Hate to admit it, but I had strong doubts about this season for the Patriots, and still had strong doubts after the first game, which was laden with mistakes, but…now they’re sitting atop the AFC East and tied for top spot in the AFC overall with the Broncos and Colts.
I was pretty much looking to the Tampa game to tell me if the team was for real, because anyone really following the Pats knows they had a soft spot in their schedule in there for a bit, with the Titans and so on. Various teams with losing records who just weren’t good. But Tampa Bay went into that last game with the Patriots at 6-2, so I have to say – New England is indeed sort of back.
The thing for a lot of us New England fans is adjusting to the new team. Defense? Still actually pretty damned good, especially under Vrabel. Though they have given up a few big plays and both offense and defense are flagged way too much. But offense? It’s hard to adjust from drop-back passers to Maye’s “waggle” sort of scrambling where he scampers on a bootleg off the edge and gains about four yards.
Of course, used to the old ways, I continually scream at the television set, “Would you get rid of the ball!I” because while our line is decent, it’s not great (some might argue that point), and Maye is constantly on the move outside the pocket, often even before it collapses. Sorry, but I still favor a pure pocket passer who just gets rid of the ball. Yeah, I know it’s a different NFL, but get rid of the ball.
Well, to sum up, I now think the Patriots can be taken “for real” this season and as a post-season threat. Vrabel’s done a good job.
Though we could get rid of the ball faster. And I don’t particularly like this nonsense about the deep ball. I was a Raiders fan for years – you live by the deep ball, you die by the deep ball. And believe me, you usually die by the deep ball.