New England

[cincygrad]

I'm much less concerned about our game with them in a few weeks. Our biggest potential weakness on defense is covering elite (or even above average) receivers. These guys on New England stink. It's pretty sad when Edleman is your best wide out. If we can't beat them at home, we're likely a 5 win team at best.

 

[DanBengalfan]

New England will figure it out though, they can adjust, we can't.

 

[Yu Lee - A Nova Lover]

The new england patriots will suffer an aaron hernandez related KARMIC IMPLOSION by mid-season.

 

[Cincyfan78]

Brady just missed on two or three of those deep balls. The line had protection, and the WR's beat their guy deep. Brady's throw to Thompkins lead him out of bounds. A better throw, and that's 6 points. Then Dodson had one right off his fingers, that would have been 6 had it hit him in stride. Brady also missed a wide-open WR just before the shanked FG.

There were plays to be made. Honestly, Brady didn't look that great. Some of that is on the WR's, for sure, but a few of those deep balls, Brady was off.

 

[JDM]

The timing was off. Brady missed, Dobson had a ball or two he should have caught, but the biggest thing is not one or the other being terrible; it's that they don't have the comfort level yet. It's why I want Dobson to keep getting thrown into the fire. It's the only way to get that.

 

[cincygrad]

Don't get me wrong -- I never count out Belicheck and Brady. But they have really absorbed a lot of losses to that offense over the years. It's tough work when you consistently have to pick at the bottom of the draft and you have to pay all of your all-pro players. Their talent has eroded as much as Pittsburgh's but it definitely isn't what it used to be.

 

[JDM]

I don't disagree. I think they are very close to a rebuilt defense in the same situation, and that is fairly impressive IMO. The oldest skill position player they have is Amendola/Edelman at 27, and I think there is a lot of young talent that will be able to produce. Dobson has everything I want in a receiver, and I think the pieces are there that Belichick may have managed to entirely rebuild this team while averaging 12 wins a year.

Yes, that view is somewhat optimistic, but I think there is a lot of young talent on this team. That said, this team today is certainly not scary. I think there are the players to become a scary team by the time the playoffs roll around, but this is almost certainly a good time to face us. I am very happy to be 2-0, regardless of how they have looked so far.

 

[cincygrad]

I don't disagree. I think they are very close to a rebuilt defense in the same situation, and that is fairly impressive IMO. The oldest skill position player they have is Amendola/Edelman at 27, and I think there is a lot of young talent that will be able to produce. Dobson has everything I want in a receiver, and I think the pieces are there that Belichick may have managed to entirely rebuild this team while averaging 12 wins a year.

Yes, that view is somewhat optimistic, but I think there is a lot of young talent on this team. That said, this team today is certainly not scary. I think there are the players to become a scary team by the time the playoffs roll around, but this is almost certainly a good time to face us. I am very happy to be 2-0, regardless of how they have looked so far.

Getting to play the Bills and Jets for 1/4 of your schedule is a nice treat as well!

 

[JDM]

I would rather play tougher opponents so our youth gets more experience facing them.

 

[RoboticDreams]

I can't believe we are even discussing this. I've never seen a team lose so many pieces in one year. Brady has to adapt and teach these kids on the fly.

 

[bengaldoug]

They'll all come together along about the trip to Cincy.

 

[cdumler7]

New England definitely looks to be about as down as I have seen them for the last 10 years. Who knows once Gronk comes back how that will change for the offense but watching last night it looks like Tom is about as frustrated as he has ever been. The receivers look completely lost at times. They have talent but talent only gets you so far in this league. They will most likely still win the division (although Miami so far has looked like the class of the AFC East so we shall see how they continue) but sometimes having so much youth can be a hindrance especially when it comes to playing the top tier teams.

I have been impressed with their defense but come on they played 2 rookie quarterbacks with mediocre talent around them...Can't really gather too much on how they will actually play this season when that is all that they have gone against. I would say in reality the Pats should be 0-2 at this point in the season as the other teams did more to lose than the Pats did to actually win those games.

 

[JDM]

They took over on the last drive against buffalo and threw the ball repetitiely against the jets to try to force rhythm with the receivers because the game wasn't seriously in question. If they needed to I believe they could have ran the ball and controlled it a little better and made sure the jets didn't win.

I don't think either opponent particularly lost the game, although the patriots certainly didn't play great football.

 

[cdumler7]

They took over on the last drive against buffalo and threw the ball repetitiely against the jets to try to force rhythm with the receivers because the game wasn't seriously in question. If they needed to I believe they could have ran the ball and controlled it a little better and made sure the jets didn't win.

I don't think either opponent particularly lost the game, although the patriots certainly didn't play great football.

I would say the quarterbacks throwing into double and triple coverage when they are driving down the field would qualify as them costing their team the game. They made rookie mistakes as they are rookies.

Also how was the game not in serious question considering one of Smith's interceptions they were already in field goal range then he threw the pick? Throw in he actually had a touchdown pass dropped earlier so to say that the Patriots had this game wrapped up is seriously misunderstanding how close this game was. Any game decided by 3 points or less should never be considered as the team that won having it in hand. One play is all it takes in that situation to turn the game in the other team's favor.

 

[Gypsumstack]

Don't worry, Gronk will be back just in time to torch Rey time and time again.