When was the last time the Patriots beat a good team on the road?

Was it the Tebow Broncos? I can't think of any other good team the Pats have beaten in their house in the last few years.

That has been a problem. I say it's time for that trend to end on Sunday.

They clearly weren't a "really good team" (neither were the Tebow Broncos, for that matter), but the Pats absolutely destroyed the Ravens in Baltimore 41-7 last year, sinking the Ravens' playoff hopes. The Ravens had won 4 in a row and were 8-6 at the time.

mayoclinic said:

They clearly weren't a "really good team" (neither were the Tebow Broncos, for that matter), but the Pats absolutely destroyed the Ravens in Baltimore 41-7 last year, sinking the Ravens' playoff hopes. The Ravens had won 4 in a row and were 8-6 at the time.

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Yeah I forgot they were still technically in contention...I guess if the Tebow Broncos were "good" then I'd have to count those Ravens as well.

Still would like to see the Pats make a statement on the road Sunday night. That's still been a problem in the last few years. If they can do that then I think these last few weeks will be validated.

Yeah id say Baltimore counts. Almost beat Carolina if they had gotten in from the 1.

sb1 said:

Yeah I forgot they were still technically in contention...I guess if the Tebow Broncos were "good" then I'd have to count those Ravens as well.

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The fact that it was the Ravens, that they were driving for a playoff spot, that they had won 4 in a row, and that the Pats completely annihilated them, all make this one count for me.

sb1 said:

Still would like to see the Pats make a statement on the road Sunday night. That's still been a problem in the last few years. If they can do that then I think these last few weeks will be validated.

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No doubt about that.

I thought this topic had been explored in some detail.

Does recent history look good? No, not really.
Are good teams suppose to win at home? Probably should.
Have the Patriots racked up numerous loses over the last few years? (4, 4, ,3, 2 in the last 4) Not many, so you really have to expect they have their usual "WTH" game and losses to good team which is more likely to happen on the road.

I get the feeling this is more of a balanced team than I have in quite a few years. I don't think past history (even the Miami/KC games) don't apply. Gronk is back, the offense is in sync. Defense is good/adjusted to losses. I feel good about the team and yes, they could still lose to any team on any Sunday.

Less of a chance against a bad team, greater chance against a good team (and that may not even be more than a 50-50 chance)

At 5-4, I consider the Bills a good team. A couple of breaks against the Texans and Chiefs and they'd be 7-2.

I go back to 2007 and it's amazing how good they were home or away against some really good teams. Beat the Colts, Ravens, Giants, Cowboys in their house when each and every one of those teams gave the Pats their very best shot.

And to think people hate that 16-0 banner. They deserve to have it up there, they freaking earned it.

2012 Ravens.

This is a little misleading. I have gone back and looked at the schedule for the last few years and the Pats haven't faced many good teams on the road.

Last year the only teams with winning records they faced on the road were Cincy and Carolina and both those games had fluke occurrences that affected the game (a torrential rain storm in Cincy that grounded Brady and Gronk getting raped for a non-call at the end of the game in Carolina).

In 2012, the only teams with winning records they faced on the road were Baltimore (with replacement refs where the Pats lost by one point where the Ravens kicked a last second field goal that many people feel wasn't a field goal) and Seattle (few teams win in Seattle). Both games were one point losses.

In 2011, they lost at Pittsburgh (with **** LeBeau actually changing his defense to confuse the Pats which he has never done before or since). They beat the Broncos.

So we are talking 6 games in three years and you can argue three of the losses were on flukes. It isn't like they get blown out by good teams on the road. Most of the losses were by under a TD.

RelocatedPatFan said:

I thought this topic had been explored in some detail.

Does recent history look good? No, not really.
Are good teams suppose to win at home? Probably should.
Have the Patriots racked up numerous loses over the last few years? (4, 4, ,3, 2 in the last 4) Not many, so you really have to expect they have their usual "WTH" game and losses to good team which is more likely to happen on the road.

