It's not unusual for Tom Brady to appear upset after an ugly win.
His demeanor fit that bill Sunday evening after the Patriots narrowly escaped Jacksonville, 23-16.
"I mean, we played pretty terrible out there," he said. "It came down to the wire and our defense made some plays but that was a bad 60 minutes of football. We got out-competed out there, out-fought.
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"We were lucky to win."
New England's execution was unimpressive from the start.
Jaguars quarterback Chad Henne went a perfect 6-for-6 passing on the team's first drive. The nine-play, 78-yard effort got Jacksonville on the board and ate up almost six minutes of clock.
New England's offense was equally impotent and the team went down 10-3 after the first quarter.
"We started slow -- couldnt do anything offensively, couldnt make any plays," Brady said. "They made plenty of plays. We were lucky to be in it at halftime, didnt really do anything in the second half in the run game or the passing game, so its just a poor effort overall."
Henne contributed 343 to the team's overall 436 yards of offense.
When the Patriots 'D' did step up, killing a Jacksonville drive that got down to New England's 1-yard line, the offense couldn't answer. With a seven-point lead to protect and three minutes of remaining regulation to burn, Brady and company gained just 13 yards before punting.
Patriots-Jaguars truly came down to the wire.
In his press conference last Wednesday, Brady gave 2-12 Jacksonville what seemed like undue respect. When the quarterback went on about how the Jaguars always fight to the last bell, it went even beyond the typical NFL diplomacy.
Those words turned out to be disconcertingly prophetic.
"They didnt give us anything," Brady said Sunday. "I mean, we had to fight for it and they made plenty of plays on us. It just wasnt a very good performance."
There was no, 'A win is a win' shrug to punctuate the presser's end.
The quarterback just saw too many mistakes, with too little time to correct them, before the postseason.
You get very concerned when you dont play well. Thats very evident by the way we performed," Brady said. "We better have a good week of practice or its going to be just as tough against Miami.