The Patriots

[Boltnut]

His broke ass neck may have an effect on that. Box 'o' rocks that one...

Yeah, not the smartest guy. TB may have to rely on Nassib and rookie Nelson for outside pass rush until JPP can come back (early November?). But the point I was trying to make is that the pressure will come up the middle via Devin White.

[Boltjolt]

i'll take nwosu over collins now, let alone looking at career stage/age. Square and shelton are both just dl depth pieces. I don't get your shelton love. There is a reason he hasn't stuck anywhwere and at his age just signed a bottom of the barrel contract with very low guaranteed money. There are teams with need and cap space, and he got peanut shells.

Yes and that's all I meant. Neither are impact players but some depth players. Collins hadn't done much being injured often til last season which was kind of a comeback year for him but Nwosu is an up and coming player and is a better fit for us than Collins is.
I was a Collins fan when he was coming out and mocked him to us (we played a 3-4 then) so I like him but at this stage Nwosu is cheaper and his star is rising.

[Boltjolt]

Yeah, not the smartest guy. TB may have to rely on Nassib and rookie Nelson for outside pass rush until JPP can come back (early November?). But the point I was trying to make is that the pressure will come up the middle via Devin White.

He may be done for this season.

[wu-dai clan]

His broke ass neck may have an effect on that. Box 'o' rocks that one...

Like I was saying...

Suh was a bad signing by the Bucs.

[wu-dai clan]

Yeah, not the smartest guy. TB may have to rely on Nassib and rookie Nelson for outside pass rush until JPP can come back (early November?). But the point I was trying to make is that the pressure will come up the middle via Devin White.

He will be in coverage.
Back to the whiteboard.

[Boltnut]

He will be in coverage.
Back to the whiteboard.

He'll be attacking the LOS... it's what he does.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-2vg38N3k40

[like54ninjas]

He can do both....

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=m4G4jJ_CE20

and FUCK the patsies!!

[Boltnut]

He can do both....

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=m4G4jJ_CE20

and FUCK the patsies!!

Sure... he CAN cover. But he's at his best when he's attacking the LOS. With questions about their DE's, expect Devin White to provide pressure up the middle as a blitzer. There is more than one way to provide inside pressure...

[wu-dai clan]

He'll be attacking the LOS... it's what he does.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-2vg38N3k40

Oh brother.
OK.
TB on the rise.
Because of the fatties up front.
SMH.
See signature.

[Guest]

In that 10 years they never were worse than 10-6, they appeared in 5 AFC Championship games and 2 SB's. They were one miracle catch away from completing the first 19-0 season ever. Super Bowl or not, that's pretty consistent and pretty excellent.

In all but one of those scenarios the Pats were able to secure HFA because they were just the best team in the AFC that year. 2011 is the ONE exception I'll give you. And even then that had more to do with them getting to play the NFC East and AFC West that year (Two very weak divisions in 2011) rather than just the AFC East being weak.

You act as if winning 6 SB's and going to 9 in 18 seasons in no big deal. Literally no other franchise has ever done it. The 49ers run in the 80's/90's is the closet thing we've ever seen to this and they still won 1 less and went to 4 less SB's than the Pats did. And before you mention the AFC East being weak: The Falcons, Saints and Rams were far from tough competition during those years.

The Patriots just own the entire NFL.

In this decade the Patriots are 47-13 against the AFC East and 76-24 against the rest of the NFL. That's very very close to the same winning %.

That isn't to mention some intangible factors that causes a certain degree of ineptitude among the other 3 franchises. The Pats act as a buffer for those teams every winning the division. When you get last place that very often leads to your HC being fired, and those other 3 teams basically take turns getting last place. They go through HC's like crazy and its very difficult to establish stability.

Think of the AFC North as the opposite: With the Browns acting as the buffer that prevents the other teams from getting last place (Up until this year at least).

You had 3 HC's that have been employed for over a decade.

