Seneschal2

The Pats ranked 7th.

Gosselin's NFL special teams rankings

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"What we want to try to do is maximize each spot on the roster; we want to be stronger at No. 1 than the opponent, stronger at No. 25 than they are, and stronger at No. 53 than they are, we're always looking to upgrade the talent level on the team, and play together to be functional."
- Bill Belichick -

PatSunday

The Patriots were #1 in field goals? That's remarkable. They also went 11-5. One cannot deny the Pats offense was great at moving the ball, just that they couldn't always finish with a touchdown while Cassel was still getting adjusting to playing from high school (which also happened to be about 8 years prior.)

This is also consistent with what I remember (Patriots ending with a field goal way too often.)

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2007 Predict the Score Contest Results: 1st, 1st, and 6th.

jeffbiologist

My take on this: Pittsburgh uses its special teams to develop their defensive players while other team use special teams specialists. Why do we constantly wonder where this new undrafted LB comes from(Harrison)?? Because they use less of their roster for ST personnel. Can it work both ways?? Yes, but the way Pitt does it you can afford to lose those "superstar" types without missing production on the field. Baltimore did the same with AD, our guy(Woods).....not so much. This definately helps the salary cap in the long run as well too! For the amount of time and roster spots held for ST specialists we should be in the top 5 every year, hmmmm.

jmt57

This list blows away my theory about special teams being vastly under rated. Seven of the nine best teams listed here did not make the playoffs, while three of the botom five did.

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letekro

"Football is a complimentary game...."

VJCPatriot

Gostkowski was outstanding last year. He was easily the best PK in the league and probably helped the Pats ranking in that regard. I thought our punting was terrible and our kick return coverage let us down at times though. There's certainly room for improvement at ST outside of our PK and LS.

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jbb9s

Gotta say that ST evaluation is sometimes subjective......I remember when 1 opponent pulled off a surprise onsides kick when Slater (or someone like that) turned their back before the ball was actually kicked. I remember saying to myself: "THAT WOULD HAVE NEVER NEVER HAPPENED DURING VINTAGE 03-04"