AFC Championship Game : Patriots vs. Colts -- Pre-Game Thread

[turkeyneck]

Manning was fearsome at one time. he did have his Achilles heel in some situations though like weather and big games. Sort of sad to see him suddenly an old man. He should retire. Thanks for the memories Peyton. Enjoy your millions.

It was like watching Willie Mays playing for the Mets. PM needs to face it and retire.

Welker too.

 

[patsfan06]

This is the last team the Pats wanted to come to Foxboro ..

Stop pretending to speak for the team.

We already went into the Colts hostile environment and whooped them. Now we get them at home?

Child please.

 

[ashley]

After the game, the Colts were celebrating like they just won the Super Bowl, let's hope they are just happy to be there and are intimidated to go into Foxboro

 

[SHOWTIME15]

The negative about this is just that...we may have seen the last manning-Brady duel last year...

And it was an afc champ game loss on our part

other than the the 42-21 whooping we put on him in November?

 

[Archeryaddict12]

Gonna be a close one but don't be confident. Still the playoffs. Pats can lose if they don't play 60 min

 

[mayoclinic]

So much for Denver getting the soft home game against the Colts while the Pats had the matchup from hell against the Ravens. Another one and done for Manning. That bye week really helped a lot.

Denver went from a team touted by the mediots as potentially one of the greatest teams in history before they came to Foxboro to a pretty meh looking team. Hard to imagine the future with Manning is going to get any brighter. People here were much too worried about the Broncos, predicting that they would win out and that we would need HFA to avoided the kiss-of-death playoff trip to Denver.

Credit to Indy for going on the road to Denver and kicking butt. Now we'll find out if they are a different team than the one who got whipped by the Pats and more recently by the Cowboys.

 

[Rob0729]

This is the last team the Pats wanted to come to Foxboro ..

This is this week's last team the Pats wanted to come to Foxboro. Funny, last week it was the Ravens even with the Colts being a possibility to come into Foxboro.

 

[Sticky Caulk]

Blount in playoffs vs Colts last season: 24 carries, 166yards, 6.9average 4 TDs.
Gray in regular season vs Colts this season: 37 carries, 201 yards, 5.4 average 4 TDs.

Ridley scored 2 TDs on the Colts in the same game Blount had 4. We know exactly how New England will attack the Colts. We know exactly how the Colts will attack New England. One has been massively more effective than the other.

 

[unoriginal]

On paper the Pats match up well, but if they fall behind 14-0 again it will be much harder to come back than against the Ravens, because the Colts D is per usual built to stop the pass, and their secondary hasn't been destroyed by injury.

A fast start and the Pats should roll.

 

[English Patriot]

A healthy dose of Gronk will be more than enough next week

 

[SteelersCanada]

I disagree heavily that this is the last team the Patriots wanted to play. In fact, I think this is the ideal match up for you guys.

 

[pencilneckgeek]

The Colts looked better than I've seen them before, but I'm still going to hold out for a game where the Pats have a 2:1 run to pass ratio on the heels of a pass-only victory.

 

[Archeryaddict12]

Question now becomes, how banged up is stork? Ir, inactive or ready to go?

 

[Connecticut]

Shouldn't underestimate the Colts. Doubt they'll bring the heat like Baltimore, but still, cautious optimism.

 

[tombonneau]

This is the last team the Pats wanted to come to Foxboro ..

Is this a joke? Obviously Colts are the top team Pats would want to see. Totally owned 3x in past two years. Best matchup by far. Anything can happen, but if game plans are carried out Pats should win by 10+. Line opened at 7 and I bet early sharps have it to 7.5-8 by midnight.

 

[zipster9]

I think Colts' TE, Fleener was an issue for the Patriots in the last matchup. Other than that, Patriots nullified TYHilton, Wayne, and Nicks.

 

[saspack]

Will Gray be active next week?

 

[obgod3]

I think the game will be closer than the last one, saying that they have their work cut out for them. pats defense will play much better next week, offense still has Gronk and Edleman and now the new guy Amendola...ha ha...I would be very surprised to see NE lose this. Our CB's and Safety's are better than Denver so I think NE matches up well. But still gotta play.

 

[SHOWTIME15]

I think Colts' TE, Fleener was an issue for the Patriots in the last matchup. Other than that, Patriots nullified TYHilton, Wayne, and Nicks.

can't cover everyone. I'm sure bill would be thrilled to negate hilton, wayne and nicks if it meant leaving fleener open.

 

[English Patriot]

The one main positive i take out of Colts winning is they will not play us anyway near as hard as the Ravens did. As i said this week was our AFC title game in theory.