DHL Dan CCLXII - High Hopes

In this week's Picked Up Pieces column, Shank's feel good team this week is... the New England Patriots?

Despite back-to-back 4-13 seasons, the Patriots are somehow the feel-good team of New England, and other thoughts

Picked-up pieces on the road to Cooperstown …

⋅ The Patriots are coming off back-to-back 4-13 seasons. They’re working with their third head coach in three seasons and have a second-year quarterback with only 13 NFL games under his belt. They haven’t won a playoff game since Tom Brady, Bill Belichick, and Ernie Adams copped Super Bowl LIII in Atlanta 6½ years ago.

And yet, they are the feel-good team of our traditionally cynical sports region.

True fact.

The Bruins are a mess and Spoked-B fans are calling for the heads of Cam Neely and Don Sweeney.

The Celtics won a championship a little more than a year ago, but Jayson Tatum is out for the year, two starters have been traded, another pair of regulars left via free agency, and the team is expected to sink to the middle of the Eastern Conference. The NBA’s dreaded “second apron” collective bargaining penalties have done more damage to the Green franchise than anything since John Y. Brown. Now Marcus Smart is a Laker. Mercy!

The interesting-but-annoying Red Sox gave us a nice summer lift with a Tomato-Can-infused 10-game winning streak, but they started their post-All-Star break by losing 4 of 6 to real teams, and now face the trade deadline. The Sox have not played winning baseball after the deadline since 2018. What other team can lose in extra innings without letting the opponent put a ball in play?

Shank sure loved the Red Sox... for an entire week!