Fan Pulse: Patriots fans progress through seven stages of grief

By Os Davis  |   Thursday, October 02, 2008  |  Comments( 2 )

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Waves from the traumatic injury suffered by Tom Brady in Week 1 continue to reverberate in New England Patriots Land. Always concerned for the psychological warfare of our potential readers in all 32 markets, RealFootball365.com has conducted a semi-scientific study (read: surfed the PatsFans.com forums) to inspect how the Patriot faithful are coping.

Though collectively well past the first of the seven stages of grief – stage one: shock – Pats backers are mixed in their current placement within the organic process of recovery. Below, a few case studies from our survey, categorized by progress level.

Stage two: Denial. By far the most colorful and wide-ranging of stages in the process, denial was the feeling at which an overwhelming majority of Patriots fans were in going into the Ronnie Brown freakshow. Post-Dolphins loss, a great exodus (kinda like the fans leaving Gillette Stadium throughout the fourth quarter of the Miami game) from stage two has happened, but many cannot let go of this.

Though essentially the same desire – that of seeking to avoid the inevitable – denial can assume different outward forms in a social environment such as message boarding. One can avoid the issue completely, as a forum administrator does in creating a thread musing “I think that we are going to be a shoo-in, but does anyone know the record for most wins in a decade? By my count we are at 93 regular-season wins this decade with 29 games to go. Anyone know the record?” Meanwhile, Maryjane, in responding to New England Patriots season" target="_new">another thread asking for a neat summary of the 2008 New England Patriots season, answers “Phoenix: The Matt Cassel Story. How a backup QB took a heartbroken Patriot Nation to Ultimate, Improbable, Unbelievable Victory!”

Don’t worry. They’ll get better. It’s early yet.

Stage three: Anger, as best publicly expressed by the boobirds at the Miami game. (Surely it’s only reasonable to jeer a team that’s gone only 102-30, or 77-plus percent, including playoffs since 2001; hey, those seats are expensive, right?) To their credit, most Pats fans online aren’t lingering at this stage, but there’s always the historically minded pessimist or two. One’s named BadMoFo, who summarized 2008 with “Crapola: We suck again!”

Stage four: Bargaining. Slash83, who apparently doesn’t read ESPN.com, kicks off a thread with, “Friends of mine have been asking me a real interesting question the last couple of weeks, they've been asking if it were possible, would I take Brady's knee injury so he could be healthy and playing right now and I be left with a torn ACL?”

Amazing how many fans are not willing to take this step in the healing process and how many questions this question begs in turn (Do I get Brady’s salary? Can I drink his beer? Do I get Gisele Bundchen? How many times can I reference Gisele Bundchen in this forum? Etcetera.) Guess this is what happens when you when a few Super Bowls in recent memory. You have to wonder what Detroit Lions forums are like on this question ...

Stage five: Depression/realization. It’s a lot easier to handle a tragedy like this after a bunch of recent championships, but some want more. PatsFans member NEsince1992, who had the temerity to place the Pats 15th in his own Week 5 power rankings while speculating that Kevin O’Connell would soon be taking over, was met with derision from those Patriot backers still languishing in stages two through four.

Stage six: Testing. Few Patriots fans in evidence have reached this point in the process; what sort of form might this take? Anticipating the 13th pick in the 2009 NFL Draft? Relishing the role of spoiler in a late-season Bills game? Demanding that O’Connell, the quarterback of the future, be given a shot in, say, Week 8?

Time will tell, but it may be years before some of the more hardcore ever reach ...

Stage seven: Acceptance.

For something completely different, PatsFans deserves props for a gut-busting weekly feature that more fan Web sites need to establish: A little game called “Name the Opponent.” A nice bunch of derisive nicknames for the following Patriot opponent are listed while forum members can vote for their favorite. As of this writing, electors are hilariously in favor of referring to San Francisco as “the 4 & 12ers,” but a number of other candidates – “Gore’s Bores” (Hey, wasn’t that the Democratic Party ticket in Election 2000?), “Rent-A-Martz” and “Raiders, West Campus," my particular favorite, are vote-worthy as well.
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About Os Davis

Os Davis has taken a twisted route to get to RealFootball365.com in his nearly 17 years in professional writing, working in any number of capacities in the sportswriting, news reporting and film criticism worlds. In print media, Os has served as editor at a few publications, including Albuquerque's...
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