Politics and sports. They’re two completely different endeavors, but in a lot of ways they’re one and the same.For one thing, both share a lot of common terminology. A tight campaign is referred to as a horse race. Those who sense themselves behind as the election nears may engage in a full-court press (the way Martha Coakley seems to be doing now).To borrow more from horse racing, the perceived leader of the pack is a front-runner; the closing days of a campaign are often called the stretch run; and the candidate who gets out of the gate early, and kind of gives everyone a feel for the mood of the electorate, is the stalking horse (the way George Romney was in 1968, taking the early hits for Richard Nixon).If you take a question in a press conference and answer it so brilliantly, so resoundingly, you’ve knocked one out of the park. If someone drops a nice, easy question, they’ve lobbed a softball.Get the point?I bring this up because I see a lot of similarities between the aforementioned Coakley and the New England Patriots.OK, you say. Krause has gone mad. He’s full of (bleep). How could he possibly equate Martha Coakley with the Patriots?Let us explain.Martha Coakley took on a soft field in the Democratic primary and won. That’s a little like going into halftime with the lead – as the Patriots did on several occasions this season.The Patriots – for whatever reasons – couldn’t close the deal. Whatever they did in the first half to get the lead, they stopped doing in the second half. Either the opposition adjusted, or the Patriots lost their edge and tried to go into sort of a four-corners offense (all right, enough with the mixing metaphors!).On at least three occasions, the Patriots let significant leads slip away (against Miami, Indianapolis and Houston).Now, let’s look at Coakley. After she won the primary, she went into the Witness Protection Program (or so it would seem). Nobody heard a word out of her for almost two weeks. Meanwhile, Scott Brown – a/k/a Indianapolis/Houston/Miami – went around the state beating her brains in, and defining her in a clearer, and certainly harsher, way than she’s been doing.Now, a couple of polls come out and Coakley is scrambling to get the edge back ? the same way the Patriots all of a sudden would have to play life-and-death football in the fourth quarter after blowing their leads.This isn’t to say Coakley’s already lost. The Patriots hung on a few times in those circumstances too (beating the Jets and Ravens during the regular season).But she definitely needs to box as we head down to Round 15. She can’t sit on the lead. No four-corners. The gloves have already come off, too. Coakley’s gone negative (loved Ayla Brown’s reaction to that; you’d think she’d have learned all about rancor from Simon Cowell), and that’s clearly something she probably didn’t want to do. She wanted to stay above the fray and keep icing the puck (had enough yet?).And, of course, it’s quite possible one of her minions may have really stepped in it the other day, knocking a reporter down (albeit, perhaps, inadvertently) who was trying to question her about something. That’s the equivalent of taking a two-minute minor when you’re protecting a one-goal lead.Who knows how this is all going to turn out? But it would appear, at this point, that she needs a closer to shut the opposition down in the top of the ninth.Steve Krause is sports editor of The Item.