough trouble keeping up with his kid brother.

Rest easy, New Englanders. You still hold the trump card over Peyton Manning and the Indianapolis Colts. Yesterday’s 31-17 victory by the New Orleans Saints in Super Bowl XLIV had more to do with coach Jim Caldwell, the Indianapolis receiving corps, and the Indianapolis defense (an oxymoron, in retrospect?) than it did with Manning, but history won’t remember it that way. With the Saints holding a 24-17 lead and with the game on the line, Manning threw a lazy pick-6 to Tracy Porter that effectively ended the NFL season and left Manning looking like the Greg Norman of football.

Norman won major championships, after all, but he could have (and should have) won more. So it is now with Manning, arguably the greatest quarterback of all time, who has played 12 seasons and won four Most Valuable Player awards but managed just one championship.

In all fairness to the quarterback of the Colts, he did not single-handedly lose this game. Far from it. But Manning did not win it, either, particularly when presented the chance at that moment when the truly great quarterbacks forge their legacy.

"Made a great play," Manning told reporters after the game when asked of Porter’s interception and 74-yard return. "Made a great play. Corner made a heck of a play."

And the quarterback did not.

How did the Colts blow this game? Let us count the ways. Indy held a 10-3 lead with scores on each of its first two possessions when Manning came back on the field with 9:34 to go in the first half. The Colts had a third-and-4 from their own 28-yard line when Manning hit a wide open Pierre Garcon on a crossing pattern that would have gone for big yardage were it not for one small fact: Garcon flat-out dropped the ball. The Saints subsequently took control of the ball for the next 6:25 in a drive that changed the complexion of the game.

New Orleans did not score on that possession, but it ultimately did not matter. The Colts ran on their next three plays and again were forced to punt, all but handing the Saints a field goal at the end of the half. A game that might be have been 10-3 (or more) in favor of the Colts instead sat at 10-6, an outcome that grew in magnitude after Sean Payton’s decision to go for an onside kick at the start of the third quarter.

Once the Saints went in for a touchdown and a 13-10 lead, Manning had been on the field for just two series and all of 2:06 from the end of the first quarter to the start of the third. He had thrown two passes – one a completion, the other the drop by Garcon. The Saints had taken complete control of the game.

Nonetheless, professional athletes are paid to win no matter the circumstances, something that Manning knows all too well. The Colts led 17-16 when Manning took over possession and drove Indy to the New Orleans 30 in the fourth quarter, when the Indy drive stalled. Manning faced a third-and-11 from the New Orleans 33 when he elected to throw deep down the middle to Austin Collie, missing the receiver and leaving Matt Stover with a 51-yard field goal attempt when even another five yards might have made all the difference.

The kick – like Manning’s decision-making at one of the more critical points of the game – came up short.

Of course, the interception by Porter ensued shortly thereafter, a play for which the Colts and Manning were as much to blame as Porter and the Saints were to praise. Indianapolis ineptitude invited the Saints back into the game in the second quarter. Colts calamity lost it in the fourth. For all that went wrong for Indianapolis during the first 54 minutes and change at Sun Life Stadium, Manning still had a chance to bring the Colts even (or better) when he trotted onto the field facing a 24-17 deficit with 5:42 left.

For Manning, who finished 31-of-45 for 333 yards, one touchdown, one interception, and a rating of 88.5, the Porter interception forever will remain the play for which this performance is remembered. Maybe that is fair. Maybe that is not. But as Archie’s son and Eli’s brother in addition to being the quarterback of the Colts, Manning long ago learned something that forever every man who has ever played the position will attest to, even Tom Brady.

The quarterback gets much of the credit for winning.

And he gets most of blame for losing, too.

FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. – In the paradoxical world of professional sports, we want them all to be team players, yet we judge them individually. We often promote our own agendas while seeking to discredit, diminish, or denounce.

Which is why I’m rooting for Peyton Manning this weekend.

Here in New England, where the Patriots have won more games since the turn of the millennium than any team but the Indianapolis Colts, we hardly qualify as objective. The Pats/Colts rivalry is currently the best in football. We have Tom Brady and they have Manning, a matchup of stars that rivals every pairing from Mantle and Mays to Larry and Magic. Picking between Brady and Manning is fodder for one of the great sports debates of our era, and the truth is that there is no wrong answer.

And yet, largely because we are here and they are there, there are those who will tear down Manning based on the simple fact that he has played on only one Super Bowl winner to date while Brady has played on three.

Can we stop with this nonsense? Please? The admission that Manning and Brady are the consummate peers does not less anything Brady has accomplished (or will accomplish) during his career. The suggestion that Manning is every bit as good (or better) does not qualify as sacrilege, treason, or infidelity. And yet, there remain those who forever try to knock Manning down a peg based on the fact that he doesn’t have as many championships.

Know what drives those kinds of absurdities? Insecurity. My quarterback is better than your quarterback has become the grown man’s version of my brother can beat up your brother, making it an utterly petty, stupid and downright childish debate.

Brady’s greatness is too far cemented to change. The same is true for Manning. We will never know how each might have done in the other’s shoes, the same way we never will know how things might have been different were Ted Williams a member of the Yankees and Joe DiMaggio a member of the Red Sox.

As a New Englander, it’s time to be entirely honest and admit something to yourself: You would have been just as fortunate to have Manning as you are Brady. The guy is that darned good. The most popular argument against Manning in New England concerns Manning’s poor big-game performance during the early stages of his career, an obvious attack point given Brady’s early-career success in the postseason.

Of course, when you get down right down to it, that argument doesn’t really work. Did Manning have a shutdown corner like Ty Law in the way that Brady did? Did he have an even remotely comparable defense? Did he have the same kicker? On the one hand, we here in New England want to celebrate the 2001 Patriots for being introduced as a team before their historic Super Bowl victory over the Rams; on the other, we want to say Brady drove them down the field in a way that Manning never could have, as if the quarterback was entirely responsible.

Talk about hypocrisy. Ask Kevin Garnett about this kind of thinking. Or even LeBron James. Both are consummate team players, having drawn criticism for passing up the final shot in favor of the open shot at various points during his career. Garnett ultimately overcame that overly simplistic nonsense. Sooner or later, presumably, James will, too. (We hope.)

All of this brings us back to Manning, who is now eying his second Super Bowl title, an honor that would silence his critics for good. It’s one thing to win a title; it’s another thing entirely to win multiple ones. Ten quarterbacks in history have won multiple titles, and the list reads like a Who’s Who of NFL history: Joe Montana and Terry Bradshaw (four); Troy Aikman and Brady (three); Bart Starr, Roger Staubach, Bob Griese, John Elway, Jim Plunkett and Ben Roethlisberger (two).

As for Manning, he currently rests in a group with, among others, Jeff Hostetler, Trent Dilfer, Mark Rypien and Brad Johnson. Not a single one of those players ever should be mentioned in the same breath as Dan Marino, whose exclusion from the list of Super Bowl titlists had far more to do with the absence of a defense and/or running game during his career than anything else.

The reason Marino fell short all of those years was because the Dolphins did not have capable teams. The quarterback was the least of their problems.

In the case of Manning, ask yourself this: Had he won a Super Bowl early in his career rather than in the middle, would his reputation be different? Would we perceive him more like much of America now perceives Brett Favre (another Super Bowl winner) or more like we once perceived Alex Rodriguez (as a choker)? Manning has had to work far harder to change his reputation in big games than he did to build it in the first place, something that could change dramatically come the late hours on Sunday.

After all, people won’t be able to say, ``Yeah, but he won only one Super Bowl.’’

When you think about it, "He won only two’’ just doesn’t have the same force.

The buzzwords now are "focus," "spirit," and "camaraderie," which might have been a good sign save for one small fact: the Celtics have been losing more than they have been winning lately. The Celtics of today talk more about what they lack than what they possess, which is often what happens when you just are not good enough.

And so now, regardless of whether Paul Pierce is out for the short-term, long-term, or any length in between, we must wonder exactly who these Celtics are, what they are, where they are going. In today’s Boston Herald, point guard Rajon Rondo speaks of a fractured Celtics locker room, at least relative to the 2007-08 championship season. In a radio interview yesterday on 98.5 The Sports Hub, Celtics vice-president of basketball operations Danny Ainge talked of the club’s inability to focus down the stretch of games, which sounded like a tactful and diplomatic way of saying that his veterans have lost interest in the regular season altogether.

But then, if that is true, doesn’t that suggest the Celtics have the requisite level of talent to win another title this year, in the third season of the new Big Three? And doesn’t that suggest that what the Celtics have now is entirely fixable, be it through trade or a simple attitude adjustment?

For now, know this: With a 30-16 record, the Celtics already have lost as many games as they did during the entire 2007-08 regular season. In fact, in the last 37 days, they have nearly a many losses (11) as they did during their last championship year. Ainge yesterday outright dismissed theories that the Celtics are already too old to win another championship, saying that the team’s breakdowns of late have had a great deal more to do with focus and attitude than with any deterioration in talent.

Given his stance, here’s the question: Do you agree with him? In some ways, Ainge and Rondo sounded disturbingly similar in separate interviews, which cannot help but make you wonder about the nucleus and direction of the Celtics, specifically as it to pertains to their roster.

Let’s back up here for a moment. Three years ago, when Ainge reconstructed the Celtics, Kevin Garnett, Paul Pierce and Ray Allen all had a common goal. As three more of the more talented players in their era, each lacked the validation that can come only with a championship. All three of those players approached the 2007-08 season with a renewed commitment and selflessness, because each stood to gain the same thing: indisputable greatness.

But now? A second title could not possibly mean as much to Garnett, Allen or Pierce – or, for that matter, Rasheed Wallace, a champion in Detroit – as a first. All four of those men have little room left for growth. None of them will ever feel as good about themselves as they did on the night they won their first titles. In the wake of physical setbacks, it would be entirely understandable if Garnett and Pierce, in particular, lost interest in a regular season that now has virtually no meaning to them.

In the wake of that reality, can men like Garnett, Pierce, Allen and Wallace turn it on come playoff time? Will they still care enough to fight through adversity that might have derailed them two years ago were it not for the simple fact that none of them ever had won anything? Or are the Celtics truly too old now – from an emotional and psychological state as much as a physical one – to deal with some of the challenges that every championship team must overcome?

Ainge clearly has his theories. Rondo has his, too. And truth be told, there were significant stretches this season where the Celtics looked like absolute world-beaters, which, in retrospect, might have been the worst thing to happen to them.

Now here’s the worrisome part: whether it be the Red Sox, Patriots, Bruins or Celtics, issues of leadership only seem to come up when a team is losing. People usually start talking about focus and spirit and camaraderie while learning there is simply not enough talent or health (or both) to consistently win games over a long period of time. The great teams overcome the bad stretches and the ordinary teams do not, and now we just need to find out which term describes the Celtics.

