That article is rich, creamy nonsense. Belichick and Scar are back, McDaniels declined an NFL head coach job to come back, Brady and Gronk are as close to 100% as they get, with the reigning MVP, they just came off an AFC title... and the "clock is ticking down"?
Pierce leads with: "there is at least one more Super Bowl appearance in this crew, perhaps even two". Then jumps to say, all is not well in Foxborough because "Stories began to emerge that all was not well between Belichick and the Kraft family, and between Brady and his departed backup, Jimmy Garoppolo", and the whole TB12 / Guerrero thing is "shady", therefore there was "the unmistakable sound of a window closing".
He then spends 500 words saying Belichick is still amazing without Brady because Cassell in 2008 (true but a red herring), offers that the manner in which they won the AFCCG this year "was much closer than it should’ve been" (has he no appreciation for drama, or respect for opponents?), and that Belichick is rumored by friends to be retiring in 2-3 years. Goes on and on about "they got less than full value for Garoppolo" and that Alex Guerrero is a sign of the apocalypse, and then says that because Belichick benched Malcolm Butler for the SB and didn't explain why, "the ineffable twilight of the dynasty deepened."
Finally he wades into the notion of "Pats fans suck / are entitled", that we're paranoid due to Deflategate (fair), and that local sports radio is a bunch of haters who are turning on the team (showing he must have never listened to it the previous decades... and wait, didn't he just slam Patriots fans himself?). And concludes by saying that the Pats are nevertheless favorites to win the SB next year, and that for the rest of the NFL nation, they "can’t wait for the worst to come. They will probably get to drink their fill of schadenfreude. But not yet."
He zigged and zagged between an argument that the Pats are done, and that the Pats are still invincible, so many times I have whiplash. Fucking great, Pierce. Why did you just waste my time?