While much of New England — and the entire East Coast — continues trying to recover from Hurricane/Tropical Storm Irene, Bill Belichick and his Patriots set about trying to recover from their beating by the Lions, while preparing for their next opponent, the New York Giants.
Gillette Stadium was inoperable this Monday due to lingering power outages that affected the Patriots home base, so the team was forced to conduct business at an undisclosed location nearby. There was no practice today, just film breakdown of the Lions game.
There was business to transact, however, with a deadline looming tomorrow to get NFL rosters down to 80 players. The Patriots got a start in that department by axing 11 players, including a shocker in safety James Sanders (Paul Perillo has details in another blog post above). When it came to the sudden change of venue today, Belichick was matter-of-fact in explaining how the team handled the situation.
"Yeah, we shuffled down the road a little bit here. Just worked outside the stadium a little bit. We should be back there in a little while.
"We've been on the road before, been away for a week at a time, partial weeks at a time," he added, noting the two week-long West Coast operations back in 2008 and the half-week in London the following fall.
"We're managing. We're OK," said Belichick.
Belichick offered no updates on the health of wide receiver Wes Welker (neck) or guard Dan Connolly (ankle), both of whom left the Lions game with their respective injuries. He did say, though, that several players who practiced last week but did not suit up in Detroit might be ready for game action this week. He did not specify who, however.
One somewhat humorous episode regarding Irene. Wide receiver Chad Ochocinco, via Twitter, reported that he was headed to Gillette overnight to get some shut-eye, because he was certain there'd be power there. A short time later, he took to the social media site again to announce his bewilderment that New England's home field was awash in darkness as well. And cornerback Darius Butler tweeted that he was driving around Foxborough, feeling like he was in a scene from the Will Smith apocolyptic film "I am Legend."