I get the feeling this is more of a balanced team than I have in quite a few years. I don't think past history (even the Miami/KC games) don't apply. Gronk is back, the offense is in sync. Defense is good/adjusted to losses. I feel good about the team and yes, they could still lose to any team on any Sunday.

Less of a chance against a bad team, greater chance against a good team (and that may not even be more than a 50-50 chance)

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Also, this is the deepest and best Special Teams this franchise has ever fielded.

Seriously, BB has put together an All-Pro ST unit. While this hurts our roster depth for the 11s on O and D it clearly makes them dominant on ST.

Rob0729 said:

This is a little misleading. I have gone back and looked at the schedule for the last few years and the Pats haven't faced many good teams on the road.

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Yeah, it's a good point and I was about to go through the same exercise because off the top of my head I was having some difficulty coming up with examples.

I think it's a given that the Pats haven't performed as well on the road as at home in recent years. Then again they've been historically good at home (42-3 since 2009, 55-6 back to 2007) so we're comparing their road performances to one of the best home stretches ever.

I do think a statement win or two during this stretch would be huge. Doesn't need to be a blowout, but a convincing win at Indy, GB and/or SD would be huge, those are all quality opponents and I think it'd go a long way in instilling confidence in a potential road playoff game if Denver overtakes them or they make it to the neutral field of the SB.

Rob0729 said:

This is a little misleading. I have gone back and looked at the schedule for the last few years and the Pats haven't faced many good teams on the road.

Last year the only teams with winning records they faced on the road were Cincy and Carolina and both those games had fluke occurrences that affected the game (a torrential rain storm in Cincy that grounded Brady and Gronk getting raped for a non-call at the end of the game in Carolina).

In 2012, the only teams with winning records they faced on the road were Baltimore (with replacement refs where the Pats lost by one point where the Ravens kicked a last second field goal that many people feel wasn't a field goal) and Seattle (few teams win in Seattle). Both games were one point losses.

In 2011, they lost at Pittsburgh (with **** LeBeau actually changing his defense to confuse the Pats which he has never done before or since). They beat the Broncos.

So we are talking 6 games in three years and you can argue three of the losses were on flukes. It isn't like they get blown out by good teams on the road. Most of the losses were by under a TD.

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For comparison purposes, I went back and looked at the road record of the 14-2 SB teams from 2003 and 2004:

- The 2003 team went 6-2 on the road, losing 31-0 to the eventual 6-10 Bills week 1, and 23-16 to the eventual 5-11 Redskins week 4. They had 2 OT road victories: 19-13 against eventual 10-6 Miami, and 23-20 against eventual 5-11 Houston; they also beat the 6-10 Jets 21-16.. Impressively, they did beat 4 teams with eventual winning records on the road, but 3 of those games were very close: they beat eventual 10-6 Miami on the road in overtime 19-13, beat eventual 10-6 Denver 26-24 on the road (the famous intentional safety come from behind game), and beat eventual 12-4 Indy 38-34 on the road; they did, however, shellack the eventual 12-4 Eagles 31-10.

- The 2004 team also went 6-2 on the road, losing 34-20 to the eventual 15-1 Steelers (of course they avenged that with a resounding playoff road win) and 29-28 to the eventual 4-12 Dolphins. They beat the eventual 6-10 Cardinals (20-12), the eventual 9-7 Bills (31-17), the eventual 8-8 Rams (40-22), the eventual 7-9 Chiefs (27-19) and the eventual 4-12 Browns (42-15). The Bills were the only road team with a winning record who the Pats beat that year.

Winning on the road is tough.

It's hard to get wins against good road teams when you constantly have home field advantage in the playoffs.

The ratio of road games against good opponents and home games against good opponents isn't very balanced.

Considering the patriots have had HFA for the majority of the last few years up until the AFCCG you are looking at a 2-1 home game vs road game.

add to that any time the #1 seed lost giving the pats extra home games.

and on top of that the fact that the patriots play whoever the schedule says they play.

Others have gone back and found the opponents, not really a big deal imo.