With regard to Ainge, there is every chance that he is entirely right about this team. He said yesterday that he has no desire to trade Allen, that he believes this team can win now. All of that suggests he will make a move to help the Celtics some time between now and the annual trading deadline, though Ainge’s faith in his team is hardly the most important question surrounding these Celtics.

The real question is whether the Celtics players believe in themselves as much as he does.

So this is what it has come to. The Bruins, currently mired in 11th place in the Eastern Conference, now have to keep an eye on the wretched Toronto Maple Leafs as much as they do anyone else.

Don’t look now, Bruins followers, but the Toronto Maple Leafs just executed a pair of weekend trades, one which of which brings them tough and talented 24-year-old defenseman Dion Phaneuf, who is signed through 2013-14. That move may or may not turn around what has heretofore been a dreadful season for the Leafs, but it could have significant impact for a Bruins club that currently holds Toronto’s first-round pick in this year’s draft as a result of the Phil Kessel trade.

At the moment, that pick projects to be the No. 2 or No. 3 overall selection, a huge payoff for a Bruins club that also hold Toronto’s first-round pick next year. But if the Phaneuf deal improves the Leafs sufficiently to move Toronto out of the top three in the draft, the Bruins could be left holding the bag in the netherworld between the playoffs and the prime positions in the draft.

Which brings us to general manager Peter Chiarelli.

Suddenly, the heat seems to be turning up on the Bruins general manager to act with regard to his team. The Bruins turned in solid performances against both the Buffalo Sabres and Los Angeles Kings over the weekend … and they had one point to show for it. The B’s carried the play for much of those two games and generated more than their share of scoring opportunities, but they simply could not score and remained on a treadmill to nowhere.

In fact, when Mark Recchi tipped home a David Krejci pass in the third period on Saturday night, it marked the first time the Bruins had held a lead in four games.

A practical man with a Harvard education, Chiarelli now founds himself in a most precarious position. He may have to do something that goes against his nature; he may have to do something purely for the sake of doing it. Last week, Chiarelli told anyone who would listen that he had no intentions of trading the Toronto selection in this year’s draft because of the depth of talent available at the top of the first round. During his weekly segment on 98.5 The Sports Hub, he went so far as to say that current Islanders rookie John Tavares (the No. 1 pick in last year’s draft) might be no better than the No. 4 overall selection in this year’s event.

By the way, Tavares is 19. He has 33 points and 17 goals this year, the latter a total unmatched by any Bruin this season. And dare we even mention that Kessel has the same number?

As encouraging as the Bruins’ efforts were over the weekend, goal-scoring remains a problem of colossal proportions. In the overtime loss to the Kings on Saturday, the Bruins had six chances to score in the shootout and managed just two tallies, by Michael Ryder and Marc Savard. Zdeno Chara, Blake Wheeler, Recchi, and Patrice Bergeron all failed.

For what it’s worth, Chiarelli last week gave no indication that the B’s were close to any deals, be it for Phaneuf, Ilya Kovalchuk or anyone else. To the contrary, Chiarelli suggested that the asking price for all trades was still much too high. (Of course, these things can change quickly.) Regardless, the addition of Phaneuf suggests the Leafs are far closer to being the Bruins than the Bruins are to being, say, the Penguins or Capitals, setting the stage for the kind of scenario that would drive the most loyal Bruins fans absolutely wild.

What if the Bruins do not make the playoffs? And what if the Leafs somehow end up finishing in front of Boston? The end result will have the Bruins picking before the Leafs following the most highly anticipated Bruins season in years, all after trading away their top goal scorer, regardless of whether Kessel wanted to be in Boston.

Of course, there is still a good deal of hockey to be played. The Bruins have seven more games before the Olympic break and 27 more overall – that is about one-third of the season – but the time for Chiarelli to make impact moves is dwindling. The trading deadline is set for just three days after the conclusion of the Olympics, and every game the Bruins play with their current roster is another game without an elite goal scorer.

And it is another game in a season where everything seems to be going so terribly wrong.

Cleaning up on some leftovers while waiting for the start of spring training …

We all understand the Red Sox have a developmental gap in their farm system, but when owner John Henry says that the club is trying to find a way to plug that hole until 2012, he makes it sound like the Red Sox don’t expect to be championship-caliber again until 2012.

OK, so maybe we’re all reading into things too much, most recently when Henry told the Herald’s Michael Silverman last weekend that this offseason presented the Sox with a challenge because their next wave of prospects is two years away. Henry is being completely honest with that assessment, which is a credit to him and to his organization. He’s not just feeding you what you want to hear. But a statement like that also ignores the fact that the Red Sox got themselves into this predicament and that there are multiple ways to build a team.

Translation: the Sox are a big market team. Clubs like Pittsburgh, San Diego, Minnesota and Florida may have to negotiate developmental gaps, but the Red Sox can buy their way through them. That’s the beauty of having both a farm system and considerable resources. Furthermore, the Red Sox are in their current plight partly because they traded away some young players (Nick Hagadone, etc.) and partly because prospects like Lars Anderson and Michael Bowden have taken a downturn in value.

Who’s to say the latter won’t happen again?

The more you look at it, the more you can't help but wonder if John Lackey is here to replace Josh Beckett. The Red Sox simply could not afford to let Beckett walk after this season without having a replacement, and the market next fall might not be as favorable as the one this offseason. So the Sox signed Lackey, assuring them of having at least two front-line starters (Lackey and Jon Lester) in 2011.

All of that brings us to Jason Bay and the curious manner in which the Red Sox negotiated with him. In a recent interview with Rob Bradford of WEEI.com, Bay detailed what we told you here in December – specifically that he and the Red Sox had all but agreed to a four-year deal last summer when the Sox started getting cold feet over concerns about Bay’s long-term health.

In retrospect, the Sox never had a chance of re-signing Bay this offseason, at least not when any team was willing to offer Bay a four-year deal for more than $16 million per season with no strings attached. Will the Red Sox prove right about Bay in the long run? That remains to be seen. In the interim, they have signed a pitcher with some recent elbow difficulty (Lackey) to a five-year deal and reached the point where they seem to be getting downright neurotic about long-term contracts.

In the Sox’ defense, as one longtime major league voice pointed out, the Sox’ stance on "protection" in long-term contracts might have some validity to it. Player contracts have become increasingly difficult to insure in recent years, which means teams must absorb more of the burden in the event of injury. If the Sox are hedging their bets, so be it. At the same time, the club is going to lose out on players like Bay if and when it comes time to bid, meaning the club is excluding itself from competing for some high-level talent at a time when the farm system is sputtering.

Does that make any sense at all?

With regard to defense, we all know that Bay was not Gold Glove material, but can we stop with the suggestion that he was a car crash waiting to happen out there? Some of the same defensive metrics that had Bay rated as one of the worst defensive left fielders in baseball last year had Jacoby Ellsbury rated last among qualifying major league center fielders. Many of us believe that Ellsbury’s speed and athleticism lead people to overrate his skill, but anyone who watched him last year knows he is an adequate center fielder at worst.

The point? Somewhere along the line, baseball’s obsession with quantitative analysis gets to be a little bit much. To their credit, the Red Sox appear to have built a very good (and maybe even great) defensive team on paper this year, but we all know that the great teams have balance. The championship clubs of 2004 and 2007 could hit, run, pitch, and play defense by the time September and October rolled around, explaining why they could win the 2-1 game just as easily as the 8-7 affair.

Admittedly, these Red Sox are not done being built yet.

But amid this avalanche of new-age statistical information, ask yourself this: if the numbers are going to make all of the decisions for you, why do we need GMs and managers anymore?

If I am Peter Chiarelli, this is what I do: I walk into the locker room and I tell the players, in no uncertain terms, that this season is entirely up to them. I tell them Claude Julien will be the coach here for years to come. I tell them that the management of the Bruins will continue to treat this team like a Stanley Cup contender, that help should be coming at some point in the next month.

And then I watch the next three weeks to see if my team has any pride at all.

Let’s make something clear here: nobody seems to be clamoring for Julien to be fired and nobody should be. Somewhere along the line, particularly in the topsy-turvy world of the NHL, firing the coach became some kind of elixir, even at the most peculiar times. In 2000, the first-place New Jersey Devils fired coach Robbie Ftorek and replaced him with Larry Robinson with eight games to play, then went on to win the Stanley Cup. No-nonsense Devils general manager Lou Lamoriello tried the same stunt seven years later and lost in the second round, as good an indication as any that coaching changes can be as predictable as coin flips. The coach he fired then? Claude Julien.

And before anyone issues the reminder that the reigning Stanley Cup champion Pittsburgh Penguins dismissed their coach before turning things around last season, let’s draw a clear distinction between those Penguins and these B’s. Pittsburgh has Sidney Crosby and Evgeni Malkin. The Bruins do not. There is talent and there is talent, and the Bruins have more of the former than they do of the latter.

Philosophically, here’s the problem some of us have with firing a coach: it lets the players off the hook. It excuses their poor performance. It teaches the younger ones, especially, that the solution for substandard play is to transplant the brain when the real issue seems to rest with the heart. It gives them a new start when they really do not deserve one, when they should instead be taught to clean up the mess they have made.

With Julien, in particular, the Bruins don’t seem to have many choices. For starters, the B’s are still paying Dave Lewis. Over the summer, they signed Julien to a multi-year extension that does not begin until next season. Another firing by Chiarelli would require him to stand in Jeremy Jacobs’s office and explain why the Bruins pay coaches like the Red Sox pay shortstops, which would put the heat squarely on the trousers of the Bruins GM.

Beyond that, there is the issue of the players, many of whom are underperforming in what has suddenly become a maddening season. In the last year or so, the Bruins have signed Tim Thomas, Tuukka Rask, Marc Savard, Milan Lucic, and David Krejci, not to mention Julien, to contract extensions. They have a great deal invested in this team. A major shakeup of any kind would be tantamount to a admission of guilt, to a confession that the Bruins have made critical evaluation mistakes.

So we ask: Isn’t it possible that Bruins players have grown a little too comfortable and complacent? Isn’t it possible that they have lost their edge now that they have been handed their money? Isn’t it possible that the Bruins are acting like they have accomplished something when they really have accomplished nothing at all?

Admittedly, injuries have been an enormous part of the problem here. Since the earliest stages of this season, the Bruins have been operating at something less than full capacity. Savard has played in only half the games. Lucic has played in even fewer. During the recent West Coast swing, the Bruins played without Savard, Krejci and Patrice Bergeron, depriving them of the center on their top three lines. The power play stinks. The team has failed to protect leads in the third period. On a disturbing eight occasions this season, the Bruins have lost by three goals or more; last year, they did not suffer a loss of such magnitude until Feb. 10 and finished with just two such defeats overall.

