Sometimes things don’t go according to plan.
That was certainly the case for the Patriots in Super Bowl LI, when the coaching staff made “start fast” the top priority in a presentation to the players -- only to have them fall behind 28-3. After the game, USA Today took a picture inside the Patriots’ locker room that showed a white board that still had the team’s defensive priorities listed on it, and “start fast” was No. 1.
The rest of the priorities listed on the white board were more or less what you’d expect: Stop The Run, Go After #2 (meaning Matt Ryan) and Eliminate #11 (meaning Julio Jones) & No Big Plays were the next priorities on the list.
Also found in the Patriots’ locker room after the game: Five empty bottles of champagne, a few empty cans of Bud Light, an empty bottle of whiskey, and two half-full syringes sitting next to empty bottles of the painkillers Lidocaine and Marcaine.