This is blasphemy as a Patriots fan, but I find myself rooting for the Jets this year.  There are a bunch of reasons: 1) there’s no more Mangini, 2) they have an amazing defense, 3) they have a great running game, and 4) Rex Ryan is hilarious. Plus I’d much rather root for them than Peyton Manning.  J-E-T-S?

After a dominating win by the Ravens, the Patriots season is over. They really did not seem to have it this year. Brady never seemed quite right, whether it was from his injury last year, his injuries this year, or just wanting to be back on vacation with his supermodel wife. And the defense was lacking in leaders. No one had that us against them mentality, that bravado that Rodney Harrison would bring.  Thus, Dan Shaughnessy says the dynasty is over. I wouldn’t go quite that far. Although if they get back to their winning ways perhaps it will be a new dynasty.  Makes you wish they had just made a few more plays in the 2006 AFC Championship collapse against the Colts or the 2007 Super Bowl against the Giants. Make 2-3 more plays and we would have had 5 super bowls and a 19-0 season…

So, what do they need to do for next year?  Hopefully Belichick and the staff do a solid internal review to figure out where they went wrong this year. In 2006 they had poor receivers and they went out and got Moss, Welker, and Stallworth.  I’d expect to see some big names this year as well. Offensively, they need way better play calling. They need a new offensive coordinator. They also need to get a 3rd WR as Sam Aiken really doesn’t cut it.  I’d expect to see them both sign a few guys and draft some for this role.  On defense, the biggest thing they need is some leadership. Then they also need some pass rush and some run stoppers. If there aren’t any new labor talks, next year is going to be an uncapped year, with some different free agency rules, so it could be really interesting.

Obviously the big news was Wes Welker getting hurt.  Supposedly it is a tear of his MCL and ACL, which is the same injury that Brady had last year. So Welker may be at risk of missing next year as well.

In addition, we had another 4th quarter road collapse, losing after holding a 14 point lead in the 4th quarter. That was with the starters in there, it really was not good.

Were there any positive signs?  Yes, good play from some rookies. QB Brian Hoyer looked great in relief of Tom Brady.  Julian Edelman looked great in replacement of Wes Welker, catching 10 passes for 103 yards.  But still, he’s not Welker, and it would have been nice to have him as a 3rd option after Moss and Welker.  Now our 3rd WR has to be Aiken, so hopefully we get some play from the tight ends.  Also, great interception return by Darius Butler.

On to the Ravens!

That was an impressive performance by the Patriots. Perhaps their best game of the year, at least #2 after the Titans game.  The run game was going (197 yards), the pass game was beautiful (more touchdown passes than incompletions), and the defense looked great, stopping the Jags on 4th and 1 early in the first quarter to get things going and getting two interceptions.

Now the question is, what do the Patriots do next week?  The game means virtually nothing to us - it decides if we’re the 3rd or 4th seed, but we have no idea who either will play.  So it could be a good opportunity to get a bye week before the playoffs start, BUT it would be nice to see if we could be conistent and continue this great performance next week, on the ROAD at Houston.  It will be interesting to see what the Patriots try to do.  Personally, I would like to see them keep the momentum going, although resting any injured players.

On a side note, the starting Colts players sure looked deflated and demoralized after being benched and losing that game to the Jets…

The Patriots again looked awful in this one.  The defense made Chad Henne and the Dolphins offense look great.  But I think the bigger problem is the offense.  We (surprisingly) don’t have enough weapons on offense!  Teams can come out and double cover Moss and shut him down.  And that leaves Welker as our only other legitimate receiving threat.  He’s doing great in that role (leading the league in receptiosn), but its not enough.  We need a 3rd receiver (not Sam Aiken).  Not having Donte Stallworth or Jabar Gaffney hurts us.  They used to always say that Brady’s favorite target was the one that was open, because he would spread the ball around so much.  Now it just goes to Welker.  One thing I really don’t understand is how the tight ends haven’t gotten more involved in the passing offense.  Surely Watson and Baker should be getting more throws their way as teams double cover Moss and Welker.

