He’s a Different Breed of Cat Now

They have what he wants and they need what he has.

The defending champion New England Patriots wouldn’t be in position to win another Super Bowl if they hadn’t added running back Corey Dillon.

He’s made for games like Sunday’s divisional playoff against the Indianapolis Colts, with snow falling, wind swirling and an added premium on running the ball.

Only he’d never played in a postseason game before. That’s what seven years of wearing a Cincinnati Bengal uniform can do for you -- and to you. Dillon hated the losing, spoke out about it and was labeled a malcontent.

We know now that Dillon’s grumblings were a reflection of his environment, not him. We know that he was up to the task of his first playoff game. And we know for certain that his acquisition, for a mere second-round pick, was the pivotal move of the NFL off-season.

He’ll be the difference-maker when the Patriots go to Pittsburgh this Sunday for the AFC championship game, the reason the Patriots will go back to the Super Bowl.

On a team of guys who blend in, Dillon was the one name that kept popping up after New England’s 20-3 victory over the Colts. He drew praise from players on offense and defense after he rushed for 144 yards and helped the Patriots hold the ball for more than a quarter’s worth of time longer than Indianapolis.

“It really gives us energy on defense when we see Corey busting up the middle for seven-, eight-, nine-yard gains, first down, moving the chains,” Patriot safety Rodney Harrison said. “It really just gives us a lot of confidence on defense.”

What, you thought wide-receiver-turned-defensive-back Troy Brown was the only Patriot who helped the team on both sides of the ball?

Dillon got aw-shucksy when he heard that the unit that held the league’s highest-scoring offense to only a field goal gave credit to him.

“Are you serious?” Dillon said. “Did you see the job they did today? I was no part of that. They did a great job. They gave us a lot of opportunities, they got the ball back for us. That allowed us to put some points on the board. It was a total, all-around effort.”

Spoken like a true Patriot, a franchise where the team comes first and the last word always belongs to Coach Bill Belichick. It’s the approach that has won two Super Bowls in the previous three years, and it’s what Dillon desperately craved.

“To never be in this position and then to actually be going out there and playing with the Super Bowl champs, that’s unreal,” Dillon said.

It takes only one player to unravel a tightly knit team (see Randy Moss), but Dillon wasn’t that guy.

“He fit right in when he got here,” Brown said. “He was like one of the fellas when he walked in the door.”

For Dillon, the Patriots have made it easy to be happy.

“I’m with some guys that I like, and they like me,” he said. “I can truly say that I’m surrounded by some guys, I can go out there and I’d put my career on the line for them each Sunday, and they’d do the same for me. That’s what’s comforting about that situation.”

This isn’t the dour face we saw in Cincinnati. He was the greatest running back in Bengal history, but that’s like winning the Miss Antarctica beauty pageant. After all the annual doses of losing, with the players not caring and the franchise unwilling to do anything about it, Dillon had to leave.

In Cincinnati, he said, “It was trust issues and a whole lot of other stuff. But that’s in the past. I’m just glad to be here, and I’m really enjoying the experience. This is something else.

“When I got here, just seeing the guys in this room, they made me want to get better. I didn’t want to let these guys down.”

If anything, the teammates and coaching staff let him down Sunday. First a false-start penalty on tackle Matt Light negated a one-yard touchdown run on fourth and goal. The five-yard penalty forced the Patriots to kick a field goal instead.

In the fourth quarter, Dillon burst outside and ran down the left sideline for 27 yards. He made a dive for the end zone pylon, but the officials ruled him out of bounds at the one. He wasn’t on the field for the next play, but his eyes locked in as Tom Brady followed his linemen on a quarterback sneak. Dillon raised his arms in anticipation, then started leaping when the officials confirmed the touchdown.

It didn’t matter that he missed out on the six points after doing most of the work to get there.

“Any time we score, I’m happy,” Dillon said.

Everyone in the huddle is happy when Dillon’s number is called. It’s hard to think of a championship team as lacking anything, but the Patriots were in serious need of a stronger running game. They had managed to control the ball with Brady’s short, accurate passes. But NFL defenses adapt faster than a mutant virus. Sometimes the way to stay a step ahead is to get back to the basics.

Dillon’s career-best 1,635 yards rushing boosted the New England running attack by 33 yards a game, to an average of 133.4 -- seventh-best in the league after finishing 27th the year before.

“Having him is just a plus, because he plays with so much heart and effort and it’s just contagious,” tight end Christian Fauria said. “It’s like a domino effect. Even when we miss blocks, he is making players miss and stiff-arming guys. He is just the heart of the offense.”

An injury forced him to bypass the Steeler game on Oct. 31, when the Patriots rushed for only five yards and their 21-game winning streak came to an end.

They’ll have Dillon with them Sunday. That’s the difference.

J.A. Adande can be reached at j.a.adande@latimes.com. To read previous columns by Adande, go to latimes.com/adande.

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Dillon by the Numbers

Corey Dillon’s career statistics and this season’s playoff stats:

*--* Season Team Yards Avg TD Rec Avg TD 1997 CIN 1,129 4.8 10 27 9.6 0 1998 CIN 1,130 4.3 4 28 6.4 1 1999 CIN 1,200 4.6 5 31 9.4 1 2000 CIN 1,435 4.6 7 18 8.8 0 2001 CIN 1,315 3.9 10 34 6.7 3 2002 CIN 1,311 4.2 7 43 6.9 0 2003 CIN 541 3.9 2 11 6.5 0 2004 NE 1,635 4.7 12 15 6.9 1 CAREER: 9,696 4.4 57 207 7.7 6 Playoffs Team Yards Avg TD Rec Avg TD 2004 NE 144 6.3 0 5 3.4 0

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