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Patriots re-sign Devin McCourty to a one-year deal

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Fred Kfoury III/Icon Sportswire via Getty Images

As first reported by his children, Devin McCourty is returning to New England for a thirteenth season with the franchise on a reported one-year deal worth $9M.

I can see the ups and downs of this move, so let’s start with the ups.

Positivley speaking, McCourty is one of, if not the top leaders of this team, he’s one of the most tenured players on the roster and certainly checks off that worry I had about if there would be enough locker room leaders to help the team forward. Alongside his duties as a captain, DMac still can still play a role on defense, in a unit which is slated to include him, Kyle Dugger, and Adrian Phillips.

The downside to this is that $9M is a fair bit for a declining veteran who we all saw slow down last season, I think this could be his final season as a pro, let’s hope it’s a good one!

In other news…

Earlier today the Patriots placed a second-round tender on Jakobi Meyers, who is a pending restricted free agent. This means If a team makes an offer for Meyers, the Patriots have a chance to match the offer, or, if they let him leave, they will receive a future second round draft pick. With a team offer for Meyers unlikely, the Patriots will retain the former undrafted pass-catcher for another season for around $3.9M.

Also reported this afternoon was the decision that the team have decided to let Fullback Jakob Johnson test out the open market, not a surprise given how much of a salary increase the lowest tender would have cost. Don’t be surprised to see Johnson back with the team next season though, especially given that the Patriots now have an international market in Germany.

Patriots 2018 Season Snap Counts: Nobody Died

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If nothing else, the NFL season depends on attrition. Just a key injury to a player or two can completely derail the best-laid offseason plans. It happened in the first quarter of the first game of the 2008 Patriots’ season. That’s why you shouldn’t bet on Super Bowl 53 in June.

These days, all that really matters is if Tom Brady, Julian Edelman, Dont’a Hightower and Rob Gronkowski make it to January. Despite any regular season ups and downs these guys have always shown up when the lights are brightest. And they will always give the Patriots a fighting chance in any game, even in, gasp, Kansas City.

Here we are on the playoff bye week and guess what, nobody died. Outside of the disappointing loss of Ja’whaun Bentley and a few guys taking a game off here and there, the 2018 Patriots have remained remarkably healthy and that is everything to their Super Bowl chances.

They’ve got their bumps and bruises for sure, as does every team, but with every key veteran piece accounted for the Pats should still have their best football in front of them.

Here’s a breakdown of who played the most, it’s no surprise the Pats once again gained a first round bye.

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Film Review: Pats Defense All In Sync vs. Vikings

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The Patriots defense didn’t quite turn in the near-perfect performance that I saw against Miami earlier in the year, but they were pretty close against the Vikings. Despite their road inconsistencies, no one can argue this isn’t a top-10 defense at home.

The addition of some murkiness to the third-and-longs was fun to see, as was some aggressive strategy (Cover 0 blitz!?), but those twists aren’t really what defines why these Patriots are good. They’re good because they’re once again fundamentally sound and all playing in sync. A defense that doesn’t give up big plays and doesn’t beat itself is hard to score more than 20 points. On this day they held Minnesota to just 10.

Now that we’re into December it’s not too much to expect the Pats to put their days of playing down to the competition on the road behind them. That starts with the defense, who showed perfect symmetry between coverage and pass rush to negate a talented Viking offense.

Here’s a bunch of rapid-fire thoughts on what I saw on the All-22.

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Pats Posits: Bye Week Not a Magic Elixir, But Pats Still in Playoff Bye Hunt

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On one hand, I feel like this weekend’s win over the Jets just reinforced what I’m already sure about with the 2018 Patriots, that with Sony Michel going they’re a very good offense. Without him, they’re up and down, and the struggles on third down are very real. Defensively, they’re up and down as well, but technically sound enough to take down an offense like the one the Jets rolled out there. Can they do it against a great offense on the road? Sunday did nothing to alleviate the concerns there, because it was Josh McCown and not some dual-threat quarterback they can expect to see in the playoffs.

But on the other hand, how much of this game was a traditional Jets struggle? How much were the penalties the Pats’ sloppiness compared to the flag-happy refs that call more penalties than anyone? How much was bye week rust? We can sweep this one under the rug, but there will be nowhere to hide on the road in Miami and Pittsburgh.

