An Independent Patriots Blog
You might’ve gotten the impression that I was a bit concerned about the Patriots defense heading into January after my piece from this morning. For those reasons I welcomed the afternoon’s news of James Harrison signing with the team just days after his somewhat surprising release by the Steelers.
Source: the Patriots are expected to sign former Steelers LB James Harrison.
— Field Yates (@FieldYates) December 26, 2017
The Patriots defense turned in another signature effort against the Bills that we’ve seen in recent weeks — early struggles on third down, some big plays allowed, only to see them tighten up in the second half and allow the offense to pull away.
I’m not here to sugar coat it guys, this defense is a shell of what we’ve seen in recent years and obviously injuries are a huge part of it. The other part of it is that the secondary, which is healthy, needed to step up and lead the way for the decimated front seven. At best, they’ve been inconsistent. At worst they’ve been lit up repeatedly no matter who they’re facing. But again, they’ve made the plays they needed to to win games.
But as I look around at the personnel up front I wonder how many stop gaps there are and how many actual building blocks there are.
I’d break it down like so:
[Read more…] about The 2017 Patriots Defense: Can Patchwork Front, Inconsistent Back Get It Done?
Fitzy’s Wicked Pissah Pats/Texans Playoff Preview (by Fitzy01821) I wouldn’t start the weekend any other way. GO PATS! (Source: https://www.youtube.com/)