It’s time to praise the Patriots.

Before the rest of this season plays itself out.

Before we find out if they’re even going to be in the playoffs.

In short, it’s time to praise the Patriots, because here we are staring at mid-December and they still have a season, when they had every right not to.

For who would ever have believed back there in the first game of the season, when Tom Brady went out for the year with a knee injury, that the Pats would still be in the hunt three months later?

That’s the real story of this season, regardless of what happens from here on out.

The fact it’s come in the face of so many injuries is even more amazing. Injuries are supposed to be the dream-killer. Injuries are supposed to be what turns all those preseason hopes into December mush.

The fact the Patriots are where they are this morning is to their everlasting credit, a testimony to their collective heart, their collective will, for this is a team that had every excuse to simply be mailing it in and waiting for next year

Sunday was just the latest example.

There they were down to a 2-10 team on the road, just a week after being slapped around at home by the Steelers. There they were down, 14-3, early in the game, and 21-16 late in the game, a game that would have sent tremors throughout New England if the Patriots had lost.

The kind of defeat that would have said that this season unofficially ended in the first game when Brady got hurt, and all the rest has just been playing out the schedule, a lament for what might have been.

Yet they somehow found a way to win.

Credit Wes Welker, the Pats’ version of Dustin Pedroia, the undersized guy with a heart as big as the stadium itself, one of those guys who always seems to do what he’s not supposed to be able to do.

A week ago, it seemed he had his head taken off in the Steelers game, one of those hits that makes you wonder why anyone would ever go over the middle in an NFL game.

On Sunday, he was a portrait in excellence, tough catch after tough catch, a visible example of this team’s heart. Randy Moss gets all the love, and draws the double coverage, and makes the highlight-film catches, the ones you see on SportsCenter. Welker makes the tough ones, in those areas where a lot of receivers fear to tread.

Credit Matt Cassel, this kid who has played his way into an NFL career, this kid who has been so much better than anyone had a right to expect.

We saw it again Sunday. No, he didn’t throw for 400 yards, like he had done two weeks in a row, right before the Steelers’ defense gave him a little reality check. No, he didn’t have the kind of game that’s going to make anyone forget Brady. But he did what he had to do to give his team the chance to win, and who can realistically ask for any more than that?

Credit Kevin Faulk, who is having the season of his life in this year when the top two running backs have been hurt most of the time.

Credit the much-maligned defense that somehow managed to come up with the huge stop on the Seahawks’ last drive.

And maybe most of all?

Credit Bill Belichick.

For his coaching fingerprints are all over this.

We know that he’s always going to give his team a chance, even if he doesn’t have as many good cards in his hand, even with the kind of injuries that would decimate most teams. We know he goes into every game with a plan, something designed to make it difficult for the other team, even when he’s undermanned.

And let’s not kid ourselves here.

It’s more difficult to coach this year’s Pats than it was last year, when every week seemed like another highlight package, and the only real suspense was if they could run the table. You and me could have coached last year’s team. Give the ball to Brady and get out of the way, right?

An over-simplification?

Obviously.

But you get the point.

Coaching is much more difficult when you have a young, inexperienced quarterback, too many injuries, and a suspect defense with backs that can’t seem to cover anybody. Coaching is much more difficult when you’re simply trying to keep your team in the season, not when you have the best talent. Coaching is more difficult when you have to keep doing magic tricks to make up for your deficiencies, the ones that seem to only get more and more pronounced each time another Patriot goes down.

Rest assured that if Belichick gets this team into the playoffs this will be one of his great coaching accomplishments, no matter how deep they go.

That doesn’t mean any of this is a sure thing. Sunday told us that, life and death with a 2 and 10 team. This is a team with little margin for error, a fact of life that does not bode well.

We all know that the Patriots’ defense is only a discount-store imitation of what it used to be, complete with injuries up front, linebackers who are growing old in front of our eyes, and a secondary that’s mediocre at best. That’s the reality, and it gets harder and harder to camouflage as the weeks go by.

But here the Pats are in the thick of the AFC playoff hunt and who would have believed that back there on opening day when Brady went down and everything changed?

So it’s time to praise the Patriots.

For here it is nearing mid-December and they still have a season, when they had every reason not to.

breynold@projo.com