The fourth down call.  I think statistically this actually makes sense.  If you get the 4th down, you can run the clock down nearly to the end and almost certainly win the game.  If you miss it, the Colts get it at the 28 yardline, where there’s a very high chance you lose.  With Brady, on 4th and 2 or less, the Pats convert 76.4% of the time.  Against the Colts since 2000, they’ve converted 75% of the time on 4th down.  So going for it, there’s a greater than 75% chance that you seal the game and win it right there.  So you need to be able to stop the Colts more than 75% of the time (meaning they score less than 25% of the time) after the punt for it to be the right decision.  For the season, the Colts score touchdowns on 30% of their drives.  In this game, they scored on 5 of their 14 possessions (35.7%) and on the last 3 drives when they were hot, they scored 2 TDs (66.6%).  So it seems unlikly you would stop them more than 75% of the time, and going for it is the right decision.  Here are two blogs with good analysis of the decision: Stats blog and the ZEUS computer program.  In Peter King’s MMQB, he looks at the last 7 drives, where the Colts scored TDs on 2 of them (28.6%), so it still the right decision to go for it if you assume a >71.4% conversion rate.  Sure, there’s a chance of an interception if you punt it, but its not greater than your chances of getting the first down right there.  The bigger issue with Belichick is the wasting of the timeouts that could have let us review the play, or stop the clock when the Colts were going to score.

This game had a few great performances:

• Sebastian Vollmer did a great job blocking Dwight Freeney.
• Kevin Faulk had an amazing game, rushing 12 times for 79 yards.
• Tom Brady and Randy Moss were great as always.

This was a pretty good game.  Another tough divisional fight. I think these close games are good practice for later in the year.  Although the defense struggled with the Wildcat in the 2nd quarter and the Dolphins’ first drive of the 3rd quarter, they came through for the rest of the second half.  A few random thoughts:

• Brady and Moss looked good, going for the deep connection.
• Vince Wilfork played over at end, and looked pretty good there.
• Stephen Gostkowski had some nice kickoffs, especially the touchback after the offsides.  I loved that Moss was the first one to congratulate him after the touchback.
• Randy Moss had a great day, especially that stiff arm.
• Miami’s rookie corners are going to be really good.  Vontae Davis had some tight coverage on Moss most of the day.
• As always, Wes Welker shined.
• The red zone offense was lacking.  We need to score touchdowns in the red zone if we’re going to win games.
• Perhaps Laurence Maroney’s “self-scouting” during the bye week paid off…

Well the offense didn’t look spectacular, but the defense was great, and the Patriots came out on top.  Looking back at our questions from before the game: Thomas started but wasn’t particularly special, Aiken and Tate split time at 3rd WR, and Maroney looked useless as usual running the ball.

Some thoughts:

• Brandon Meriweather played great, flying around, getting those two INTS and a touchdown.
• Tully Banta-Cain also had an impressive game, he had a couple tackles for loss on running backs in the backfield.
• The defense was way more aggressive, blitzing a lot this week, which I liked.
• The offensive line was TERRIBLE.  Brady kept getting pressured and had to scramble, and the O line had way too many penalties.  Vollmer had two holding calls, Mankins had two false starts, and there were a couple other false starts and illegal man downfield calls on the O line.

Looking into the bye week:

• With two weeks of practice, will we see Brandon Tate emerge more as a 3rd WR?
• Will we get any of our players back from injury? (Matt Light, Sammy Morris, Fred Taylor, Julian Edelman)

A few things to look for today:

• With Edelman hurt, the Patriots have activiated 3rd round pick Brandon Tate off of the PUP.  Could he be our #3 WR?
• We’re thin at RB with Taylor and Morris out.  How will Maroney perform with a majority of the carries?
• After being inactive last week, Adalius Thomas is back this week.  Will his inactivation spark him to better play this week?

Could the Patriots be active before the trading deadline today?  I think so… they’ve been making some odd moves.  Cutting Banta-Cain and Alexander but supposedly about to re-sign them.  New deals to make more cap space for someone?  They also cut Joey Galloway and Michael Matthews, leaving two roster spots… possibly for the two players they could activate off PUP (WR Brandon Tate and OT LeVoir) but maybe a trade. Hmm