FOXBORO, Mass. — It’s easy to lie…
I’ll be honest, plenty of people tried to do that as a certain reporter made his way through the crowd during the New England Patriots’ official send-off rally in advance of Super Bowl LX on Sunday.
“It’s not even that cold,” one young man could be overheard, as temperatures hovered in the single-digits but felt as if they were below zero.
“I could probably score a touchdown,” said another, standing roughly three yards away from the north end zone at Gillette Stadium.
“I believed,” said Jean Brennan from Stow, Mass.
Story continues below advertisement
Now, I don’t know if that first kid has a liquor jacket on or not, so perhaps he wasn’t that cold. I’ve also never saw the other dude’s high school highlights, so maybe he could plunge one in behind a good offensive line.
Jean, though… there’s just no way she actually thought this team was going to make it this far.
“I knew it from the day they hired (head coach Mike) Vrabel,” Brennan said after facing some doubt (from yours truly). “I watched him back 20 years ago, he was so good back then I just knew he was going to have what it takes. He knows winning.”
Story continues below advertisement
Okay, that part is true.
Vrabel has a career record of 73-51 as a head coach, and made six playoff appearances and won three Super Bowls — XXXVI, XXXVIII and XXXIX — during his playing days in New England. It’s pretty much the only thing he’s ever done, but very few believed that history of winning would lead to immediate success in a place that had fallen on extremely hard times as of late.
Story continues below advertisement
Bill Belichick, the winningest coach in franchise history and perhaps the greatest of all-time, lost his way and found himself on the outside looking in after an 8-9 finish in 2022 and a 4-13 finish in 2023. Jerod Mayo, his replacement in waiting, was an abject disaster and was ousted after finishing 4-13 in 2024.
The Patriots were a laughing stock, but then something changed — something that isn’t all that difficult to identify.
“I’d (expletive) die for Vrabes,” said Michael Primo of Hardwick, Vermont.
Story continues below advertisement
Vrabel was brought in to flip everything on its head, and that’s exactly what he did alongside vice president of football operations and strategy John Streicher, vice president of player personnel Ryan Cowden and incumbent executive vice president of player personnel Eliot Wolf.
Vrabel, Streicher, Cowden and Wolf, the contingent that has been fine sharing credit throughout this improbable run, absolutely nailed the offseason — bringing in an all-star coaching staff, hitting on free agents with unbelievable efficiency and finding rookies who could (and ultimately would) contribute immediately.
It’s about as close to perfect as you can get, and has a recently down-on-its-luck organization just one game away from turning literal dreams into reality.
Story continues below advertisement
“I thought about turning them down,” said Mike Stefanik of Mansfield, Mass., who finally obtained season tickets earlier this year after waiting for more than two decades. “I can’t believe this ride, man. I told my wife no when we got news that we were approved, she convinced me to give it a shot and now I almost took out a loan for the Super Bowl. It’s like a dream.”
It’ll remain to be seen, but no matter what the result is on Sunday at Levi’s Stadium, there’s no doubt that faith has been restored in New England.
Story continues below advertisement
The Patriots were practically giving tickets away two years ago at this time, looking to get anyone into the stadium as they dropped an awful loss to the New York Jets. 756 days later, people showed up in record low temperatures just to say thank you.
“It wasn’t fun for a while,” Stefanik said. “I didn’t think they were going to do anything — now I’ve got faith. It’s true faith, true belief, too. Thankful for this team and these experiences. Truly. I think they’re going to win the (expletive) Super Bowl.”