Take it one step further... in the BB/Brady era, what is the Pats home/away playoff win/loss record (not counting Super Bowls, of course)?

At home: 12-3, .800.
On Road, 3-3, .500.

Our last win on the road in the playoffs... San Diego in 2006. (of course, we've only played one road playoff game since then... last year in Denver).

However, when you're playing a road playoff game, that means you were a lower seed, and presumably not as strong a team... so it makes sense that your W-L would be lower. Altho that didn't help in 2009, 2010, or 2012, when we lost playoff games at home.

So... what does this all mean, considering all this, from all these different angles?

One thing, and one thing only...










WE MUST BE IN THE MIDDLE OF A BYE WEEK!!!

shmessy said:

Seriously, BB has put together an All-Pro ST unit. While this hurts our roster depth for the 11s on O and D it clearly makes them dominant on ST.

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Which offensive units do you think have lost depth to STs? My take starts:

• QB -- no.
• RB -- yes. We could have a better offensive player than Bolden if he weren't kept for his ST prowess.
• WR -- no. With Dobson a perennial healthy scratch, WR depth is fine.
• TE -- no. We might wish Hooman were better or Wright used more, but depth is fine.
• OL -- no.
• CB -- obviously not.
• S -- no; rather, the total count is padded for reasons of ST.
• DT -- no. Depth is fine, whatever you think about quality.
  
• Edge rusher -- I lean yes. We could use another roster slot for a developmental guy.
• Other LB -- I lean yes. I suspect that BB wants to have ST LBs develop into 4-down ones. But the ones for whom it works out always seem to be the edge rusher types (Vrabel, Ninkovich, sort of Pierre Woods). Unless I'm forgetting somebody, the pure standup LBs developed from STs seem to have topped out at Chatham/Fletcher/Guyton quality.

mayoclinic said:

They clearly weren't a "really good team" (neither were the Tebow Broncos, for that matter), but the Pats absolutely destroyed the Ravens in Baltimore 41-7 last year, sinking the Ravens' playoff hopes. The Ravens had won 4 in a row and were 8-6 at the time.

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I count this game and mentioned it here before. Folks have to remember Baltimore came to Foxborough and "punched the Patriots in the mouth", as the media likes to say, and beat the Pats in the AFC Champ game the year before...

sb1 said:

I go back to 2007 and it's amazing how good they were home or away against some really good teams. Beat the Colts, Ravens, Giants, Cowboys in their house when each and every one of those teams gave the Pats their very best shot.

And to think people hate that 16-0 banner. They deserve to have it up there, they freaking earned it.

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I hate second place banners. Should be like the Celtics and only hang title banners.

Fencer said:

Which offensive units do you think have lost depth to STs? My take starts:

• QB -- no.
• RB -- yes. We could have a better offensive player than Bolden if he weren't kept for his ST prowess.
• WR -- no. With Dobson a perennial healthy scratch, WR depth is fine.
• TE -- no. We might wish Hooman were better or Wright used more, but depth is fine.
• OL -- no.
• CB -- obviously not.
• S -- no; rather, the total count is padded for reasons of ST.
• DT -- no. Depth is fine, whatever you think about quality.
  
• Edge rusher -- I lean yes. We could use another roster slot for a developmental guy.
• Other LB -- I lean yes. I suspect that BB wants to have ST LBs develop into 4-down ones. But the ones for whom it works out always seem to be the edge rusher types (Vrabel, Ninkovich, sort of Pierre Woods). Unless I'm forgetting somebody, the pure standup LBs developed from STs seem to have topped out at Chatham/Fletcher/Guyton quality.

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On Offense? Other than "Slater the WR" and Bolden, you're right, not much lost to ST aces.

On Defense? Chris White LB, Nate Ebner S, Donald Jones S, Jonathan Casillas LB are all (or at least 3 out of 4) considered among the very best STers in the league. That is "loaded". None of them I ever want to see on our Defense. I am still fearful about our LB depth.

Froob said:

I hate second place banners. Should be like the Celtics and only hang title banners.

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Is it really second place if no one else has done it before?