new england patriots

Good stuff on Coach Belichick here…

The defensive snap numbers from last season paint an interesting picture that we might be able to extrapolate from when thinking about how the Patriots defense might be put together for Sunday.

Outside of Meriweather and Cunningham, every one of the defensive players that played the majority of snaps are back. Now, instead of Meriweather playing Free Safety, the Pats will likely put Chung there, with Ihedigbo being the in the box safety. Ihedigbo has had his issues but his size and physicality should be a plus in this one.

On the outside linebacker front you had Mark Anderson playing a huge role against the Broncos. Cunningham played his most snaps to date in last year’s game, a clear sign of how much the Pats wanted to put forth their most stout and physical defensive front seven.

So this is where a major question comes in, do the Pats keep Anderson out there in base or is he too big of a risk in the run game? If they go back to the 4-3 defense we could see an Ellis-Love-Wilfork-Deaderick line up front which might be the best option. Surely Anderson will get some snaps in sub-packages as will Dane Fletcher.

Below are the Pats who played the great majority of the snaps. They were in the 3-4 defense for 75% of the snaps.

• S Patrick Chung – 77 of 77
• ILB Jerod Mayo – 77 of 77
• CB Devin McCourty – 77 of 77
• CB Kyle Arrington – 76 of 77
• S Brandon Meriweather – 68 of 77
• OLB Jermaine Cunningham – 59 of 77
• OLB Rob Ninkovich – 58 of 77
• DL Vince Wilfork – 58 of 77
• ILB Brandon Spikes – 57 of 77
• NT Gerard Warren – 56 of 77
• DE Brandon Deaderick – 52 of 77