Speaking yesterday on 98.5 The Sports Hub, Bruins vice president Cam Neely effectively dismissed any and all talk of a Julien dismissal, saying "it was a little early’’ for such conjecture. Neely spoke of a Bruins team that lacks confidence and needs its morale rebuilt. The Bruins now have nine games remaining before the Olympics break – the first coming on Friday at Buffalo – and the annual NHL trading deadline is just three days after the Olympics conclude.

Translation: Before he can make any determination on what kind of acquisitions to make, Chiarelli needs to see what kind of character this team has. And he needs to find out now.

Last year, for all intents and purposes, the Bruins coasted through the regular season. They subsequently dusted the Montreal Canadiens in the first round of the playoffs before spanking the Carolina Hurricanes by a 4-1 score in Game 1 of the Eastern Conference semifinals. In retrospect, maybe that was a bad way for the Bruins to start the playoffs because they really haven’t been the same team since. The Bruins fell asleep in Games 2, 3 and 4 of the Carolina series and woke up briefly in Games 5 and 6, which cannot help but make you wonder where the problem with this team resides.

As we all know, you don’t learn about character and heart during the good times.

You learn during the bad times.

And so an entire season of NFL football comes down to three cities: Indianapolis, New Orleans, Miami. For the Patriots and their followers, it’s as if they are being visited by the ghosts of Christmas during a time of critical soul-searching.

Indy, New Orleans, Miami. The Patriots played in all three cities during a span of 22 days from Nov.15-Dec. 6, and the results were damning. The Pats blew a big lead at Indy, got throttled by the Saints, and caved in against the Dolphins. In retrospect, no stretch of the season better encapsulated New England’s problems during the 2009 football season characterized by breakdowns on offense, defense, and the coaching staff.

Nobody here needs to relive those games, though all three had something in common. From Peyton Manning to Drew Brees to Chad Henne, the Pats could not stop the opposing quarterback, proving utterly defenseless against capable passing attacks.

The NFL has completely changed, folks. If we needed it to, the weekend offered further proof. The teams with the better running games and defenses got bounced by the clubs with Arena League mentalities, the Colts and Saints emerging as both symbols of dominance – both were No. 1 seeds – as well as the NFL’s complete metamorphosis into what might as well be known as the Devo era. Who needs a running game? Whip it good.

In the games against the Colts, Saints and Dolphins this year, the Pats went 0-3 while allowing 95 points. Combined, Manning, Brees and Henne – which one of those doesn’t belong? – went 75 for 119 (63 percent) for 1,033 yards, 11 touchdowns, and 3 interceptions. That translates into an average of 344.3 yards and 3.7 passing touchdowns per game, numbers that would produce a whopping 5,509 yards and an absurd 59 touchdown passes over the course of a full season.

All of that only further highlights the Pats’ complete inability to defend the pass – they weren’t just bad, they were historically bad – when even moderately capable teams committed to throwing against them. If the Pats are to reclaim their place at or near the top of the NFL hierarchy, they must dramatically improve their abilities in the passing game on both sides of the ball -- but especially on defense.

With regard to this particular aspect, one can’t help but feel that the Pats have been, at best, inconsistent in their approach. Three years ago at this time, the Pats were coming off a historic loss at Indianapolis in the AFC Championship Game. New England’s answer was to go out and load up on wide receivers, adding Randy Moss, Wes Welker and Donte' Stallworth to the offense. The result was an 18-0 season that ultimately crash landed in the desert in Super Bowl XLII, the nearest of near misses that might have forever altered our thinking.

Here’s the problem: while the Pats have completely sold out to become a passing team on offense, their defense remains focused on stopping the run first. Over the last two years, the absence of a pass rush has been easily the team’s greatest weakness. Anyone who thinks the Pats’ greatest need is anything other than an elite pass rusher didn’t pay attention over the weekend and certainly didn’t pay attention to the 22-day span during the regular season against the Colts, Saints and Dolphins.

When you get right down to it, here’s the only thing the Colts and Saints have over the Patriots on defense: pass rushers. The Colts have both Dwight Freeney and Robert Mathis, the latter of whom was a thorn in New England’s side during the meeting between the clubs this season. And two months after rattling Tom Brady with three- and four-man rushes (in front of a makeshift defensive backfield), the Saints yesterday repeatedly had Brett Favre throwing from his heels, right up until he made a fatal mistake.

NFL experts may not regard the Saints and Colts as truly elite defenses, but that is missing the point. Defensively, the Saints and Colts force mistakes by bringing pressure.

As for the Pats, they traded away their two best pass rushers from recent years – Mike Vrabel and Richard Seymour. Unsurprisingly, the large majority of their victories this season came against clubs with no better than an average passing attack. Anytime the Pats faced a team with an average passing attack or better, they proved utterly incapable of forcing mistakes. In retrospect, the playmaking ability (or lack thereof) of the Patriots defense probably had more to do with their inability to force the issue than it did with any personnel deficiencies in their secondary.

As we all know, offense in the NFL now runs through the quarterback more than ever before. Rules changes have helped open the door for rookies like Pierre Garcon and Austin Collie to become central figures on a Super Bowl team. The best way to neutralize such receivers is to get to the quarterback, which makes pass protection and pass rushing the most valuable skills in the game.

The Pats generally did the former this year – at least most of the time - but they were positively wretched when it came to doing the latter.

Assuming you can get past any visceral reaction, enjoy this weekend’s AFC Championship Game. Celebrate it. However much it may pain you to watch two of the Patriots’ chief rivals play for the right to go to the Super Bowl, the football gods are granting you a look at the future.

On Sunday, you get to see what you must beat.

At the risk of urging you to root for the Colts or Jets – we all know how well that went over during the baseball season – the simple truth is that you have no choice this week but to root for our football equivalent to the New York Yankees. Maybe that’s the Colts. Maybe that’s the Jets. Regardless, someone detestable to most Pats fans is going to be hoisting the Lamar Hunt Trophy as champion of the AFC, thereby possessing the right to play in the Super Bowl.

Along the way, Patriots fans will get to see the best the Colts and Jets have to offer, specifically in the forms of Peyton Manning and Darrelle Revis, the former who is the NFL Most Valuable Player and the latter of whom should have been the NFL Defensive Player of the Year.

Let’s start with Manning, who already has wrought his share of havoc on the Patriots in the last four seasons. The Indianapolis comeback in the AFC title game three years ago inflicted such trauma on New England that the Patriots went schizophrenic on us and created a new personality. Out went the Pats of old and in came the high-flying antics of Randy Moss and the New England passing game, which produced a perfect 18-0 record until the February 2008 razing in Arizona.

As we all know, the Pats haven’t been the same since and they haven’t beaten the Colts since, either. After going for it on fourth-and-2 earlier this season, Pats coach Bill Belichick cited the AFC championship loss in defending his decision. In that game, Belichick said, the Pats punted the ball away and Manning beat them. In this game, they went for it and Manning beat them. As such, you couldn’t help but the get feeling that Belichick has given up entirely in trying to stop Manning and has elected to try beating the Colts at their own their own game.

Of course, the Patriots of old never would have chosen such a path.

If you already knew all of that – and you undoubtedly do – here is now the flipside: the Jets may have the closest antidote to Manning when it comes to defending the passing game. The 24-year-old Revis is the consummate shutdown cornerback in a league where the term "pass defense’’ has become an oxymoron, which has only made him all the more valuable.

Example: In the last four games against the Jets and Revis, Pats receiver Randy Moss has 14 catches for 106 yards, an average of 3.5 catches and 26.5 yards per game. And while the Pats throttled the Jets in Foxborough during the regular season, they did so largely behind a brilliant 15-catch, 192-yard performance by Wes Welker, who has since suffered a major knee injury. Quite simply, Revis changes the game, and the Pats of 2010 may not have an answer for him given the uncertainty over Welker’s future.

So there you have it. On the one hand, a deteriorated Patriots defense still has Peyton Manning to contend with for years to come, largely because the road to the Super Bowl still goes through Indianapolis. On the other, the road through the AFC East now includes at least a stop in New York, where the Jets have built a relatively young, tenacious defense around a cornerback who could be around a while. If you’re the Pats, you now have to find ways to account for both of those things – Manning and Revis, the best passing offense and the best passing defense in the AFC – if you want to reclaim superiority in the conference, let alone the league.

Maybe that means finding better players in the secondary to combat the Indy passing attack. Maybe it means finding a pass rusher. Maybe it means rebuilding your wide receiving corps with more versatile receivers than Moss to combat the Jets passing attack. Maybe it means a better running game. Maybe it means all of the above because the combination of the Colts and Jets will require the Pats to be far more like the balanced teams of the early 2000s who could play any team in any style of game and win.

As we all know, no team better demonstrated that the 2004 Patriots, who shut down the Colts in the divisional playoffs, 20-3, before going to Pittsburgh and lighting up the defensive-oriented Steelers in a 41-27 affair that was far more lopsided than the score suggests.

Three years ago at roughly this time, after losing the AFC title game to the Colts, the Pats had one of their more aggressive offseasons ever, adding Moss, Welker and Adalius Thomas, the latter of whom was supposed to be an answer for Dallas Clark. Thomas never turned out as advertised. This Sunday, the new challenges for the Pats will be on full display, from Manning to Revis, covering the entire spectrum of offense to defense.

And right now, the Patriots don’t have an answer for one, let alone both.

So OPS and run production have given way to UZR and defense, raising the question of whether the Red Sox are better or worse. But look at the bright side. Baseball in Boston just got interesting again.

The rest of the sports world is preparing for the AFC and NFC championship games this weekend, but here in New England we already rest in the wasteland of deep winter. Truth be told, the next truly meaningful game played by a Boston sports team will not take place until spring, when baseball begins anew and the NHL beginsits postseason. This is the problem when every pro team in town begins its year with championship goals.

Here and now – from the Patriots and Red Sox to the Celtics and Bruins – making the playoffs is not fulfilling enough anymore. We know too much. We treat the playoffs like a forgone conclusion and save for those all-important 16 Sundays from September through December, the regular season has been all but completely devalued.

All of this brings us to the Red Sox, who have undergone significant change since we saw them implode against the Los Angeles Angels at Fenway Park in October. Spring training is now less than a month away. The Red Sox have brought in John Lackey, Marco Scutaro, Adrian Beltre and Mike Cameron, among others, and there are now more questions about the team than there have been since the spring of 2007.

Can they win it all? That is hardly a question we need to answer now. (But if you're asking for snapshot evaluation, the temporary answer is no.) Still, general manager Theo Epstein has shown both a willingness and proficiency to improve the Red Sox during the season, and if the last 10 years in Boston sports have taught us anything, it is this: It's not how you start. It's how you finish.

