For about an hour or so Monday night, I was having flashbacks to the 2001 season.

Must’ve been a Superdome thing, I figured. Or seeing Jon Gruden, though this time there was no visor or snow. But then the game started and I still couldn’t shake it.

The Patriots' “bend but don’t break” defense, holding the Saints to a field goal on the opening drive? Maybe. How many times did we see that in 2001?

Or how about the first drive for the Patriots? Ten running plays, including a pair of fourth-down conversions, with Laurence Maroney doing his best Antowain Smith. 

A stop followed by a nice punt return by Wes Welker (or was that Troy Brown?) and the Pats had the ball at midfield with a 7-3 lead. A TD and they have a 14-3 lead at the Superdome against a speedy, high-powered offense. And, yes, that was the score at halftime of Super Bowl XXXVI.

I was pondering who would play the role of Lawyer Milloy in the postgame hug with Bill Belichick, when Mike McKenzie ignored the script and picked off Tom Brady. And before you could say “J.R. Redmond,” the Pats were heading to the locker room almost happy to be down by only 14 points.

And I started having flashbacks to 1991.

Look, you could at least try to write off the first three losses of the season.

The Jets game? No Wes Welker. And Rex Ryan had managed to make the Jets believe that game was their Super Bowl. Brady was still rusty. All that and it was still only a 16-9 final.

The Broncos? Again, much bigger game for them. They were on a roll at the time. An OT loss at Mile High is not a cause for panic.

And the Colts? C’mon, the Pats dominated, what, 75 percent of the game? Plus the fourth-and-2 stuff. I mean, the most optimistic Pats fans could have even tried to sell you the idea that a break here and there and we could have been watching a pair of undefeated teams on Monday night.

Well, now we have a full-fledged whiff on our hands, with Monday night's 38-17 loss to New Orleans. Not an admirable effort in defeat, or one that got away. Nope, this was an undressing. We expected a classic and were stuck with the kind of game you see in the first act of a sports movie.

And again, there will be panic all week long. Belichick isn’t a genius after all, the offensive line is awful, bring in Charlie Weis and Romeo Crennel. You’ll hear it all. And it might be justified. This could turn out to be a team that just isn’t good enough to win a Super Bowl.

But the truth is that we won’t find out anything else about the 2009 Patriots until the playoffs come around. No real tests are left in the regular season (the toughest game left is probably at Houston, an OK team but not the kind that can show you where you are). It is now time to sit and wait.

A trio of questions to ponder (we aren’t afraid to settle for the field goal here) while wondering how the Pats defense would look today if they had made an offseason trade for Derrick Burgess …

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Bad. Really bad. I’m talking “Gary Unmarried” bad. “Jack Wagner Unplugged” bad.

I’m going to throw out the Jets game, because the Pats aren’t going to see a rookie QB in the playoffs. But they’ll see guys like Peyton Manning and Drew Brees. And if you combine the fourth quarter of the Colts game and the first three quarters of the Saints game, you’ve got this line by the opposing QBs:

21-for-25, 424 yards, 6 touchdowns.

The No. 1 problem for this team is lack of a pass rush. Nothing else even comes close. If the Patriots can’t make Brees or Manning or Roethlisberger or Rivers even a little uncomfortable, they will go nowhere in the playoffs.

I was all over Bill Belichick for fourth-and-2 a few weeks ago, but watching this defense on Monday I can almost understand the thought process. And, again, think big picture here and understand that it will mean nothing when the Patriots pick off Chad Henne three times on Sunday. You won’t see Chad Henne in January.

WHAT HAPPENED TO THE OFFENSE? DIDN'T I READ SOMEWHERE RANDY MOSS AND WELKER ARE THE BEST WR DUO OF ALL TIME?

Hey, I stand by that column.

I’m willing to give Brady, Moss and Welker a pass. All three have had terrific seasons and were due a stinker. But the pressure put on Brady is a legitimate concern. The Jets (first time), Broncos and now the Saints have been able to get to Brady with regularity.

And while Brady was far from vintage, this won’t be remembered as a game lost by the offense. When the opposing QB completes 78.3 percent of his passes, throws five TD passes (and Mike Tirico’s “Give Me Five” call after the final Brees TD pass scored a solid eight on the Jim Nantz scale) and finishes with a perfect passer rating, you are going to lose every single time.

ANYTHING GOOD FROM THIS ONE?

If I told you that Brees would have maybe the best game of his career AND the offensive standouts for the Pats would be Maroney and Sam Aiken, you might have decided to use your three hours to watch “TLC’s 650-Pound Virgin: The Weight is Over.”

Clearly the game plan was to run the ball, and Maroney did his part, scoring twice for the second straight week as he continues to run with aggression. He did put the ball on the ground again but, to his credit, he came back to force a fumble at the end of the play (not sure what Sean Payton was thinking on that challenge; Sedrick Ellis clearly fumbled before he was tackled).

Gruden praised Belichick for staying loyal to Maroney, but the truth is that the Patriots don’t have a lot of other options at this point. And Maroney is, despite the fumbles, in the middle of the best stretch of his career. He's going to be the lead guy the rest of the way. Sure, you'll see Kevin Faulk and Sammy Morris, but I bet Maroney gets at least 75 percent of the carries for the remainder of the season.