Patriots so-called confidence is starting to wear thin

The New England Patriots are treading carelessly close to that thin line between confidence and arrogance. All season opposing fans and neutral bystanders alike have questioned whether the Pats and Head Coach Bill Belichick were purposefully running up the score. Now the Patriots themselves are whining about possible rules infractions by conference rivals the Indianapolis Colts.

After his team squeaked out a slim 24-20 victory against the Colts on Sunday, Patriots President Jonathan Kraft accused the Colts of distracting tactics, including enhancing the home crowd by playing digital crowd noise over the stadium speakers. Apparently, that would be against NFL rules.

The Patriots were obviously hoping for another blow-out, while making a serious statement to the rest of the league, the media and fans. Unfortunately for them, Peyton Manning and the Colts were not at all interested in conceding such a result. But, just because you didn’t roll over your opponents as you had hoped, does that mean you accuse your opponents of cheating? And even if they were cheating, the Patriots, who themselves earlier this year were implicated and fined for cheating, are in no position to act all high and mighty when it comes to scrupulous tactics that bend the NFL rules.

After being the door-mat of the NFL for decades, under Belichick the Patriots had become a classy NFL franchise. Unfortunately, it seems that the unprecedented success this season is going to their head a little bit, as the confident swagger is starting to look a little like obnoxious haughtiness.

This New England team hasn’t won anything just yet and last time we checked, despite the result on Sunday, Indianapolis is still the defending Super Bowl champion. It would be wise for the Patriots to keep that in mind and maintain some humility, lest arrogance be their ultimate demise during what otherwise could be one of the most historic Super Bowl runs ever.