That said, purely with regard with entertainment value, let's be honest. The Red Sox were starting to get a little stale. Save for the Manny Ramirez/Jason Bay exchange – a decision based on business as much as (or more than) anything else – the Sox effectively have played the last three seasons with the same nucleus that Epstein built during the winter of 2006-07. That team won a title right out of the gate. Television ratings have since spun back as surely as the Sox have regressed, suggesting some level of complacency – with the Red Sox, it is all relative, of course – that did not previously exist.

Translation: The Sox needed to shake things up a little. Most of us would have preferred to see them do that by keeping Bay or replacing him with Matt Holliday while adding Lackey and someone like Adrian Gonzalez, but Epstein has months to keep adding pieces. Nobody ever said the renovations had to be done by March.

So what do we have here? Good question. This is all going to take some time to evaluate, which is at least a small part of the beauty. We have a reason to watch again. A year ago at this time, there wasn't a person on the planet who could have predicted that the Red Sox would take the field in early 2010 with Lackey pitching to Victor Martinez, backed up by Scutaro, Beltre, and Cameron. In the last six months, the Red Sox have ripped out the spinal cord of their defense as thoroughly as the Patriots have, bringing in a new catcher, shortstop, and center fielder, not to mention a front-end starter.

Again, let's take a moment to acknowledge that recent Red Sox success has spoiled us. In the last seven years, the Sox have made six playoff appearances and been to four American League Championship Series while winning two world titles. Last year, the season didn't even really start until the trading deadline. The Red Sox (and most all of us) were so confident in their ability to contend that John Smoltz was signed almost exclusively for the stretch run, regardless of whether the move panned out.

The point is that come September and October, we expected the Red Sox to be there. And they were.

Last week, for those who put stock in such things, an estimated 500 attended the annual Boston Baseball Writers dinner, an event that might have drawn a crowd nearly three times that size as recently as five years ago. For all intents and purposes, Boston has not seen that kind of offseason apathy since the major league work stoppage of 1994-95. Lest anyone think the drop was all related to "the economy," most anyone here would tell you that the Red Sox are recession-proof.

Several years ago, when John Henry, Tom Werner, and Larry Lucchino took over the Red Sox, they assured us that change was good. With regard to the 2010 season, there is still no way to know whether the Red Sox have changed for the better – and some of us have our doubts – but the proof, as always, will be in the product.

At least now we get the adventure of finding out exactly what that is.

Another year, another arbitration season, another debate concerning Jonathan Papelbon. And as the Red Sox creep nearer and nearer the seeming end of the relationship with their fearsome closer, a question remains.

Are they doing the right thing?

Roughly a month before the start of spring training, the Red Sox and Papelbon are due to exchange arbitration figures today.  (Editor's note: Papelbon and the Sox reached agreement on a one-year, $9.35 million deal Tuesday afternoon). In and of itself, that is neither a bad nor especially newsworthy thing. When all is said and done, arbitration really isn't much different than any other negotiation with a player who lacks the service time to file for free agency. Papelbon can't go anywhere until after the 2011 season, and the sides are merely leveraging over what his salary will be for the coming year.

The only difference is that the team does not get the right to decide (or "renew") in the absence of an agreement. The case goes before a third party and the player has as much say as the team does.

So is Papelbon worth $10 million? $11 million? $12 million? That is certainly open to debate. Regardless, for a Red Sox club that just gave 37-year-old Mike Cameron roughly $8 million a year and Marco Scutaro more than $6 million per season, does Papelbon's final number really matter?

So Papelbon might set a record for arbitration. So the Sox might end up with a $179 million
payroll under the luxury tax formula instead of a $177 million formula. Whoopee.

He's going to get a lot of money and he still won't be eligible for free agency until the fall of 2011.

The greater and more important questions here concern Papelbon's value to the Red Sox over the last four full seasons and whether the club will miss him if and when he leaves. This is where the Red Sox have a far more difficult decision than anyone might be willing to acknowledge.

We all know how the Sox have approached their closer situation during the era of John Henry, Tom Werner, Larry Lucchino, and Theo Epstein. First, Sox officials came in preaching the benefit of the famed "closer-by-committee," an approach that blew up like a trick cigar. In Epstein's first season as general manager, the Sox signed Mike Timlin and Ramiro Mendoza before trading for Byung-Hyun Kim and Scott Williamson - and they still needed Derek Lowe to close Game 5 of the 2003 American League Division Series against the Oakland A's.

That progression begot Keith Foulke, who begot Papelbon, who brings us to where we are today. Daniel Bard is the new flavor of the month who looks like a closer-in-waiting, but there is simply no way of knowing if Bard is the next great closer in baseball. At the very least, the odds are against it.

Given the Red Sox' approach with Papelbon and his early-career history of shoulder problems, maybe it is not surprising that media and many fans are simply assuming at this point that the Sox will let Papelbon walk after the 2011 campaign. Or maybe it is. The Red Sox have been so risk-averse during most contract negotiations that they have negotiated "protection" (or tried to) in recent deals involving J.D. Drew, John Lackey and Jason Bay, among others.

If the player hasn't been darned-near perfect - Mark Teixeira, for example - the Sox recently have seemed unwilling to extend themselves despite one of the greatest revenue streams in baseball. They stopped short on Teixeira. They stopped short on Bay. And their offense now will suffer as a result of it.

Let's not underestimate what Papelbon has meant to the operation here. Since Papelbon became the full-time closer in 2006, the Red Sox rank fourth in the American League in save percentage, behind only the Angels, Yankees and Twins. Generally speaking, those teams have employed Francisco Rodriguez, Mariano Rivera and Joe Nathan as their closers during that span. Along with the Sox, those teams also rank in the top four in the AL in overall winning percentage during that span.

Do we really need to debate the cause and effect of that? In any sport, it's one thing to have a roster that will get you leads. It's another to close them out, something that is becoming particularly evident in the wake of a Patriots season where the team simply could not close. (The Bruins have had some difficulty with this of late, too.)

At the risk of introducing a topic nobody wants to consider here, here goes: what if Daniel Bard takes a major step back this year? What is he repeats some of the late-game failures he demonstrated in 2009, be it at Tampa or New York?

Great closers don't grow on trees. Someone like David Aardsma might be able to come in off the street and have a terrific year, but the overwhelming odds are that he will not be able to repeat it. As a result, using Aardsma (or anyone even remotely like him) as some sort of barometer for the success and longevity of closers is utterly ridiculous.

At the moment, the Red Sox are under no obligation to give Papelbon a long-term deal. In that way, they would be wise to use the clock to their advantage. But if Papelbon is still performing at a high level in 18 months - the summer of 2011 - letting him go could be a colossal mistake, especially if the Red Sox do not have a clear cut replacement in waiting.

There is simply no way of knowing what Bard will be by then, but it will be impossible to overlook what Jonathan Papelbon has been.

So now we have learned that Daisuke Matsuzaka had a groin injury, which makes perfect sense. This explains why Matsuzaka opened the season last year with a cotton-candy fastball, which is what you get when you look like you’ve spent the offseason eating nothing but bonbons.

The good news? At least now we know that Matsuzaka wasn’t lazy or complacent, unless this was all some well-orchestrated cover-up to minimize embarrassment. With Matsuzaka, who can tell anymore? But if Matsuzaka was indeed hurt, it just would have been nice if the Red Sox knew that long before he went out and threw batting practice in his first eight starts of the season, during which the Red Sox went 2-6 and Matsuzaka averaged just over four innings per start.

Instead, Matsuzaka lost games and taxed the bullpen, meaning that he put the next day’s game in jeopardy, too.

"I think the one thing that we strive to do, and go to great lengths, is to put a player in the best position possible to have success," Red Sox pitching coach John Farrell told reporters prior to the annual Boston Baseball Writers dinner last night. "And that takes an openness on all parts to accomplish that."

In sports, we often focus on the physical feats more than the mental ones. But frequently, the latter opens the door for the former. Unquestionably, Matsuzaka is a proud, competitive and mentally tough man unafraid of either responsibility or the big stage. In this case, the backlash was that he made a foolish decision that put both him and, perhaps more importantly, his team at risk, something that is hard to defend.

Yes, we all praise athletes for playing hurt. But baseball is different. More than any other sport, the big picture has to drive the decision making. There is a very big difference between an injured Josh Beckett taking the mound in October and an injured Matsuzaka taking the mound in April or May. With Beckett in October 2008, the Red Sox had little choice but to try. They did not have the luxury of time.

For clarity’s sake, let’s also make a distinction. There is a difference between playing hurt and being injured, though that admittedly can be a fine line. No manager wants to enter a critical weekend series with a bunch of cream puffs who can’t play because their hair hurts.

Matsuzaka? He didn’t merely take the mound with a groin injury he suffered while training last January, at least according to a recent published report in Japan. (Have the Red Sox started subscribing to all the Japanese media outlets yet?) He lied about it, too. Groin injuries can be particularly troublesome and debilitating for pitchers for obvious reasons – their performance is based largely on leg drive – and anyone who doesn’t believe that might consider having a conversation with someone like Dustin Hermanson, who hurt his groin in early 2002 and effectively had his whole season wiped out.

Come to think of it, the same thing basically happened to Matsuzaka last year.

Yesterday, Farrell said that he believes communication between the Red Sox and Matsuzaka has improved since early last year, though club officials have acknowledged that they did not know about Matsuzaka’s groin problem until the recent scoop in Japan. Matsuzaka still seems to communicate more with the Japanese media than he does with the Red Sox, which is probably inevitable to a large degree. Matsuzaka’s relationships in Japan were forged long before the Red Sox ever entered the picture, so some communication gap was bound to exist and remain.

Still, that doesn’t excuse the absence of communication with the Sox on matters that affect them, which is really what this is all about. By all accounts, the Matsuzaka of early 2010 is mile ahead of the Matsuzaka of 2009, and neither he nor the Red Sox have the World Baseball Classic to worry about. Matsuzaka has a great deal to prove to everyone this year – himself, the Red Sox, his country – because last season was an absolute train wreck for him, save for four relatively meaningless starts in September.

In the end, what makes all of this so frustrating for the Red Sox (and everyone else) is not merely the $103.11 million the Sox have invested in Matsuzaka. It is the fact that he is capable of giving them something reasonably close to their money’s worth. As much as Matsuzaka has been a high-wire act during his Sox career, they went 40-21 in his 61 starts during the 2007-08 seasons. That kind of success would translate into 106 victories over a 162-game schedule. The Red Sox of 2010 could be far less potent offensively than the Sox of those seasons, which means Matsuzaka will have to be just as effective, if not more so, this year.

In order for that to happen, doesn’t he have to be on the level with his bosses?

Count these among the things we may never know: Did Patriots coach Bill Belichick get any resistance on fourth-and-2? Does he get challenged by defensive coordinator Dean Pees? Do the assistant coaches of the Patriots challenge their boss or do they merely execute what he prefers?

