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Despite loss, a Mile High sigh of relief for Patriots

Sunday night’s loss was tough to take, but it could have been far worse.Matthew J. Lee/Globe Staff

While still angrily exhaling through your nostrils at the way the Patriots were dealt their first loss of the season, take time to breathe a sigh of relief that the maddening Sunday night in the Mile High City wasn't worse.

The Patriots' perfect season is no longer intact after a difficult-to-swallow 30-24 overtime loss to the Denver Broncos, but the ligaments in Rob Gronkowski's right knee still are. That's what really matters. Reports Monday indicated that Gronkowski suffered a minor knee strain. He will miss a week or two at most. Game lost, but crisis averted.

The regular season is prologue for the Patriots. It's about the big picture, and taking one at the end of the season with 7 pounds of sterling silver known as the Lombardi Trophy. Going 16-0 would have been neat, but the best Deflategate rebuttal is repeating as Super Bowl champions.

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If you take Gronk out of the big picture, you might as well crop the Lombardi out, too. The Patriots OT defeat was a frustrating setback. A major injury to Gronkowski would have been a crushing loss.

On the Patriots' hierarchy of irreplaceability, Gronkowski sits only below the venerated quarterback-coach duo of Tom Brady and Bill Belichick. He is sine qua non to New England's cause as a coverage-dictating headache for opposing defensive coordinators.

No team is better at concealing its true feelings than the Patriots. But all you needed to know about Gronkowski's essential nature was written on Brady's chiseled face as he watched Gronkowski wriggle in pain on the snow-dusted turf at Sports Authority Field at Mile High.

NBC's cameras showed a shot of a blank-eyed Brady. At one point, TB12 bowed his head in a combination of consternation and concern. It was as if he saw the whole season flash before his eyes.

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In the "Do Your Job" infomercial, err, documentary, Belichick singled out the lack of a healthy Gronkowski in the 2011, 2012, and 2013 seasons as one of the reasons the Patriots failed to add to their trophy collection.

"Had Rob been healthy in any of those three years, as close as those outcomes were, it might have made a difference," Belichick said.

The personnel losses are piling up for the Patriots. At some point Next Man Up becomes Last Guy Left. Losing Gronkowski would have put the Patriots injuries at a critical mass.

Gronkowski's close call overshadowed the loss of linebacker Dont'a Hightower to a sprained medial collateral ligament in his left knee.

Fellow linebacker Jamie Collins has been out for four games with a mystery illness. Running back Dion Lewis is done for the season with a torn ACL. Brady pass-catching confidant Julian Edelman is hoping to return for the playoffs from a broken left foot. Danny Amendola missed the Broncos game with a sprained knee.

Fortune is not favoring the depleted and defeated Patriots right now. Yet, they still had the Broncos game within their grasp.

Incredibly, it took nearly a full calendar year for the Patriots to lose a game they were committed to winning (omitting the meaningless 2014 season finale against Buffalo in which Brady played a half). The last real loss the Patriots suffered before Sunday night's game was the one in Green Bay on Nov. 30, 2014.

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Sleep-deprived and irascible, Patriots fans reported to work or class on Monday convinced that their Do Your Job team got jobbed by the officials in Brady-Brock Osweiler I.

The officiating sent the Patriots persecution industrial complex into overdrive.

The first questionable flag was an offensive pass interference penalty on Gronkowski with 4:56 left and the Patriots leading, 21-17, that negated a 10-yard gain on third and 5. Gronk did extend his "Terminator" brace-covered arm ever so slightly to push off, but those kinds of plays happen routinely in the NFL.

The second was a defensive holding call on Patrick Chung in the end zone on second and goal that wiped out an Alan Branch sack that would have forced Denver into third and goal from the 15 with 1:15 remaining and zero timeouts. Instead, the penalty handed the Broncos first and goal at the 4, and Osweiler hit Andre Caldwell (brother of Reche) for a go-ahead touchdown.

The late-game yellow laundry had everybody seeing red.

During his weekly interview with WEEI, Brady shared a sentiment that many Patriots fans awoke to Monday. "I don't think I've ever been so visibly pissed off after a loss," Brady said.

Brady was excoriating the officials like Pat Riley late in the game. It wouldn't be surprising if referee Tony Corrente's eardrums were still ringing rock concert-style from Brady's harangues.

It's easy to pin this defeat solely on the officials, but the Patriots' injuries and execution also contributed to their demise.

The absence of Edelman and Amendola were obvious on third down. The Patriots converted 2 of 13 third downs.

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That contributed to 10 punts, including the one that ended the coveted first possession of overtime.

It was only the fourth time since 2001 that the Patriots punted 10 times in a game. The last time they punted that much was an 11-punt effort in a 13-10 victory over the Jets on Sept. 9, 2013, when Gronkowski was still recovering from forearm and back surgeries.

Then there was Chris Harper's muffed punt with a 14-point, fourth-quarter lead that applied the defibrillator paddles to a flat-lining Broncos team.

The Patriots' loss should give folks a greater appreciation for just how lofty the accomplishment of the 2007 Patriots was.

That season has been marginalized and effaced with the removal of the 16-0 banner from Gillette Stadium.

But there is a reason that only one team has accomplished a perfect regular season since the NFL went to the 16-game slate in 1978.

The Patriots aren't going to finish undefeated this time, but they just avoided their biggest loss of the season.


Christopher L. Gasper can be reached at cgasper@globe.com. Follow him on Twitter @cgasper.