This sure didn’t feel like the reset button win we hoped would come post-bye, but it was still a solid victory. It might not have allayed my fears about what this editions weaknesses are, but it showed that even if they’re not perfect, the Patriots are still a very solid football team that will give any team problems.

More on it all in Posits.

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Patriots Gameplan: Week 12 at New York Jets

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Is it really already week 12? Yes, we’re after Thanksgiving, when the “real” football starts and the push to the playoffs begins. After a week off the Patriots are back in contention for a bye, a vitally important piece of the Super Bowl run equation. There are just six games left, with three of the next four on the road. That’s where we’ll learn the most about who these Patriots really are.

They kick things off with the 3-7 Jets who will be without rookie quarterback Sam Darnold. The Jets have been hit hard with injuries this year, with running back Bilal Powell ending up on IR. Losing your best running back and young quarterback when you’re in rebuild mode is never a good thing and the Jets have lost four in a row and have put up just 26 total points in their last three games.

Still, no matter how bad the Jets appear on paper they always seem to play their asses off against the Patriots. Last October they put up 400 yards on the Patriots and lost by just a touchdown and that was a team that won just five games. The season finale was a meaningless affair just as this year’s finale will likely be.

But for now the Pats have a lot to prove on the road, and the Jets have the 2nd-best third-down defense in the league. That hits the Pats where they’ve struggled most. Tom Brady and the offense will get a good test. Defensively there aren’t any excuses. They’ve played down to the competition on the road and to do it again this week after getting a break will be unacceptable and another sign that the Pats are sputtering when they usually don’t sputter.

Let’s dive into both sides of the ball and come up with a gameplan that will get the post-Thanksgiving train rolling!

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Pats Posits: Maybe the Pats are Just Bored

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It was nice to get a chance to catch our breath over the bye week and enjoy some non-Pats-stressed football. What seems clear is that the parity of last season has extended into 2018. It’s good for the league that so many games were close with the exception of just a couple blowouts which please the fantasy crowd.

After the Chiefs, Saints and Rams it’s a whole lot of up and down teams that could win or lose on any given Sunday. The Pats are definitely in that lower tier but part of me has to wonder if maybe the Patriots Football Machine is just having a little trouble getting up for non-big games. Especially on the road. At home against good teams, the Patriots have looked like one of the most solid teams in the league.

How you play on the road and against supposed inferior competition does say a lot about the complexion of your team, but I don’t know, maybe this team is just having as hard a time getting psyched up to play all our old friends at the Titans or Lions as I do. And a September Super Bowl in Florida? Whatever. Wake me up for KC, Aaron Rodgers, Big Ben and playoff games.

This is a transition year on offense and injuries have altered things a bit. Defensively, there aren’t any excuses. They’ve played pretty good at home and on the road they’ve looked like a different defense. The struggles on special teams, resulting in field position losses, have been silent killers.

We’ll get a small idea whether or not they can finally just turn it on this weekend. Yeah, the Jets have struggled but so has Buffalo and they hung with these road Pats. New England will get no credit for putting down the Jets, especially if their offense sputters again, but a solid road win to start the post-Thanksgiving push would be nice.

There’s a good team inside these 2018 Patriots, but their dueling personalities have drawn skepticism about their Super Bowl chances. All I know is they’ll keep at it, and go down swinging no matter what. It’s just what they do, even when they don’t win.

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Film Review: Patriots Defense vs. Titans Edition

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It took me a couple days to finally dive into the film review of the Patriots against the Titans and I can’t say I was looking forward to it. But I’ve been with this defense for a decade and I can’t shy away even when things go as badly as they did in Tennessee.

Let’s take a look at the scoring drives and what went wrong.

1st Drive – Touchdown

The first play of the game pretty much summed up what kind of day it was going to be, as the pressure collapsed around Marcus Mariota but couldn’t bring him down and he found Corey Davis on a deep in cut. The re-appearance of Keionta Davis was a bit surprising and what wasn’t surprising was how the Titans went right after him on this drive. He had the same trouble getting off blocks and making plays. Really Trey Flowers was the only one who showed any pop in this first drive. The Titans finished it off on a third down as Patrick Chung failed to get a jam at the point of the bunch set and was outrun across the field by Jonnu Smith. The rollout by Mariota forced Devin McCourty into a no-win position (see below).

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