Shots Heard 'Round The Web - Patriots Links 9/22/08

"It doesn't matter what a team did before. They have enough good players. If you just come out there and think you can just show up and beat someone, and they come in motivated, it isn't going to happen in this league," said defensive end Richard Seymour. "You have to be prepared, and I think they came in with a good game plan and they executed, and we really didn't have any answers for it."

THE AFTERMATH

• Can President Bush declare yesterday's carnage a disaster area?  Patriot's players offer up their reactions after the game.
• The team analyzes the sucker-punch that caught them completely off-guard.
• NFL Game Center has the stats on the good, the bad, and the ugly.
  

SHOTS TAKEN FROM CLOSE RANGE:

• Dan Shaughnessy lobbies the idea that "Belichick's genius seemed to start around the same time Brady became his quarterback."
• Everything you wanted to know about "The Wildcat" - the surprise play the Dolphins used six times to beat the Patriots.  Hmmm...Shouldn't a surprise play work only once?
• Matt Cassel's play displayed a chilling return to pre-season form.
• Maybe this game ball needs to be buried alongside the grave of the Patriots' loss to Miami in week 4 of 2001?
• Can't forget to include the customary analysis of Randy Moss's body language.  In 2006 the media kept tabs and its cameras on Brady.  Wonder who's turn it is next.
• Mike Reiss's Pieces is the place to go for post-game analysis, ups and downs, and wrapping up the loss.  Double bagged please, and toss it in the dumpster.
• Karen Guregian analyzes this stinker of a game, notes that it could just be an aberration, and focuses on Cassel and the stymied defense.
• Steve Buckley points out that Cassel showed his inexperience yesterday, but the loss can't be pinned on him.
• John Tomase reports on "embarrassing lessons", but this time he's referring to the Patriots D.

SHOTS FROM AFAR

• ESPN's Tim Graham declares "The New England Patriots as you know them, those dominant and defiant Patriots of the past few years, are dead."
• SI's Don Banks says that Cassel can't game-manage his way through the season or rally the troops from behind, there's something wrong with the D, and the Patriots miss Brady.  He's right.
• The NY Times offers a white-board video, along with written analysis of The Dolphins Formation:  How They Did It.  I'm sure a book deal is in the works as well.
• How the Wildcat Package was hatched, and other giddy, laughing, Dolphin player quotes from the South Florida Sun-Sentinal.
• Pro Football Weekly talks about Josh McDaniels, saying yesterday's game aside, "it might be premature to cast wunderkind McDaniels as a flash-in-pan coordinator."
• Yahoo! Sports discusses the Pats-Phins game in his Winners and losers column (guess which one is which?) stating the obvious that Ronnie Brown made the Pats look foolish.