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Patriots Gameplan: Week 13 at Buffalo Bills

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The Patriots are back on the road this weekend, in the middle of playing five-of-six away from the friendly confines of Gillette Stadium. Of course when you’re undefeated on the road and haven’t lost there since late in the 2015 season maybe it isn’t such a bad thing.

The Patriots odds for Sundays game are once again unnervingly high.

This is arguably the toughest divisional game remaining this season. Though the Bills stumbled mightily two weeks ago with a sudden decision to yank Tyrod Taylor, Buffalo got back on track with a solid win over the Patriot-defeating Chiefs in Kansas City. That’s never an easy task. A win over the Patriots would put the Bills back in the playoff contender category and we’ve seen plenty of tight ones in Buffalo to expect a good game.

The Patriots’ biggest opponent in recent weeks has been their own injuries. That’s just where we’re at with this dynasty now. Staying healthy is all that really stands between them and how high their Super Bowl expectations are, and last week they were hit hard again, losing Nate Ebner and Martellus Bennett for the season. Luckily injuries to key cogs Trey Flowers and Kyle Van Noy do not appear to be serious.

Can the Pats keep their 13-game road win streak and seven-game overall win streak intact while putting an iron grip on the AFC East title? Here’s the gameplan to make it happen.

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Brady’s Favorite Receiver (The Open One) Is Back!

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When Julian Edelman was lost for the season the first question on my mind was who was going to make the tough catches on third down. Brady had grown to depend on Edelman in the toughest spots. From 2013-2016, Edelman had 135 targets on third down, 40 more than second-place Rob Gronkowski.

If there was a player for defenses to key off of on third down, it was clearly Edelman. But now, without Edelman, the Patriots are spreading the ball around, with Brady becoming reacquainted with the days when his favorite receiver wasn’t Edelman or even Wes Welker, it was the open one.

Now the Patriots have a balanced third-down attack that has seen little regression from where things left off in 2016 with Edelman still tearing up the field.

Here’s how the 2016 season looked for third down targets.

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Bend Don’t Break Report: How 2017 Pats D Stacks Up

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Bend Don’t Break is what frustrated fans know as the Patriots’ favored style of defensive strategy. They don’t sell out by sending a ton of pressure, instead they preach not getting beat deep and good tackling. That forces opposing offenses to continually execute, something most of them can’t do for any sustained period without mistakes, whether it’s third-down red-zone stops, takeaways or missed field goals.

Sometimes, often on the first drive of the game, opponents seem to move the ball right down the field, only to stall out and have to settle for a field goal or worse. From there the Patriots’ constriction begins, often aided by turnovers, and that simply gives Tom Brady and the Patriots’ offense enough margin to win the game.

But the BDB leaves a bad taste in many dismissive minds. That’s because the Pats always tend to give up yards. In nine of the last 16 seasons they were in the bottom half of the league in yards-per-drive. The last two seasons saw dramatic improvement, with them finishing 7th in 2015 and 8th in 2016, their best back-to-back seasons under Belichick. Only once (2003) were they inside the top five at 4th.

Your eyes are not deceiving you. Teams consistently move the ball on New England’s defense. They just don’t score, and that’s the Bend Don’t Break.

So how does the 2017 team stack up so far? It’s developed from a total Bend AND Break edition early in the season to one far more typical of the last 16 years of Patriots defenses. Let’s take a look:

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Film Review: Pats vs. Dolphins Defense Edition

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The Patriots defense continued their streak of solid play against the Dolphins, only allowing 10 points and showing more of their renowned Bend-Don’t-Break style. There isn’t a lot of flash or sizzle with this defense, instead it’s mostly role players doing their jobs, tackling well and getting off the field in critical situations.

The team is on a seven-game win streak and they haven’t given up more than 20 points in a game since losing to the Panthers back in Week 4. As we’re well aware, points are what matters most but how good is this Patriots defense really? It’s been fairly smooth sailing as the offense has broken 30 points the last three weeks and has been generally in control for most of the seven games they’ve won in a row.

I still have my questions, not that I’m skeptical, but because I like to see the true character of a defense revealed and that only comes in pressure-packed situations, which they’ve mostly been able to avoid of late. That’s helped them get their feet under them, and the next few weeks should provide some more interesting challenges, especially facing the mobile Tyrod Taylor on the road this weekend and then the vaunted Steeler offense in two weeks after a rematch with the Dolphins in Miami (which I am very much not looking forward to).

Here’s 10 hits on 10 players who stood out to me against the Dolphins, players that will be critical to the defense for a Super Bowl run.

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Patshow #115: Dolphins Wrap and Bills Mafia Fails

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Here’s our latest episode of Patshow, which you can check out live every Tuesday morning here. In this week’s episode we breakdown the Pats sloppy blowout of the Dolphins, take a look at the best Tweedia from the game and check in with our Top 5 Bills Mafia Tailgate fails. Lots of fun all around and if you’d like to help support Patshow please throw a click or two down below to our sponsors who are helping us make Patshow into something permanent and awesome!

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Pats Posits: Injury Attrition and Wins Continue

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The Patriots rolled over the Miami Dolphins as most expected, but it wasn’t quite as enjoyable as it should’ve been with some sloppy play and worse, injuries marring the contest. It’s a constant refrain here on the blog — all that really matter at this point are injuries and Sunday’s game against Miami had a significant number of casualties. Nate Ebner, Trey Flowers, LaAdrian Waddle and Kyle Van Noy were among those to leave and not return.

So yes, a win is a win, but at this point the injury scoreboard is almost more important and there the Pats got beat pretty good.

Still, the beat rolls on as Dion Lewis and Brandin Cooks continue their sensational seasons sparking the new-look Patriots offense despite the litany of injuries. The defense continued their hot streak of not giving up many points, giving up just 10 themselves while the botched snap by Ted Karras gave the Dolphins their other touchdown. The defense has now moved into 11th place allowing 20 points-per-game, just a shade above the 18.6 that the Patriots have averaged under Bill Belichick.

With the Steelers needing a last-second field goal to knock off the struggling Packers, the Patriots remain atop the AFC favorites. While initial reports on Trey Flowers and Kyle Van Noy sound like these weren’t season-enders, the bumps and bruises continue to add up. Will they be enough to alter the destiny of this Pats team? We’ll see a pretty good test next weekend in Buffalo as the Bills look like they’ve gotten back on track with a win over the fading Chiefs.

Here are all the Posits on the Dolphins win.

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