PatsFaninAZ

Looking at the schedule at the beginning of the year, I never would have expected that the Patriots would end up only playing three games against playoff teams. It looked way harder in the beginning of the year. Even more strange -- the only one of the three they won was the 8-8 Broncos!

Just goes to show how strange the NFL can turn out. It turns out the North had 3 of the top 5 teams in the AFC, and that's the way it goes some times.

Interestingly, the Patriots played lots of teams that were competing for the playoffs but ended up a game short -- the Jets, Chargers, Raiders, Chiefs, and Cowboys. I think at least three of those teams would have made the playoffs if they had won their games against the Patriots -- the Jets, Chargers and Raiders. I'm not sure about the Chiefs -- if everyone had ended up 8-8 in that division, I don't know what would have happened. The Cowboys would have just missed even if they beat the Patriots, because the Giants beat them twice.

PatriotFan77

Was a weird year

mgcolby

Which is why I laugh every year when people look at the schedule in April and come to conclusions....either "oh man this schedule is going to be easy" or "oh man this schedule is going to brutal". One thing recent history in the NFL tells you is half of the teams that you think will be good, will either be average or outright suck and half of the teams you think will suck will turn out to be average or good.

Team chemistry, injuries, surprise performers, under achievers, previous season's overly weak or overly strong schedule tainting the teams record one way or the other...etc all lead to the 50% rule when it comes to the turnover of playoff teams from the previous year.

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letekro

Yeah, but playing the AFC South and NFC West next year has me jumping to some unavoidable conclusions: Tarvaris Jackson, John Skelton/Kevin Kolb, Alex Smith, Sam Bradford, Blaine Gabbert, Matt Hasselbeck and Indy Rookie are not scaring anybody and likely will not be able to score with the 2012 Pats.

TBradyOwnsYou

I've already marked down this Super Bowl as a win and the next season as 19-0. If you want a 30-0 tshirt give me a hollar, I put an order in for 1,000 of them!!

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