Old School

I really thought I  preferred the 33-20 wins but winning 16-3 in Denver felt good. So good.

Defense wins championships, right? I think I heard that somewhere once.

Defense Wins You Know What

It isn’t like the Patriots defense has been bad in recent years. Not as good as the ‘03-’04 bunch but still, you know… not bad. They were a Top 10 defense in points allowed last year and they were good enough to help win a Super Bowl only two years ago. Is it just easy to forget the defense when you have Tom Brady leading a Top 3 scoring offense? Maybe that’s part of it. After all, with Brady, Gronk, Edelman and the rest putting 28+ on the scoreboard every week, the defense only needs to be good enough.

Will good enough be good enough this year?

Gronkless in Cincinnati

Rob Gronkowski will be out of the lineup for the fifth week in a row. Can the Patriots keep winning without him? Not easily.

I Heard Once That Defense Has Something To Do With Winning Something

You hear people refer to it as “multi” these days but what they’re really talking about is balance. Offense and defense. Passing and running. Stopping the pass and stopping the run. The Patriots have been a team that needed to outscore its opponents since 2007. Scoring 34 points a game will make that seem like an okay strategy until that one junk punch Sunday when you score 17.

It’s so, so easy to forget those 34 points was an average, not a guarantee.