PatsPropaganda

An Independent Patriots Blog

Adding Injury to Insult: Burkhead and Bentley to IR

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Remember yesterday when I dove into the All-22 and came away with one headline silver lining which was Ja’whaun Bentley looked really good in places, including his interception where he ran like we haven’t seen a linebacker run since the days of Jamie Collins. Welp, today Bentley along with Rex Burkhead were sent to IR.

It appears that Bentley was injured on the final play of the Lions game, adding another level of gut-punch to a season that has been not much fun for the past two weeks.


With the lack of speed already glaring in the middle of the field, losing Bentley like this is devastating. Putting more pressure on Hightower, Roberts and Van Noy, a trio that doesn’t need more pressure put on them. Of every defensive player, I’m not sure there’s a player I’d want to lose less. Maybe Trey Flowers but just about anyone else, including Hightower, would be less depressing, which I’d never thought I’d write as recently as 10 days ago but here we are.

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Film Review: Finding Some Silver Linings

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I was surprised that watching the All-22 of the Patriots loss to the Lions made me feel a lot better about the Patriots chances of turning the season around from the 1-2 start. This is almost always the case, because you get a sense of how close the Pats were on many plays that went against them.

It’s small consolation, but it’s a clear illustration that all is not lost and that a 23-10 loss isn’t the worst thing to ever happen to a football team even if it was the second week in a row the Pats didn’t really show up.

I had to take this one in as a total experience, not a specific play by play, drive by drive breakdown but I came away with some general thoughts that were much different than what I came away with as I depressingly crawled into bed close to midnight on Sunday.

The first good takeaway is the Ja’whaun Bentley is a keeper. Yes, he had mistakes that took away from his overall impressive play, but this is the kind of player the Patriots defense needs badly and he should only continue to improve. His reaction speed is so impressive, better I dare say than any other linebacker on the roster. Watching his interception and he sticks with his receiver like glue and effortlessly makes the pick.

I don’t know where the Patriots defense is headed, but I’m pretty positive that Bentley is going to be a building block.

The other good guy I’ll mention is Dietrich Wise, who appears to still be viewed mostly as a pass rusher at this point, but he brings great energy and is one of the only consistently disruptive players up front. Bentley and Wise are the future on defense.

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Pats Posits: This Feels Different

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The Patriots have had plenty of September stinkers over the years where an average-to-terrible team goes toe-to-toe with them and either flames out right at the end or dispatches the Patriots, and the punditry gleefully jumps to pronounce the dynasty dead.

Usually, in those games, it was just a case of a good football team playing bad football and the Pats would snap out of it with a statement win near the end of the month and then they’d cruise into the playoffs, constantly getting better and fighting through the kind of injuries that would derail every other team.

I’ve spent the early parts of those seasons being level-headed, reminding everyone how hard it is to win in the NFL, how amazing it was that we just took for granted that the Pats had been doing it for going on two decades. Because it was always clear to me that those Patriots teams that sputtered in September were far better than they looked on the field. I still believed that last week after the perfect storm loss to Jacksonville, but now, after an all-around flat performance in Detroit, even I’m starting to wonder if this is finally the year the Patriots just don’t have it.

Boil it down and we’re seeing a team that lost some key clutch playmakers while none of the replacements have stepped up. Aside from Dietrich Wise, no other young player has shown anything. Coming off the Jags loss it was easy to just assume the Pats would bounce back, but that meant brushing aside the losses of Patrick Chung and Trey Flowers, arguably their two best defenders.

So yes, this looks exactly how you’d expect a team to look that doesn’t have Amendola, Edelman, Lewis, Chung, and Flowers, while Dont’a Hightower, Duron Harmon and Devin McCourty have begun to regress and none of the developmental players have developed. No one outside of Brady-Gronk-White and Wise for a down or two were able to make any impact.

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Patriots Gamplan: Week 3 at Detroit Lions

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It’s been a long week in Patriots Nation. The team got blasted on the field. Another book came out and drudged up more things from 2017, a recurring occurrence now. Even the low-risk Josh Gordon acquisition was met with controversy. Sometimes it can be exhausting being an even-keeled Patriots fan man blogger and this was one of those exhausting weeks. But with a win in Detroit over Matt Patricia the Pats can get everything back on track and shut up a lot of the noise once again.

Despite a first-game shitshow, the Lions are going to put up a good fight. Like the Patriots, they’ve shown some holes but they’ve also had their share of nice plays, especially against the 49ers in a tight three-point loss.

While I know we will see a far better Patriots squad I also don’t expect it to be perfect. There’s still too much to work through, especially dealing with potential absences of Trey Flowers and Patrick Chung. Under any circumstances, a Pats defense without those two would be severely affected and that could be even more exacerbated if everyone plays as sloppy as they did in Jacksonville.

What do they have to do to get the all-important win and return home to face the Dolphins? Here’s the gameplan.

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Film Review: Patriots Offense and Defense Sucksonville Edition

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Nothing like an emotionless deep dive into the All-22 to give you a nice football reminder how scary it can look when even good teams play bad. I left my film review with a near-exact feeling like I had after breaking down the Patriots loss to the Chiefs in 2014. This is what happens when everyone takes turns making bad mistakes until things are just totally unraveled. Add in a talented young team playing a near-perfect game, making miraculous plays in heavy heat and it’s recipe for disaster.

And that’s what this loss was. But it was still just one loss in week two under extreme conditions. What we see in Detroit will be far more toward the center of who this team is. There might still be issues but no defense can play this perfectly bad two weeks in a row, especially a Patriots defense.

Flip just a couple plays and this is a ball game in the fourth quarter. But that doesn’t mean the Patriots don’t have issues to fix. Getting Josh Gordon this week proved that. But is it time to dip into the rookies at cornerback? At least there are options, whereas we’re all just holding our breath hoping Dont’a Hightower gets through the season on his knee.

More on that and everything else in the film review.

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Foxboro & Friends: Episode 1!

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Excited to introduce the first episode of Foxboro & Friends, a new webshow I’m doing with Nick “Fitzy” Stevens! We’ve got big things planned and this is just our Wayne’s World’y first episode, but we’re glad to be able to launch it after such a bummer loss.

Please like our Facebook page as we hope to get back to doing live broadcasts there.

Much more to come!

Will Josh Gordon to the Pats Work?

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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_QAiLZKL5hI

The Patriots once again proved that the team building process goes well into the season as they acquired wide receiver Josh Gordon from the Browns.

My initial reaction is just wow, because it’s so exciting to think what Josh Gordon playing at his best would do for the Patriots’ offense. But the chances seem remote that Gordon not only buys into the Football Machine but that he stays the straight and narrow, immersing himself in the culture and takes to it like Moss 2007.

Perhaps a more plausible case will be that McDaniels throws him some Patterson-esque plays, and he isn’t quite Moss 2007, but he’s a guy that can chip in with a couple plays a game (CAN YOU SAY UNDERNEATH CROSSERS?). After last weekend, even a couple plays per game sounds appealing.

It will be interesting to see how problem child Gordon takes to New England. It’s a huge opportunity for him, to finally tap his unquestionable talent, or let it all go to waste probably for the last time. It’s no easy task, he’ll have to totally buy in, and it’s been apparent that totally buying in was never his thing in Cleveland. Still, that’s Cleveland.

The Patriots have strong organizational stability and can afford to roll the dice on Gordon. He’ll be treated just like everyone else and he’ll either cut it or be cut.

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