For all of the things that bogged down the Patriots this season, perhaps the most unexpected was this: the coaching. The Pats made curious decisions in some games and seemed alarmingly disorganized during others. Prior to fourth-and-2 in Indianapolis, for example, the Pats took timeouts before first down and fourth following a change in possession, the most obvious example of a breakdown in communication, decision-making or both.

And we have yet to even mention the simplistic approach of their play-calling, in which the Pats seemed to use a connect-the-dots mentality: 12-to-83, 12-to-81. Or bust.

All of this brings us to the dynamic between Belichick and his assistants, something addressed between the coach and reporters during the following exchange at Belichick's postmortem press conference on Monday.

Reporter: "This is kind of a hard one, but a lot of the guys that are on your staff now - as talented as they may be - weren't on your staff before you were Bill Belichick, three-time Super Bowl Champion. I wonder if there isn't a level of awe that they may feel to be on your staff, whereas Josh McDaniels, Tom Dimitroff, Scott Pioli, Charlie Weis - you all came up together. What I'm driving at is are you getting enough pushback from the guys on your staff? Do you know what I mean?"

Belichick: "Yeah, absolutely. And I've talked to other coaches about that - coaches that are pretty well established, and I get the nature of your question. There's definitely Romeo [Crennel] or Charlie [Weis] or somebody - they wouldn't really be afraid to at times say, 'What are you doing? Are you serious? Are you seriously considering that?' And then there is certainly another level of coach that at that time or at this time, they just wouldn't say that to me. And I mean, I understand that and that's ... and I was like that.

"There was a point in time where I was like that, where I would never say to - whether it was coach [Ted] Marchibroda or Red Miller or whoever - I wouldn't. And then there was a point in time where I would, whether it was Bill [Parcells] or - mostly Bill. There's a point in time where you reach a point or you have a relationship and you feel more comfortable saying things that you just wouldn't have said - even with that [same] guy, a few years earlier. I definitely get where you're at on that and I mean, I understand that.

"We try to have an open communication, an open forum on some things, and some things aren't open. Some things are, 'This is the way they're going to be.' But I understand what you're getting at and I think that's something, as a head coach, you have to be conscious of and I am. I'm not saying I do a great job of it. I don't know whether I do or not, but I'm definitely conscious of that and I get what you're saying there."

The turnover on the Patriots coaching staff has been cited before, of course, but the ripple effects may be greater than any of us could possibly know. The Patriots have not won a Super Bowl since longtime Belichick loyalists Weis and Crennel left the team following the 2004 season (and a victory in the 2005 Super Bowl), which may be a coincidence as much as anything else. Or maybe it isn't. In the case of the Patriots offense, Weis eventually was replaced by Josh McDaniels, who did not truly blossom until his third year on the job. Crennel gave way to Eric Mangini, who gave way to Dean Pees.

Now, Crennel and Weis are in Kansas City, McDaniels is in Denver, Mangini is in Cleveland, where he lured former Pats special teams coach Brad Seely. Belichick's most valuable coaching methods and secrets are now scattered around the NFL, all while the Patriots routinely have been thrust into a state of transition. One coach seemingly has led to the next, creating the kind of instability (on multiple levels) that can eat at an organization from the inside out.

None of this is anybody's fault, but it has indisputably made Belichick's life more difficult. Even player personnel man Scott Pioli, a true disciple of Belichick and Parcells, has moved out of the house. In sports, as in any other walk of life, the best and healthiest relationships are forged over time, and there is simply no way to speed up the process. Undoubtedly, that is a big reason Belichick generally has seemed to believe in hiring from within, taking advantage of whatever time and trust he has built with his staff.

Still, when Belichick elected to go for it on fourth-and-2, did anyone give him any resistance? Would someone like quarterbacks coach Bill O'Brien even feel empowered to do so at this stage? Maybe someone like Weis might have advised Belichick to punt and maybe he wouldn't have. There is no way of knowing for sure if Belichick would have overruled just the same. But the important thing is that the Pats would have gone through a process that, in many ways, is more important than the actual decision itself, independent of the outcome.

For all of Belichick's critics, two things about him should never be questioned: his ability and his desire to win. Most everything he does is dictated by the latter. Belichick would be among the first to tell you that a healthy exchange between coaches and decision-makers is vital to any process, and Michael Holley's "Patriot Reign" as well as David Halberstam's "Education of a Coach" certainly paint the picture of a man who is thorough and detailed. When it comes to football, particularly, Belichick seems entirely open to other opinions and ideas -- assuming they are coming from someone he trusts.

But now, as the Patriots stand at what seems to be a critical crossroads in their history, the following question is nestled among the many:

How long does it take to build something like that?

Bill Belichick slumped his way to the podium at 4:17 p.m. and moped his way off at 4:23, a fitting conclusion yesterday on the day the dynasty died. Belichick’s team lasted all of five minutes against the Baltimore Ravens. The coach survived six. Then Belichick disappeared through a back door at Gillette Stadium, presumably on his way back to the drawing board.

Here’s the problem with having complete control, be it of the football operation or any other: at times like this, there is simply nowhere to hide. The buck stops with Bill. In the end, the 2009 Patriots looked a lot like the 2009 Red Sox, capable of beating the bad teams and often getting exposed by the good ones. Belichick built this team and coached it, meaning he was ultimately responsible for everything from the personnel decisions to the game decisions, many of which went terribly wrong in this most humbling Patriots campaign since Belichick’s first in New England.

This time, this is not about Belichick being arrogant, uncompromising or uncooperative with the fans, media, ownership, players or anyone else. None of that really matters at all and the truth is that it never did. This is purely about football now, about a Patriots team that has deteriorated over the last two seasons, about a 2009 club that started out badly before going from better to worse, about a series of decisions that delivered the Patriots from the pinnacle of professional sports to the here and now.

"I think we obviously have a long way to go this offseason as a team," quarterback Tom Brady said yesterday in the most succinct evaluation of the Pats offered after the 33-14 face-bashing at the hands of the Ravens. "Playing the way we played today, we’re not going to beat anybody, [much] less a good football team. It was kind of just the way the season went."

Indeed it was. And so for the first time in a long time, the Patriots enter an offseason with more questions than solutions, largely as the result of decision-making that failed to address some problems and created others.

Yesterday, while the Ravens were manhandling the line of scrimmage and turning the Pats into road pizza, the holes were glaring. The inside linebackers of the New England defense (Jerod Mayo and Gary Guyton) were run over and tossed around. There was no pass rush to speak of. Sam Aiken had one catch for five yards on a day when the second-most dangerous receiver in the New England offense was a seventh-round pick (Julian Edelman) who played quarterback at Kent State last year. On three separate third-and-short rushes in the second quarter, the Ravens successfully ran over the right side of the Patriots' defensive line, a spot once occupied by Richard Seymour, traded away for a draft pick that won’t help the Pats until at least 2011.

That last issue became such a concern, in fact, that the Pats moved Vince Wilfork to right end at the start of the second half, asking the man in the middle of the Patriots' defense to replace another (Seymour) who might have been playing alongside him.

All of this brings us back to Belichick, whose problems, in retrospect, began to intensify at the 2009 draft. Possessors of the 23^d overall pick, the Pats traded down to No. 26 and, ultimately, out of the first round. They needlessly included Mike Vrabel in a trade with Matt Cassel to Kansas City for the 34^th pick, a move that only grew in peculiarity when the Pats subsequently sent two draft picks to the Oakland Raiders for Derrick Burgess to effectively replace Vrabel. (Burgess played sparingly yesterday and had one tackle against the run-focused Ravens, a curious development after Belichick praised Burgess’ run-stopping abilities last week.) In the draft, the Pats passed on a pair of highly-touted Southern Cal linebackers (Clay Matthews and Rey Maualuga) either of whom they might have had instead of, say, Ron Brace, which might have left Matthews or Maualuga alongside Mayo yesterday instead of the undersized Guyton.

Beyond the draft, the picture got only more muddied. Seymour was dealt while Wilfork remained unsigned, all as Belichick traded for Greg Lewis (cut during training camp) and signed Joey Galloway (cut during the season) to fill out his receiving corps. Shawn Springs was signed to a three-year contract and spent much of the season as a healthy inactive, adding to a series of moves that made it appear as if Belichick were playing either musical chairs or pin-the-tail-on-the-donkey.

As for the first-round pick the Pats got for Seymour – assuming the team actually uses it – remember that Brady will have turned 34 before the Pats begin to reap any benefits from that selection. By then, the Patriots may have an entirely new set of problems – or additional ones to go along with the ones they possess.

And then there is this: if, indeed, this was (dare we use the term) a bridge year, then why did Belichick go for it on fourth-and-2 at Indianapolis and against on fourth down at Miami? (In the latter case, he might have kicked a chip-shot field goal.) If the Pats were truly planning for the long-term, wouldn’t it have made more sense to entrust the Pats' defense with some responsibility in hopes of enduring the growing pains now more than later?

Then, at least, we might have had more reason to believe there was a long-term plan or a process.

Yesterday, at that one point in the game when the Patriots might have had a chance to play their way back in, the simplest truth is that the Pats could not stop the Ravens in short yardage. With Baltimore holding a 24-7 lead in the second quarter, the Ravens faced a third-and-1 at their own 49-yard line. The Ravens ran to their offensive left – the defensive right of the Patriots once occupied by Seymour – and converted a first down before quarterback Joe Flacco followed with an interception. The Patriots subsequently stalled on two possessions, the latter ending with a punt from the Baltimore 36-yard-line in hopes of pinning the Ravens deep in their own end.

On the game’s next possession, the Ravens twice faced third-down situations deep in their own end. A punt would have given the Pats the chance to score before the end of the half, a particularly appealing development given that New England was due to open the third quarter with the ball. The Ravens subsequently converted both plays with runs to the left side of their offensive line, again exploiting a hole that Belichick himself created by trading Seymour before the 2009 Pats season officially began.

And so, when the Patriots defense took the field for the second half yesterday, Mike Wright was at nose tackle and Wilfork was at right defensive end, the 2009 Patriots season ending exactly as it began.

With Bill Belichick trying to cover up his own mistakes.

The coach and the quarterback. Truth be told, were it not for the simple presence of those two men, many of us would not be giving the Patriots any chance at all this postseason.

But when Bill Belichick and Tom Brady are involved – and they forever will be joined at the hip in any recollection of this Patriots era – to dismiss them would be illogical, foolish, and downright reckless. For all of the debate that has existed over the last several years – Belichick or Brady? Brady or Belichick? – we all know that the success of the Patriots largely has been built on the fusion of coach and quarterback, just as it was in Pittsburgh (1970s), San Francisco (1980s,) or Dallas (1990s).

Now, as the Patriots enter their seventh postseason in nine years since Brady became the starter in 2001, the coach and quarterback are pretty much all they have.

