The one thing I knew I could count on when I got the word Michael Jackson died was an absolute lack restraint. I knew the soulless creatures who fawn over famous people would quickly turn this thing into a hagiography and we’d forget that the last time MJ turned out a massive media circus it was his trial for getting little boys drunk and raping them. And God bless ‘em, they didn’t disappoint. Seeing those celebrity worshipping nitwits take to the streets to mourn a dead pop singer… when for the last two weeks the whole world has been watching people take to the streets to fight tyranny… is one of those things that makes you sad to be an American. End of rant.

But the purpose of this blog isn’t to tear down MJ… God rest his soul… but to thank him. Because as Chad Finn pointed out in the Globe today for all his faults, Michael did nothing less than save the Patriots. The brief history lesson goes like this: It was 1984. Coming off his “Thriller” album, Jacko was arguably the hottest commodity in pop music history. Not only that, but he announced he was getting back together with his brothers for the Jackson 5 “Victory” reunion tour. The tour didn’t have a promoter and the Jacksons put the contract out to bid. This tour couldn’t miss. It was going to be a license to print money for whomever landed the deal. Enter the Patriots, specifically VP/Worthless Owner’s Son Chuck Sullivan who miraculously outbid everyone else and was hired to promote the most anticipated concert tour of all time. The weird thing is, Chuck Sullivan knew less about pop music than he knew about running a football team. And that’s saying something since the Pats of the time were the worst run franchise in all of sports. No kidding, no one who knew Sullivan had ever heard him even mention music, save maybe classical or Cole Porter or some such crap. It would be like finding out Danny Ainge signed on to run the 2009 Monster Jam. And to win the bid, he put up Sullivan Stadium as collateral. But Sullivan brought the same mush to the Victory Tour as he had to the Patriots and somehow… improbably… impossibly… managed to lose money. The massive stage the Jacksons used obliterated thousands of premium seats. Ticket sales weren’t close to what Chuck needed to make his money back, even after the J5 added dates to help him recoup his losses. As part of his deal, Chuck had the t-shirt concession and hoped to make some money back that way, but not long after it came out that Michael was into sharing a bed and porn with little kids and every spare room in the Pats stadium was filled with boxes of unsold shirts like it was El Pres’ apartment. Eventually, the massive debt on this boondoggle cost the Sullivan family the stadium, which was bought for a song by a loyal Pats fan and cardboard box magnate named Bob Kraft. And you know the rest of the story.

So thank you for that Michael. I’m not smart enough about these things to know where you’re going to end up next, but if you have to talk your way past the bouncers to get into Heaven, I’d tell them how you helped create an NFL dynasty.