Dr. Giganto

Well, I think a lot of people will say the Patriots were a failure this year, and they shouldn't be considered among the greatest teams of all-time.

I disagree whole-heartedly

Too many people focus on WHEN a team loses, instead of looking at their overall body of work.

You can put all the bells and whistles you want on the Super Bowl, but when it comes down to it, it's just two teams playing football, no different from opening weekend or a random mid-November game. Things aren't "different" because its the Super Bowl. It is, and always will be, a match-up of two good teams. Sometimes the better team wins, sometimes the better team loses. In this case, the better team lost, and I'm not afraid or ashamed to say it, even as a Giants fan.

Let's say, hypothetically, the Patriots had lost that Monday Night game in Baltimore and then went on to win the Super Bowl...would they be considered "greater" than the team that won that Baltimore game then lost in the Super Bowl? People would probably say that. But why? Because one game happened to have been played in November and the other was played in February? Because one game had Tom Petty playing at halftime and the other didnt? What about the fact that the Ravens were a worse team than the Giants this year, so losing to them is much worse, from a big picture perspective, than losing to a 14-6 Giants team?

When you look at the overall body of work the Patriots accomplished this year, I think they should be considered right up there with the '72 Dolphins, '85 Bears, and that 49ers team (I forget which year) that went 18-1.