"He's had a tremendous year. I think we all know that," Belichick said of Brady earlier this week after learning that Brady was named Comeback Player of the Year. "Tom just brings so much to this team and our organization on and off the field: his preparation, his leadership, his performance, his unselfishness. All the things that he gives us are just top shelf, whether he did or didn’t play last year. The fact that he didn’t I guess qualifies him for this award, but he brings those things on a daily basis and they’re exceptional."

Generally speaking, the same is true of Belichick. And yet the question remains:

Is that enough to get the Pats a fourth Vince Lombardi Trophy?

Objectively speaking, this has not been Belichick’s best season in New England. Rather, it has been one of his worst. Belichick made some shaky fourth down decisions in a pair of one-point losses – one at Indianapolis, the other at Miami – and there have been more questionable personnel decisions than during perhaps his entire previous career in New England. Richard Seymour. Mike Vrabel. Joey Galloway. Ron Brace. The Pats lost four meaningful games by a combined 12 points, frequently spending the final minutes looking like they were stumbling around in the dark in search of the light switch.

While drunk.

As for Brady, only heaven knows what he has been through this season. A year ago at roughly this time, there were media reports that Brady already was behind schedule in his recovery from reconstructive knee surgery. He has played this season with, according to various reports, a broken finger on his throwing hand, three broken ribs, and a sore shoulder. Brady’s numbers suggest he struggled in the most critical moments – his fourth-quarter rating this year is 75.9 – though he posted better numbers this season than he did in any other year but the record-breaking campaign of 2007.

Meanwhile, the Patriots have operated with no viable threat at the third wide receiver position, a transitional defense (to say the least) and offensive play-calling that sometimes made us wonder if they were playing pickup hoops.

Along the way, from Boston to Baja, the questions were asked: is Brady the same guy? Does Belichick still have his touch? Do the Patriots have the necessary talent to compete with Indianapolis, New Orleans, San Diego, and New Orleans?

The answers were obvious.

No, no, and no.

And yet, here we are on the verge of the playoffs, and the greatest hopes of all Patriots followers rest on the coach and the quarterback. Together, Belichick and Brady are 14-3 in their postseason career. They are 8-0 in Foxborough. For all intents and purposes, Belichick and Brady are the only true link these Patriots have to the Patriots from the fall of 2001 through January 2005, a group that won three Super Bowls in four seasons and established itself as the preeminent franchise in sports. With the exception of perhaps Kevin Faulk, the rest of the Pats have been turned over and shaken about, from the punters to the kickers to the touchdown makers.

Let’s be honest, folks. The Patriots are who they are, not who they were. At this stage, that might be true of even the quarterback and coach. The greatest dynasties in history all came to an end at some point, leaving reality and perception to inevitably clash.

"Tom does everything pretty well. He's smart. He's well-prepared. He can handle all elements of the game: the running game, the passing game, play-action, third down," Belichick said of his quarterback this week. "He’s a very experienced quarterback. He's got good talent, good skill and he’s done it."

There you go.

He’s done it.

Thanks to the coach and quarterback of the Patriots, that is pretty much what we cling to now.

The hope is that this means they can do it again.

In the simplest terms, with regard to the starting lineup of the 2010 Boston Red Sox, the impact seems obvious. Adrian Beltre is in. Casey Kotchman is out. So continues Theo Epstein’s winter construction of the Golden Glove Bridge.

Whether or not you like Adrian Beltre, you’re missing the point. He’s better than Kotchman. In the long term, the investment is minimal. At the very least, the Red Sox have added defense and more power to a lineup that badly needed some of the latter, though the ramifications of the Beltre signing could affect the Sox on multiple levels, beginning with:

Mike Lowell and David Ortiz. Clearly, the Red Sox don’t feel Lowell can play the field anymore. Whether the Sox elect to utilize Lowell as a designated hitter remains to be seen – either full-time or against left-handed pitching - particularly as Lowell recovers from what seems like minor thumb surgery. And given that the Sox were prepared to eat $9 million of the remaining $12 million on Lowell’s contract to trade him for Max Ramirez, there is the possibility that the club will dispose of Lowell again (by trade or otherwise) before the start of the season.

Beyond that, here is something to consider: Lowell might be a better full-time option at DH over Ortiz, assuming he can stay healthy. Last year, Lowell had an .867 OPS against lefthanders while Ortiz posted one of .716. The difference against righthanders was not nearly as great as one might have thought - .828 for Ortiz, .784 for Lowell – which cannot help but make one wonder if Ortiz could be competing for a job in spring training.

Of course, if Ortiz hits righthanders like he did in the latter stages of 2009 – he had a .946 OPS against beginning June 1 – then the Sox might have to give serious consideration to a platoon. That could put a great deal of pressure on manager Terry Francona to appease a pair of proud veteran players who generally are accustomed to playing everyday.

The defense. With Beltre in the starting lineup over Kotchman, the Red Sox will feature one of the best defensive infields in their history - assuming newcomer Marco Scutaro grades out as the Sox project. Keeping Youkilis at first base gives the Sox recent Gold Glove winners at first (Youkilis, 2007), second (Dustin Pedroia, 2008), and third (Beltre, 2007-08), which takes the philosophy of pitching-and-defense to new levels. Add in center fielder Mike Cameron (`01, `03, `06), and the Sox could boast seven Gold Gloves in their starting lineup on a nightly basis.

Furthermore, Jacoby Ellsbury should score quite well defensively in left field. And we all know that J.D. Drew can handle right.

Ah, but only if the Sox still had an elite defensive catcher.

The lineup. Given his propensity to swing – over the last five years, he ranks among the 15 most impatient hitters in the American League based on percentage of pitches taken – Beltre hardly seems to fit with the Red Sox philosophy of patience and plate discipline. Nonetheless, Beltre posted a .277 batting average and .813 OPS away from canyonesque Safeco Field during his time with the Mariners, numbers that are eerily similar to Lowell’s career averages (.280, .810). Over the last couple of seasons, he also has annihilated lefties (a .932 OPS).

Get the picture? Factoring in defense, what the Red Sox could be getting here is a younger Mike Lowell – with better speed.

As a result, the Red Sox’ projected lineup now looks something like this, leaving room for some platooning and pinch-hitting depending on left-right matchups:

Starters
1. Jacoby Ellsbury, LF
2. Dustin Pedroia, 2B
3. Victor Martinez, C
4. Kevin Youkilis, 1B
5. Ortiz/Lowell, DH
6. J.D. Drew, RF
7. Adrian Beltre, 3B
8. Mike Cameron, CF
9. Marco Scutaro, SS

Bench
Casey Kotchman, 1B
Jed Lowrie, IF
Ortiz/Lowell, DH
Jason Varitek, C
Jeremy Hermida, LF

At the moment, one obvious problem is that the Sox have too many players (5) on their bench to accommodate a 12-man pitching staff, which has been their preference under manager Terry Francona. Unless the Sox carry just 11 pitchers, someone from the group of Lowell, Kotchman, or Ortiz will need to be trimmed from the roster.

The payroll. With the Beltre acquisition, the Sox actual cash outlay for the 2010 season currently rests in the vicinity of $160 million, rivaling the franchise-high total established in 2007. Under the formula used to calculate the luxury tax – this includes roughly $10-$11 million for benefits and uses the average annual value of all contracts – the Sox project closer to a whopping $180 million. That figure places the Sox about $10 million over the luxury tax threshold and means that the Beltre deal actually will cost the club closer to $12-$13 million (instead of $10 million) given the tax implications.

One obvious question here is whether the Beltre acquisition will affect the Sox’ financial flexibility and, thus, their ability to add players during the season. The team could save some money by executing another trade for Lowell – they would have saved $3 million in the deal with Texas - or even moving Kotchman, who is eligible for arbitration and will end up with a salary of roughly $3 million.

Also, consider this: If Kotchman ends up going to arbitration, his salary would become non–guaranteed until late in spring training.

The long term. For the Sox, one of the real beauties of the Beltre deal is that the team is committed to only one year, perhaps two, though the second season would be a bargain ($5 million) if Beltre opts to return. Regardless, the Sox are hardly crippled by this. The Red Sox love short term deals, almost independent of salary, and the fact that Beltre effectively has a one-year, $10 million contract will serve them well.

Here’s why: If Beltre has a good year and leaves, the Sox can either re-sign him or shake hands and part ways. In Beltre, Lowell, Ortiz, Varitek, Julio Lugo, and Josh Beckett alone, the Sox will have in the neighborhood of $45-$55 million to spend next winter depending on where they set their payroll, leaving them great flexibility for what projects to be a far better free agent class than this one.

As Bill Parcells long ago told us, players play. That’s what they do. In the wake of a devastating knee injury to Wes Welker, there is really no point in wondering whether Welker should have been out on the field at all yesterday when his knee buckled.

The Patriots have been through this sort of thing before and they have rallied, which is really the point. This team either will or it won’t. The 2001 Patriots won the Super Bowl after leaving Terry Glenn behind, and the 2006 Pats reached the AFC Championship Game after losing Rodney Harrison. In the case of the latter, Harrison was hurt in a relatively meaningless Week 17 affair on a crack-back block by Titans wide receiver Bobby Wade; early in the fourth quarter of that chippy affair, with the outcome in doubt, Tom Brady was pulled.

So now Welker goes down with what was essentially a non-contact injury, stripping the Patriots of a man who has indisputably been their most valuable player this season. The Pats now must find a way to derail the Baltimore Ravens without their "slot machine" –- Welker has been so dubbed by colleague Bob Ryan –- and we all know what Welker meant to a New England offense that's still on a never-ending search for its identity.

Simply put, if the Patriots lose this game, there is every chance that Welker’s absence might be a factor. But if the Patriots fail to win the Super Bowl, it will have far more to do with the structural problems of their entire football operation than it will with the breakdown of Welker’s left knee.

Decisions, decisions, decisions. Teams make them all the time in professional sports, and the ramifications are considerable. Oftentimes, one cannot help but wonder if luck is the single greatest factor in determining success. Bill Belichick could just as easily have sat Welker as he might have punted on fourth and 2, and we might all feel differently about this team right now if he had done both. There is also the very real possibility that the Patriots would be precisely where they are today, the wildest of wild cards entering the tournament.

In the end, at times like this, focusing on the consequences of any decision is pointless. Going in, we generally know what the possible outcomes were. More relevant is the predicament that led to the decision, which speaks to longer-term issues or decision making that might be questioned.

For example: Fourth and 2. Regardless of whether the Patriots succeeded or failed, the more relevant issue is that Bill Belichick got to a point where he didn’t trust his defense to make a stop. Maybe this began in the AFC Championship at Indianapolis three years ago, maybe it was magnified last season. Whatever the case, the Pats reached the point where their coach felt he could not beat the Colts by a 20-3 score, as New England did in the 2005 AFC divisional playoffs, albeit in wintry Foxborough. Back then, the idea of engaging the Colts in a shootout would have seemed preposterous.

