My point is that the Patriots are very vulnerable when the offense does not play like it has been playing for the majority of the season. Last nights game proves my point. The defense is just a little above average, and I dont think they can win a playoff game when the offense does not give them a double digit lead. If the Patriots played like they did last night against any playoff team do you really think they would win? I think BB would say no, he pretty much did last night and today in his pressers. The Patriots allowed the game vs. Matt Flynn and the Packers to come down to the last possession, that is fairly concerning.
Football games are played on the field, not on the stat sheet and they are decided by points. They are not decided by yards, or by discounting the plays you want to discount (ie turnovers) and assume the outcome would be different without them.
The defense is not above average, it probably barely is average in many areas in a vaccuum. But you dont play in a vaccuum. The Ravens are a statistically superior defense to the Patriots yet the Ravens D consistently fails in the 4th quarter and ours does not. I am sure you think the Raven defense is better than the Patriots because it destroys awful teams. (Same with the Jets)That will not help it in the playoffs but the fact that they consistently fail in the 4th quarter will kill them against good teams.
The Patriot defense has shown that it consistently steps up in the 4th quarter. That it takes the ball away. As was proven,contrary to your opinion, takeaways are more common and more important in the post-season.
Finally, you may be 100% correct that this defense may have a harder time winning if its offense craps the bed than most teams. (I doubt it though because the defense has played to the scoreboard all season, and that is much more telling than any stats) But this team is far less likely to need its defense to overcome a crappy offensive day than any other.
What team do you expect to stop this Patriot offense and even make your concern relevant.
At this point, you just seem to be wasting an awful lot of time trying to make up a hypothetical argument to create a ficticious scenario to confirm your negativity after making a statement that we wont win because we rely on turnovers that proved to be completely wrong, and now you are scrambling for credibility.
I will give you an analogy.
When I was a teenager, I umpired Little League baseball. There was a sliding rule, where if the play was close you had to slide.
In one game there was a play that wasn't close and the guy didnt slide. The coach came out and argued and I told him the rule only applies to a close play and this wasnt a close play. Later there was a close play and the player slid, and was safe. He came out and argued that he slid too had. Finally, there was a play that the player didnt slide and was out. He came out and argued AGAIN. I told him I called the player out, and he argued for 10 minutes about whether I would have called him out if he was safe but didnt slide.
You are becoming that coach. You have forsaken having a valid argument with the desire to simply argue the point, and change your argument to fit the circumstances.
As I said earlier, your concern had become how would the defense play in a close game because it hadnt been in many, then when it shuts out a team in the 4th quarter of a 1 score game, your argument changes to other issues.
