Giardi: What does this voluminous injury report say about the state of the Patriots and Belichick?

FOXBOROUGH - Twenty. That's how many players the Patriots listed on their injury report following Wednesday's practice. Covering this team for over two decades, I've seen some bleep, but this is genuinely something - reminiscent of my son's high school team after playing Norton earlier this month. 'How many guys got hurt? Can you even field a team next week?" The Pats will manage - they have a practice squad teeming with wannabe NFLers - but we're talking about nearly 30% of their active roster and what I consider half their offensive and defensive starters.

I'd put Brown, Henry, Andrews, Smith-Schuster, Stevenson, and Strange as starters on "O" and Jon Jones, Barmore, Dugger, Godchaux, and Peppers on "D." 

There's no denying the Pats have had rotten luck regarding their team's health. Their most promising young player, Christian Gonzalez, injured his shoulder and is lost for the season. We only got a little over three regular season games to admire and evaluate him as a player. Matthew Judon went down in that Cowboys game, and while there's a chance he could return this year, it likely won't make a difference. Or, troubling, it could make you better, and come December, you might not want that. Plenty of folks in the upper reaches of the building would rather have more losses than a win or two that could cost draft positioning. In fact, some are already talking about next year. That's what 1-5 will do for you.

Jon Jones, who is as much of a gamer as anyone who's come through that locker room in the last decade, hasn't been right since training camp. That ankle is troublesome, and how he was laboring about on Tuesday made it clear that it might be time for another break. Not great for that already thin secondary, and while Jack Jones had the clock started on his return, hamstrings can be tricky. Throw in backup Shaun Wade with a shoulder, Kyle Dugger and the foot problem that popped up late last week (and he didn't play well Sunday), and Jabril Peppers (no, not him!) with a knee, and maybe it's time to start cross-training one of these wide receivers. Or get Edelman back here to play on both sides of the ball. I think I'm joking. Ask me later.

As for Mike Onwenu - as the boss man said on Felger and Mazz Tuesday - he practically needed a wheelchair to be on the sidelines Sunday in Vegas and didn't play a snap - an "emergency" guard, if need be. Which makes you wonder about his availability as well. Cole Strange is headed for a lost year - he practiced once this summer - and when he did return, he clearly wasn't right either (like Onwenu). I mean, who did the Pats piss off? 

But as I read and re-read the injury report, I thought: Is Belichick playing games with this? Can you picture it? I can. 

"Hey RKK, what did you want me to do?" he asks at their end-of-the-season meeting. "The whole team was hurt? I mean, not even Paul Brown could have won with this team."

(Clears throat and snorts)

**end scene**

I was already talking about this notion on TV - my fear - that Bill would make that part of his pitch to remain the boss next year. Not a day later does the injury report - which was 14 players long last week - blossom to 20. I'm not suggesting Belichick did that in response to what I said - though I know someone in that building cares - but it struck me as odd. We know the Pats have messed around with these things during this era. How many years was Tom Brady (shoulder) listed? And how many games did he miss because of said shoulder? (That would be zero). I always assumed that was to tweak the league, which Belichick is obsessed with. But this? This wasn't about the league. The league doesn't care about you right now except for some in the Park Avenue offices reveling in you and your team's predicament. This feels like something else, something more than just the football gods striking down at the last remains of this fallen dynasty. This feels like an act of a desperate man who's watching his time in Foxborough come to an inglorious end. I could be wrong - I have been before - but...