It goes back to my earlier point: If the Pats were in the AFC West the Broncos probably aren't able to attract Peyton Manning and the Chiefs aren't able to attract Andy Reid. Having the Pats in your division inherently keeps you down because high profile coaches and players that want to win will not want to have to get through the golden standard of the NFL every year to do so.


I hope so too. They have a good chance to be a very consistent team for as long as Tolesco is the GM. We have to hope that Stick pans out or we find another guy to be our franchise QB once Rivers retires. That being said if we can get 1 SB I'll be happy, let alone 6.

I will take your thoughts point by point:

1. It is easy to go 10-6 when you are guaranteed to go anywhere from 4-2 to 6-0 in your division every season. Even in those lesser 4-2 seasons, all that is required is to win 6 of 10 remaining games. Several of those games are going to be against lesser teams since every NFL team plays two full outside divisions every season. So, for example if one assumes 3 wins in 3 games against lesser teams from the other two divisions, even against "better" AFC East competition in which the Patriots only went 4-2, they would be 7-2 with 7 games left against better teams. They could go 3-4 in those games and still win 10 games.

Nobody is disputing that the Patriots have been a very good team over the years, but you seem to want to dismiss the benefit of playing in a crappy division year after year. I have zero doubt that if the Patriots had played in the AFC North all of these seasons instead of either the Steelers or Ravens (much less the Bengals or Browns), they would have lost more games in most of the seasons in the Brady/Belichick era. In short, they would have looked a lot like the Ravens or Steelers.

2. Except for 2007, the Patriots have never been clearly the best team in the AFC. Several times they would have been in that discussion, but just to come out and say that they were clearly the best is overrating them. They secured byes and/or home field advantage because they have had the built in advantage of playing year after year in a weak division. We are talking about a situation in which one more win than a team from another division can make all of the difference in terms of byes and home field advantage. Without getting a bye the Patriots have not reached even a single Super Bowl.

3. The Patriots have not owned the entire NFL over an 18 year period. They have had two four-year windows in which they won three Super Bowls each. During each window, it would be reasonable to consider them as being the most successful team, but not over the whole decade in between in which they failed to win even a single Super Bowl. During that decade, the Steelers, playing in a tougher division, went to three Super Bowls, winning two. The Giants won two Super Bowls over the Patriots. The Colts and Seahawks each went to two Super Bowls and won one. The Ravens, Saints and Packers won a Super Bowl.

4. IMO, you give way too much weight to the Patriots in terms of their impact on other teams/players/coaches. I think the appropriate weight would be ZERO. You think Peyton Manning was initimidated by the Patriots? Really? IMO, Manning saw a Denver team that made the playoffs in 2011 with Tim Tebow at QB and knew that he could make that playoff team much better by upgrading the QB position. And he was right as the Broncos were able to go to multiple Super Bowls. It had nothing to do with the Patriots.

Similarly, Andy Reid took over the head coaching job of the last place Eagles in a division that Dallas had won 6 times and appeared as a wild card once in the preceding 8 seasons. He turned the Eagles around in a competitive division. And yet, under your theory, a coach like Reid would be too intimidated to compete against the Patriots? I disagree with that take.

5. Finally, I would give the Patriots credit for the ineptness of other AFC East teams over the years to the extent that they beat them and directly put losses on their record just as I would give the Chargers credit for beating the Raiders over and over again when the Chargers had good teams from 2004-2010 and the Raiders did not, but to say that the prolonged troubles experienced by the Raiders were due to the Chargers would be giving too much credit to the Chargers just as saying the prolonged troubles experienced by the Dolphins, Jets and Bills have been due to the Patriots is giving the Patriots way too much credit.

The Patriots have had two successful four year runs that were separated by a decade in which they did not win any Super Bowls, but had good teams. The deserve a lot of credit for what they have accomplished, but not as much as you are giving them.

[like54ninjas]

FUCK the patsies!!!

[blueman]

FUCK the patsies!!!

I am blue and approve of this sentiment.