The week after that game, the Patriots went to defensive-minded Pittsburgh and blew out the Steelers with a 41-27 victory that was hardly so close. From week to week, the Pats won with offense, with defense, with special teams, with talent and with coaching. You named the game and they beat you at it.

How does all of this pertain to Welker? If the Patriots were so reliant on him that his absence will now destroy their Super Bowl hopes – however slim they were – then they probably weren’t championship material to begin with. As such, there is simply no point in using his injury as any kind of excuse. In a sport like football, a 5-foot-9-inch, 190-pound slot receiver should not be the difference between ultimate success and failure.

For all that Welker accomplished this season, he finished with just four touchdown receptions. He did not reach the end zone, on this side of the Atlantic, after a 59-0 drubbing of the Tennessee Titans at Foxboro on Oct. 18. He scored just one touchdown this year in a true road game, that coming in a 20-17 loss at Denver.

Today, the Patriots will begin preparations for this weekend’s game against the Baltimore Ravens at Foxborough. Julian Edelman looks like the obvious choice to replace Welker in the New England offense. Including training camp, the Patriots are now roughly six months into their season, meaning they have had ample time to figure out exactly who they are and prepare for every possible situation.

At this stage, no matter who is healthy or hurt, you are either ready or not.

Final swings of the decade while getting ready to tee it up for 2010 . . .

Whatever it was that happened between the Red Sox and Jason Bay, it happened at the All-Star break. That is when the Red Sox backed out of a potential agreement over concerns about Bay’s health. And that is when Bay must have decided that he would rather take $66 million to play for the Mets than $60 million to play with the Red Sox.

I mean really, does this make any sense? Fifth-year vesting option or no vesting option, Bay would have been better off playing at Fenway Park for $60 million than at Citi Field for $66 million. And no matter what anyone says, it defies logic for the Red Sox to give five years and in excess of $80 million to a 31-year-old pitcher with a recent history of elbow/forearm issues while balking at the prospect of giving a five-year offer to a position player.

Especially when the Sox gave a five-year deal to J.D. Drew as recently as three years ago. As we all know, Drew ain’t exactly the Iron Horse.

Now, if the Red Sox have a trade lined up for Adrian Gonzalez that required them to make the Lackey deal so that they could trade away Clay Buchholz, that would make more sense.

But I’d still rather have Bay (at roughly $16 million a year) than Mike Cameron and Jeremy Hermida (at about $10.5 million combined in 2010).

By the way, in case you’re wondering about the effect of canyonesque Petco Park on Gonzalez’s career output, consider this: during his four-year career with the Padres, Gonzalez has batted .305 with a .955 OPS on the road, .264 with an .805 OPS at home. His road performance translates into averages of 42 home runs, 122 RBI and 118 runs over a 162-game schedule.

So why wouldn’t you want him at Fenway?

For the life of me, I just can’t figure out Laurence Maroney. Until his final carry at Indianapolis, Maroney had fumbled just one time in 515 career touches from the line of scrimmage. Now he has fumbled four times in his last 106 carries and receptions.

Thus, the questions remain:

Can Maroney run effectively and hold onto the ball at the same time?

And is this the football equivalent of being able to simultaneously walk and chew gum?

Of all the things I’d like to see in 2010, the Bruins winning the Stanley Cup is at the top of the list.

Actually, I take that back.

First, I’d like to see the Bruins get sniper deluxe Ilya Kovalchuk from the Thrashers.

Totally get Bobby Knight’s point about ethics in college basketball, but it’s not like he has pristine record, right?

Just throwing this out there: would you rather have your child play for Knight or John Calipari?

According to Bruins vice president Cam Neely yesterday on 98.5 The Sports Hub, the NHL will waste no time postponing the Winter Classic to Saturday in the event of inclement weather on New Year’s Day. Neely ensured that there would not be a scenario in which fans were asked to drive in to the game only to have it pushed back a day.

So the NHL and the Bruins won’t do what the Red Sox often do?

"Exactly," said the no-nonsense VP.

That’s an entirely clean hit if you ask me.

Nobody ever said Randy Moss was a bad guy. He’s just a little, er, temperamental.

Stephen Gostkowski is very underrated.

Never thought it would come to this, but it might be time to start taking bets on whether Kendrick Perkins can shoot better from the floor than Rajon Rondo can from the free throw line. Entering tonight’s game in Phoenix, Perkins has a comfortable lead, 64.8 percent to 55.4 percent.

By the way, take away Rondo and the rest of the Celtics are shooting 78.4 percent from the line.

Does anyone else think that Rasheed Wallace can finish with more technical fouls (currently 10) than Brian Scalabrine will have field goals (11)?

Some of us believe the Red Sox are better off with Mike Lowell than without him, but you still cannot help but get the feeling that the Sox will trade him away before Opening Day.

Which brings us to this: If and when Josh Beckett leaves, will we start ruing the day that the Sox traded away Hanley Ramirez? Remember: Part of the reason Theo Epstein has had a revolving door at shortstop is because the team traded away Ramirez when Epstein wasn’t looking.

Said it before and will say it again: If I’m the Pats, I want no part of the Steelers or Ravens in the first round of the playoffs.

As for anyone else, invite 'em in.

But after that, I still have my doubts that the Pats can beat anyone.

Of course, because of Tom Brady and Bill Belichick, you always have to give them a chance.

Having trouble figuring out the next step for Tiger Woods. Does he play in Hawaii and invite the media circus there? Or will that merely prolong the saga, assuming that many media folks will wait for him to return to the continent anyway?

After all, you know that he wants this all to be history by the Masters.

Biggest Boston sports story of the decade: Adam Vinatieri’s kick against the Rams or the Red Sox’ comeback against the Yankees? Discuss.

Don’t forget that Victor Martinez is currently eligible for free agency at the end of the 2010 season.

Unless or until they give out a trophy for the NFL Team of the Decade, I really couldn’t care less if the Patriots win it or not.

Come to think of it, a trophy isn’t enough. You have to have a parade, too.

Are we spoiled or what?

From Tom Brady's injured ribs to Laurence Maroney's buttery fingers to the disturbing lack of overall consistency, the problems remain. And yet, no matter what happens on Sunday in Houston, the Patriots are now just three meaningful wins from another trip to the Super Bowl.

For that, give the Patriots credit. Even division titles should not be taken for granted. In the wake of yesterday's dismantling of the Jacksonville Jaguars, the only question that matters now is whether the Pats are heading in the right direction again.

And that is certainly open to debate.

"It hasn't always been perfect, but I think that our preparation, our communication, our understanding and just playing together and playing situational football has improved, which it should," said Patriots coach Bill Belichick, who was speaking specifically of his defense but could just as easily have been speaking about his entire team. "I mean we've had over 100 practices and 15 regular season games, but those are the kind of things you get out of it."

As a result, the Patriots will be playing again in Foxboro on the weekend of Jan. 9-10, though the opponent remains unclear. Depending on where the Pats end up in the AFC hierarchy -- as the No. 3 or No. 4 seed -- and depending on who the remaining AFC playoff participants are, New England could face any one of the five following teams: the Texans, Jets, Broncos, Ravens or Steelers.

Preferences, anyone? (We'll skip the Dolphins and Jags, who are the longest of long shots to make the playoffs although it's mathematically possible next week).

The Texans. As luck would have it, Houston is the Pats' opponent in Week 17, when it might actually benefit the Pats to take a knee. For one thing, Tom Brady (and others) could benefit from a week of rest. For another, the Pats could angle themselves to be the No. 4 seed, potentially putting the team in position to play at Indianapolis (and not San Diego) in the second round of the playoffs.

Given the events of Week 10 on Sunday, Nov. 15 -- the night of fourth-and-2 -- wouldn't the Pats rather face the Colts on the road again than venture to red-hot San Diego?

Here's the problem: if the Pats lose in Week 17, they could open the door for a possible meeting with the Texans in the first round. On paper, the Texans don't look like a great matchup. Houston has the No. 2-ranked passing offense in the league and the Pats defense has been vulnerable against offenses of the like (Indy, New Orleans). The fact that the game would be played in Foxboro is a huge advantage -- the Pats lost to Indy and New Orleans indoors -- and New England should be able to throw on the Houston pass defense.

One other thing to consider: the Houston rushing attack is ranked 30th in the NFL and Belichick typically devours one-dimensional offenses. (But is this his typical defense?) Still, in the end, this looks like a desirable opponent given that the game would be played at Gillette Stadium.

The Jets. Plain and simple, with a win at home against the Bengals in Week 17, the Jets guarantee themselves a playoff spot and, perhaps, a return trip to Foxborough. That spells bad news for Randy Moss -- hello again, Darrelle Revis -- but it should be good news for a Pats team that throttled the Jets by a 31-14 score on Nov. 22 (Week 11).

The Jets are one of the better defensive teams in football -- they have allowed an NFL-low eight passing touchdowns - but their offense has scored a total of just 30 points in two games against the Pats this year. Rookie quarterback Mark Sanchez, who threw four interceptions at Foxborough on Nov. 22, would be making his first career postseason start. Assuming Vince Wilfork can play, the Pats will be reasonably effective at slowing the Jets' running game.

The bottom line? Under Belichick and Brady, the Pats are 14-3 in the postseason and 8-0 at Foxborough. In a playoff game, would you bet on the team with Brady at quarterback or on the team with rookie Sanchez?

The Broncos. Former Pats understudy Josh McDaniels defeated Belichick and the Pats in overtime by a 20-17 score in Week 5, but these aren't the same Broncos. Denver is 2-7 in its last nine games, a period during which the Broncos have allowed an average of roughly 24 points a game and lost to, among others, the Redskins and Raiders.

During that span, Denver's only road win is at Kansas City.

If the Broncos play to their capabilities, their pass defense could create some problems for the Patriots, thanks largely to the presence of Champ Bailey.

Still, the Pats all but spit up on themselves in the game at Denver in October, and it's hard to believe that Belichick and Brady will make the same mistakes against the same opponent in Foxborough in January. All things considered, this, too, is a favorable matchup.

The Ravens. This is purely subjective, but what we may have here is the very best 8-7 team in football. The Ravens now have a balanced offensive attack and a tough, physical defense that excels against both the pass and run. So why are they fighting to get into the playoffs? Because they fail to execute at the most critical times, a flaw evidenced yet again in yesterday's 23-20 loss at Pittsburgh.

Of Baltimore's seven defeats this year, four have been by a field goal or less. Add in a 27-21 defeat to the Patriots in October -- the Ravens were deep in New England territory when Mark Clayton dropped a fourth down pass late -- and the Ravens could easily have 10 or 11 wins. The simple truth is that you want no part of this team in January because the Ravens might be one of the more balanced teams in football.

