The end lingers like a bad breakup. You replay it in your mind wondering what went wrong and why you didn’t see it coming when it’s so obvious now.
A week later, the Patriots’ 20-18 loss to the Denver Broncos in the AFC Championship game remains a fresh wound. It’s still difficult to process that football season in New England is finished.
There is only one acceptable ending to a Patriots season in these Super Bowl-or-bust days of Bill Belichick and Tom Brady. A season that started with a renegade Super Bowl banner celebration, repeat aspirations, and a Deflategate defiance double-digit winning streak faded to black in Denver with missed opportunities, missed blocks, and mistakes.
Here are seven parting thoughts on the Patriots:
1. The calling card of the Patriots during the Belichick era has been an ability to morph into whatever type of team they need to be in a given week to win. The 2015 Patriots didn’t have that on offense. The team became overconfident and overly reliant on it’s death-by-a-thousand-paper-cuts passing attack. It felt it could simply spread teams out and pass at will, letting Brady serve as his own pass protection.
The fourth quarter of Super Bowl XLIX and their 10-0 start fueled this notion.
Belichick dismisses the idea of prescribed run-pass balance, saying the idea is to score. But balance matters. Denver defenders didn’t even pay lip service to the idea of the Patriots running the football as they raced to put Brady on his back, and Broncos defensive coordinator Wade Phillips put six defensive backs on the field with impunity.
Brady was the Patriots’ leading rusher with three carries for 13 yards, 11 on one scramble.
The Patriots ranked 29th in yards per carry (3.7) and 30th in rushing yards per game (87.8). That’s the worst they’ve been under Belichick.
You can’t blame it all on injuries to Dion Lewis and LeGarrette Blount. The Patriots ranked 19th in rushing after Week 1 and never stood better than 23d (Week 5) the rest of the season. The Patriots ranked in the top 10 in rushing in 2012 and 2013. Last year, they were 18th.
Restoring the run has to be a priority for 2016.
2. Sports are cruel, as evidenced by Stephen Gostkowski’s missed extra point against Denver. Gostkowski, who had made 523 straight extra points, has always had the unfair burden of being compared to Adam Vinatieri. There might be a few Patriots fans who think that misfire never would have happened to Automatic Adam.
Vinatieri missed three extra points this season for the Colts. In two lifetime playoff games in Denver, he has missed field goals in each, including a 43-yarder in the fourth quarter for the Patriots in the 2005 playoffs. Gostkowski’s lifetime playoff field goal percentage is 92.3 (24 of 26). Vinatieri’s is 82.4 (56 of 68).
3. Speaking of kicks, Belichick should have taken the 34-yard field goal, instead of going for it on fourth and 1 from the Denver 16 with 6:03 to go, trailing, 20-12. It’s a tough decision, and the one he made has merit. But the reality is that it was a two-score game either way, and Gostkowski’s field goal percentage is higher than the odds of making a 2-point conversion.
The league-wide success rate on 2-point conversions this season was 47.9 percent. The Patriots were one of five teams that didn’t attempt one during the regular season. What going for it really signified was that Belichick didn’t think his offense was capable of getting that close to the end zone again.
4. Belichick hasn’t endured so much second-guessing since the 2009 season, which featured the infamous fourth-and-2 call and the disastrous decision to play Wes Welker and the starters in the season finale. Yes, the mortar kick against the Eagles backfired, and his overtime decision against the Jets failed after two Patriots defenders picked each other.
The real second guess, though, should be the Dec. 20 home game against the Tennessee Titans. With linebacker Jonathan Freeny (hand) out, the Patriots had Dont’a Hightower active with a sprained knee. They also had Danny Amendola, nursing a sprained knee, returning punts, which was how he had injured it in the first place.
Both players aggravated their injuries. Amendola had to be held out the next week in an overtime loss to the Jets. Hightower sat out the season finale in Miami. It would have been better to have them sit out the Titans game than miss the home-field clinchers.
5. Ranking the Patriots’ offseason priorities, I would go running back, wide receiver, and offensive line. The team could use a boost in the backfield, perhaps from a free agent such as Lamar Miller or venerable veteran Matt Forte. The offensive line was a disaster in Denver, but the Patriots invested a pair of fourth-round picks in guards Tre’ Jackson and Shaq Mason. The return of Nate Solder to left tackle and a healthy Sebastian Vollmer at right tackle should improve the line. Guard Josh Kline was solid, until he hurt his shoulder.
6. It would be so Belichick to find a way to bring Calvin Johnson to Foxborough. Megatron is contemplating retirement. He carries a $24 million cap charge for Detroit in 2016. The Lions’ new general manager is former Patriots director of pro scouting Bob Quinn.
The 30-year-old Johnson could be Randy Moss 2.0. Johnson is also a reminder that when evaluating offseason moves you have to consider possible cap casualties. Players who fit that mold include wide receivers Pierre Garcon of Washington and Mike Wallace in Minnesota.
7. I don’t think it’s a housecleaning in the House of Hoodie. I would be careful linking all the offseason staff departures. The team did part ways with offensive line coach Dave DeGuglielmo and strength and conditioning coach Harold Nash, who landed in Detroit. But linebackers coach Patrick Graham leaving for the Giants was tied to compensation, not performance or personality issues.
Christopher L. Gasper is a Globe columnist. He can be reached at cgasper@globe.com. Follow him on Twitter @cgasper.
