Playoff hopes, vs playoff expectations.

My hopes are that we win the Superbowl obviously. I would not bet against Brady and BB if they make another one (no way we lose 3 straight).

Getting there is going to be tough though. I have a feeling we get Cincy, and even though I fully anticipate us beating them, their pass rush is vicious and you never know how our young wideouts will respond.

Teams I'm Worried About In Order :

• Chiefs
• Bengals
• Broncos
• Colts
• Chargers

The Chiefs pose an interesting threat to us. Strong d-line and solid run game. Charles will run wild against us, even though we have sured up our d-line a little bit. I worry about dink and dunk teams against press coverage with Arrington.

I dont put a lot of stock in the regular season Pats/Broncos game, Pats gave up a lot of points mostly due to turnovers, same for the Broncos and Manning was not passing and they didnt have their best TE. I would really like for NE to beat Denver again but in their stadium I really dont see it happening without Gronk or someone to take his place as a larger presence in the endzone. Go back and look at that game with Denver, Denver moved the ball as did the Pats (but only in the second half). I dont think Denvers plan will be to try to rush for 200 again. I think NE loses in several of the matchups due to poor defense, of which Denver has one of those also but add to that the lack of ability for the Pats to score passing TD's in the red zone, they pretty much suck at it.

I think the Pats got lucky that Fox decided that the run was the way to go. That wont happen again and certainly not in Denver. Look i want the Pats to win I just agree with some other folks, the Broncos are loaded and they can get to the SB with that lousy defense, heck the Pats did it in 2007.

BradyFTW! said:

I assume that the four good teams that you're talking about are the Pats, Chargers, Colts and Chiefs? To be totally honest, I think it's still up in the air as to whether the Chiefs and Chargers are actually good. The Chargers went .500, and only managed that by eeking out a must-win against KC's backups. And KC basically just put on a season-long clinic on beating backup quarterbacks for bad teams. They were exposed against the Colts, I thought.

From where I'm standing, it looks like the Broncos only played two good teams and lost to both of them. That said, I'm still more afraid of them than anyone else in the AFC. I think everyone's banging the "they're overrated" drum so hard that they've somehow become underrated.

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The chargers actually played the broncos great and are a bad matchup for them.
Phillip rivers is the only other qb that has never been caught up in the peyton manning hype and has outplayed him many of times.

I'm expecting a SB. We are hard to beat at home so we have a good chance at the AFCCG. We have already proven we can beat Denver. I'd expect us to play the Chiefs, then face the Broncos.

It's very simple , we can win the SB but brady will have to play 3 straight great games. He can't have a let down the AFC title game last year

A man named Brady said:

It's very simple , we can win the SB but brady will have to play 3 straight great games. He can't have a let down the AFC title game last year

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That wasn't Tom last year. That was a lack of receivers getting open and welker drops. Tom didn't have much to work with.

obgod3 said:

Look i want the Pats to win I just agree with some other folks, the Broncos are loaded and they can get to the SB with that lousy defense, heck the Pats did it in 2007.

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I agree with your thoughts that beating DEN out at Mile High will be difficult, especially 2/2 times this season, and 3 in a row altogether.

I am a bit confused with your comment about the Pats being able to get to the SB in 2007 with a lousy defense however, as they had an awesome defense that gave up 17 points a game on average

Actually, the 2007 defense had 12/19 games where they only gave up 17 points or less, and were coming off of the incredibly effective 2006 defense that ranked either 1st or 2nd overall and was giving up 14.8 points a game.

I feel like I did going into the playoffs after the 06 season. After dispatching of the Jets, I had no real expectation of beating the Chargers. I went into that game prepared to lose and as it unfolded, I was as happy as I had been since 01. In 03 and 04 I was so sure of a Super Bowl title that I don't think I fully enjoyed the games as much as I'd like to have.

The Indy game, while disappointing, was only tough due to the way the team collapsed. In hindsight, that team had no business being in a position to be moments away from a Super Bowl and I will always love that team as I do this one.

CISGS said:

Teams I'm Worried About In Order :

• Chiefs
• Bengals
• Broncos
• Colts
• Chargers

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Again, I find it interesting that you could ask 10 different people here who they are concerned about and would rather play, and you'd get 10 totally different answers.

Some are worried about KC, while a poll I saw the other day fans were hoping to get KC. Some are worried about DEN, while others think that we match up well against them. Some don't want to play a recently hot SD team, while others point to their 6.1 defensive gain per play and hope to face them. Some don't want to face the physical CIN team who already beat us this season when we had a much better defense, while others point to their 3-5 away road record and say "bring it on..."

The AFC is so insanely wide open this season outside of obvious and well-deserved favorite DEN (in my opinion), that it's either going to be anyone can win it OR everyone else is a pretender outside of the Broncos.

BradfordPatsFan said:

The Indy game, while disappointing, was only tough due to the way the team collapsed. In hindsight, that team had no business being in a position to be moments away from a Super Bowl and I will always love that team as I do this one.

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We had a 12-4 record in 2006, and also boasted one of the nastiest defenses in the entire league who was ranked #2 overall and gave up a 14.8 per game point average.

We then went on the road and knocked off the #1 seed SD Chargers on the west coast, dealt with the flu to practically the whole team, flew back to Boston, prepared as much as they could, then flew out to Indianapolis and promptly shut Peyton Manning down by leading 21-6 at halftime.

I'm going to have to respectfully disagree with you and say that we had every reason to believe that we deserved to be there, and would've whipped the lowly CHI team into submission on the way to our 4th SB ring, had it not been for the horrible officiating error, which they later apologized for to no avail.