The Steelers. The defending Super Bowl champions are still fighting for their playoff lives, but the truth is that the Steelers have more problems than they have had in some time. Two weeks ago, head coach Mike Tomlin had such little faith is his defense (sound familiar) that he ordered an onside kick with a 30-29 lead against Green Bay, a move that backfired despite an eventual 37-36 Steelers win.

Still, the Steelers know how to win. Despite the absence of a reliable running game, the passing attack could present big problems for the Patriots. Despite Tomlin's apparent feelings toward his defense, the Steelers can get to Brady and are physical enough to neutralize Moss, which creates its own set of problems.

Fine, so the Steelers aren't the same team that came in here and throttled the Pats last year. But aren't there far better matchups for the Patriots in the first round than the men of steel?

Fourteen games into the 2009 season, the voice of Bill Parcells still echoes throughout New England. And yet, as much as the Patriots are what they are, we still cannot help but wonder if they can be what they once were.

During the period defined by the union of Bill Belichick and Tom Brady, success in New England has been calibrated in only one increment: Super Bowls. The Pats have been to four (2002, 2004, 2005, 2008) and won three ('02, '04, '05); on another occasion (2007), their season ended at Indianapolis in the AFC Championship. To this point, Belichick’s nine full seasons in New England have produced six trips to the playoffs and three seasons where the Pats fell short, the most recent example of the latter coming last year after Brady was felled by a knee injury.

Barring a collapse in the final two weeks of the season, these Pats once again will be headed to the playoffs, most likely as the No. 3 or No. 4 seed. Under Belichick, no Pats club has reached the Super Bowl as anything other than a No. 1 or No. 2 seed, prompting assorted questions this week as the Pats prepare for the Jacksonville Jaguars at Foxborough.

1. What will it take for the Pats to win the Super Bowl this season?

Something close to a miracle.

At this stage, the issues are pretty well spelled out. The Pats are 7-0 at home, 1-0 at neutral sites and 1-5 on the road. They have defeated one team that currently possesses a winning record (Baltimore, 8-6). Of the Pats’ nine wins, seven have come against teams that rank in the bottom 12 of the league in passer rating, which is to say that those have below-average passing attacks.

In a nutshell: The Pats have beaten the bad teams and lost to the good ones. They have proven vulnerable against any team that can throw, especially on the road. They look like pretenders more than contenders.

Still, given the unpredictable nature of the NFL and the pedigree of the Belichick-Brady tandem – the Pats are 14-3 in the postseason with those two joined at the hip – we all know that (in theory) anything can happen.

But with this particular team at this particular point in time, that only leads to more questions.

2. Is their best chance to win by keeping the ball on the ground?

Given Brady’s history, this might sound like blasphemy. Still, in the last four games, Brady has thrown more interceptions (six) than touchdowns (four), and he has not played a single game with more TDs than picks. Much of that clearly has to do with the quarterback’s health. On Sunday against Buffalo, Brady threw fewer passes than he has in any complete game since the first week of the 2006 season.

In each of the last two weeks, albeit against Carolina and Buffalo, the Pats have run the ball more than they have thrown. If and when Fred Taylor returns to the lineup – think he’s eager to play against his former team this week? – the Pats will have greater talent and depth at running back than at any other offensive skill position. Given the weather and relative ineffectiveness of the passing game (especially on the road), maybe the Pats’ best plan for the postseason is to control the ball and keep their defense off the field.

At least until they get indoors.

Or maybe especially when they get indoors.

3. Can the defense really stop anybody when it matters?

Based on scoring, the Patriots are tied with the Cincinnati Bengals for having allowed the third-fewest points in the league. Only the New York Jets and Baltimore Ravens have allowed fewer. And yet, Belichick had such little confidence in his defense that he went for it on that infamous fourth-and-2 at Indianapolis, where the Pats all but handed the Colts the final touchdown of the game.

Do not be fooled by Sunday’s performance against the Bills, who have allowed as many sacks (44) as any team but the Green Bay Packers (49) and rank 28th in the NFL in scoring. Of the Pats’ 28 sacks this season – that number ties them for 19th in the league – a whopping 10 have come against the Bills.

Team sack leader Tully Banta-Cain has recorded five of his eight-and-a-half sacks against Buffalo.

The point? The Pats can’t get to the quarterback and don’t exactly have Darrelle Revis in their secondary. That’s a bad combination. Their only signature stop of the season came against Baltimore in Week 4, when Ravens receiver Mark Clayton dropped a pass inside the Patriots’ 10-yard line on fourth-and-4 with less than a minute to play. Take that for what it’s worth.

4. Is Stephen Gostkowski capable of being a bigger weapon?

Two weeks ago, in miserable weather against Carolina, Gostkowski made field goals made fourth-quarter kicks of 28 and 27 yards, the latter to give the Pats a 10-point lead with slightly less than four minutes to play. The performance went relatively overlooked by many given the never-ending Randy Moss saga and the array of Patriots issues, but Gostkowski was a huge weapon in the game.

When the Pats lost to Miami by a 22-21 score on Dec. 6, Gostkowski did not attempt a single field goal. In fact, with the Pats holding a 14-7 lead late in the second quarter, Belichick opted to go for it on fourth-and-1 from the Miami 6-yard line when a field goal would have given the Pats a 10-point lead. The Dolphins subsequently stopped the Pats and drove for a field goal before the end of the half, turning a potential 17-7 game into a 14-10 affair.

Last season, Gostkowski was a first-team All-Pro selection and was voted to the Pro Bowl. He has the leg to make the longer kicks. It may be time for the Pats to make their kicker a bigger part of the offense.

5. Are the coaches willing to change?

Admittedly, it is difficult to completely change course this late in the year. The Patriots entered this season as a passing team built around Brady, but their offense has been surprisingly mediocre, especially on the road. Minus the blowouts win over Tennessee and Tampa Bay – one team that quit and another that should have – the Pats have averaged 22.6 points per game in their other 12 contests this season, a number that would put them on par with the Miami Dolphins.

That said, does it make any sense to get into shootouts?

For obvious reasons, this week’s game against Jacksonville is enormous. With a win, the Pats can secure the division title and put themselves in position to at least protect Brady in Week 17. A win also would allow Belichick to use the final regular season game (at Houston) as an opportunity to measure his defense against a playoff-caliber passing attack.

Of course, if the Pats get to Week 17 needing a victory to advance to the postseason, all bets are off.

Two weeks to go, one win to clinch. And for all of the questions that have surrounded the Patriots this season, the health and performance of their quarterback now ranks chief among them.

Tom Brady and the Patriots can wrap up the AFC East championship with a victory over the Jacksonville Jaguars on Sunday, and do not underestimate the magnitude of this game. Brady clearly is banged up. A victory would give the Pats the luxury of protecting Brady in Week 17 at Houston. Barring some stunning turn of events, New England will have no chance at a bye entering the final weekend of the regular season and the Patriots will end up as either the No. 3 or No. 4 seed.

But they have to beat Jacksonville first. Pretty simple.

In the interim, it’s time to wonder about Brady’s health and effectiveness. In the last four weeks, the New England QB has four touchdown passes and six interceptions. He has not played a single game with more TDs than picks. Even at Miami, where Brady passed for 352 yards, he threw one interception in the end zone and another to effectively end the game. And yesterday he threw fewer passes in a complete game performance (23) than he has in any contest since the first week of the 2006 season.

Back then, the Patriots had no passing game amid the Deion Branch holdout. Behind the newly created tandem of veteran Corey Dillon and rookie Laurence Maroney, New England ran the ball 41 times in a 19-17 win over Bills at Foxborough. Pre-Randy Moss and pre-Wes Welker, there was much talk early that season of how the Patriots had become a running team.

The Brady of today looks far more like the Brady of 2006 than the aerial assault weapon of 2007.

"That was great news to win the game and come in the locker room and see Tennessee kick that field goal," Brady told reporters following yesterday’s win, noting that simultaneous losses by the Dolphins (to Tennessee in overtime) and Jets (to Atlanta) gave the Patriots a two-game lead in the division with two games to play. "It is a big game for us coming up this week. Not too often this team has had to go into December to get a road win. We did today and [I] didn’t think it was our best performance out there, but we won the game and that was most important."

Indeed it was. Long gone are the days where we measure the Patriots by the quality of the victory. At times like this, just winning is enough.

Clearly, Brady isn’t right. The Pats’ offensive issues aside, Brady is showing up every week on the injury report looking like Cavity Sam, the patient in the board game "Operation." Tom’s finger. Brady’s shoulder. Quarterback’s ribs. Following a 22-21 loss at Miami on Dec. 6, Brady looked so detached during his postgame press conference that you couldn’t help but wonder if he had been fed a steady diet of painkillers.

Yesterday, against a Buffalo team that has allowed more rushing yards than any team in the league, the Pats ran the ball 34 times. Brady was not sacked. Whether a result of Buffalo’s ineptitude against the run or Brady’s delicate physical state, the game plan in Week 15 served two purposes. The Pats got to exploit the Bills and protect Brady at the same time, a convergence of wants that lined up perfectly.

This week, the Pats are going to need Brady at his best against Jacksonville team cubed, diced and minced by Peyton Manning and the Colts last week. Though Jacksonville has one of the better run defenses in the NFL, the Jags are utterly inept against the pass. Jacksonville has a league-low 14 sacks, a number placed put in astonishing clarity when one considers that the Patriots (no hunters of the QB they) had six sacks yesterday against the vulnera-Bills.

Assuming the health of Brady and the interest of Randy Moss, the game plan should be obvious this week: whip it.

As for the prospect of protecting Brady in Week 17, there is precedent for that sort of thing. In 2006, with his team in a similar position – that is to say, angled for the No. 3 or No. 4 seed at best – Belichick effectively pulled Brady for the fourth quarter of a game at Tennessee with the outcome in doubt. A year earlier, with the Pats playoff standing similarly cemented, Brady played only the earliest stages of a game against Miami at Foxborough, where Matt Cassel earned the bulk of the snaps in an eventual 28-26 defeat to the Dolphins.

As this season has progressed, certain things have become self evident. The Pats aren’t nearly as good as many predicted they would be –- and on both sides of the ball. Until recently, the offense has been one-dimensional and predictable. The defense is not nearly as good as the numbers suggest. Seven of the Patriots’ nine victories have come against teams with poor passing offenses, and the team has shown an alarming absence of poise, particularly on the road.

If and when the Patriots do qualify for the playoffs, the simple truth is that most of us are not expecting much. We have seen enough to know better. And yet, at the same time, we also know that anything is possible come playoff time, when the coach and the quarterback become even more important, when the Patriots have a tandem of Belichick and Brady that will go down forever as one of the more accomplished duos in the game.

But isn’t that hope almost entirely contingent upon Tom Brady being a better far better and healthier quarterback than he has been for much of the last month?