Patriots have the NFL's easiest schedule 3rd year in a row??

[DarrylS]

As Dan Snyder and the Washington Redskins continue to flounder, a Washington Post sports scribe came up with the idea of using a metric of projected point spread in the 2019 season to determine the difficulty of the Patriots Schedule.. all of this before TC, preseason, injuries and roster adjustments.. "Projected Preseason Point Spreads"??? WTF...

They need to do something to justify their existence and salaries..

https://www.washingtonpost.com/spor...hedule-third-year-row/?utm_term=.e2075a487e35

Even though the NFL’s schedule makers jump through hoops to ensure parity, the Patriots again have the easiest schedule in the league. To determine this, we used the weekly preseason point spreads released by CG Technology in May to calculate each team’s projected record and its opponents’ records. Because New England’s division, the AFC East, is the worst division in the NFL and the AFC East’s teams play two other divisions expected to be near the bottom, the NFC East and AFC North, the average Patriots opponent is expected to win seven or eight games in 2019, not dissimilar to last year’s exercise or the results from 2017.

 

[wizwor]

'cause they don't have to play the Patriots. So unfair!

 

[supafly]

I remember someone posting a breakdown of the AFCE division records which showed that it wasn’t nearly as bad as many think, but I don’t remember what thread it was in.

And I agree that this article about using point spreads to try and determine SOS is ridiculous.

 

[moosekill]

The title and conclusion are misleading. He bases the “easiest schedule” on the fact they are favored to win in every game except for one. There are two factors that lead Vegas to think a team will win. How weak the opponent is and how strong your team is. If the Jets switched schedules with the pats they would not be favored to win every game. Plus let’s face it, the pats will be favored to beat any team in the league at home and all but two or three on the road.

 

[moosekill]

If the title was, Vegas thinks the Patriots are the strongest team, or the Patriots have the best chance to have the best record it would be fine. Rather he implies that they have the easiest schedule, ie play the weakest teams, which isn’t true.

 

[TruthSeeker]

It really is ridiculous to ignore the most important factor in the calculation - the expected strength of the Patriots team. But I guess it draws clicks and perpetuates myths.

 

[Pat the Pats Fan]

Go figure, the tuna fish have the third hardest schedule based on this writer’s weak premise, but they play the same weak conferences as the patriots? Maybe it’s because the tuna are projected to suck big time....sorry I wasted one of my free reads at the post on this.

 

[WaterfallJumper]

Go figure, the tuna fish have the third hardest schedule based on this writer’s weak premise, but they play the same weak conferences as the patriots? Maybe it’s because the tuna are projected to suck big time....sorry I wasted one of my free reads at the post on this.

Easy explanation: they play us; we play them.

 

[aluminum seats]

Wow, that’s really dumb.

 

[bormio]

They actually pay people to write this tripe.

 

[TomPatriot]

Patriots = Bad, lucky, cheating, lying. Blah, blah, blah, again.

Best organization in all of sports. Hands down. Period.

 

[50-yard-line]

Wah wah.

I have no patience with stupid people and this guy is stupid. The Pats play 6 games every year against the AFC East. That's a given. The other three AFC East teams look worse than they are because they play the Pats twice. That's logic.

The Pats then play 8 games against two other divisions, same as the other three teams in the AFC East, so that's a wash.

The Pats' last two games are against the remaining two AFC DIVISION WINNERS, while the other AFC East teams play the teams in those other two AFC divisions who finished equal to them in place.

In short, the Pats have the exact same schedule as the other AFC East teams, except they have to play each other twice and the Pats play the previous year's best team in the two AFC 1-play divisions.

So unless you count the head-to-heads, which should logically be a wash when determining strength of schedule, the Pats can have no better than the 4th easiest schedule in the league any year they win the AFC East.

 

[SHOWTIME15]

Easy explanation: they play us; we play them.

Twice

 

[Simpelton]

Of course we have an easy schedule compared to the other 31: We never have to play the Patriots.

 

[hornetfb85]

I feel dumber now that I’ve read that, and that’s hard to do...

 

[jmt57]

I remember someone posting a breakdown of the AFCE division records which showed that it wasn’t nearly as bad as many think, but I don’t remember what thread it was in.

And I agree that this article about using point spreads to try and determine SOS is ridiculous.

Here's the article.

The Myth of the Easy AFC East, the Definitive Guide | Patriots Dynasty

Whenever some writer uses the words "easy AFC East" or "AFC East is the worst division in football", that writer deserves to be bombarded with links to this article.

Division records since 2000:
AFC East -- 653-595-0 -- .523
NFC East -- 634-612-2 -- .508

Division records, excluding division winner, since 2000:
AFC East -- 428-516-0 -- .453
NFC East -- 421-521-2 -- .446



A few previous discussions on the subject:

Mythbusting: Patriots benefit from a weak division?

The Myth of the Easy AFC East: The Definitive Guide

Debunking the "AFC East Sucks" Fallacy - More Dumb Numbers (stats)

 

[Jackson 2]

The degree of stupidity on display in that piece is exceeded only by the arrogance of the author's attempt to have anyone swallow its absurd premise. Holy s###, is that a load of garbage...

 

[RobertWeathers]

Here's the article.

The Myth of the Easy AFC East, the Definitive Guide | Patriots Dynasty

Whenever some writer uses the words "easy AFC East" or "AFC East is the worst division in football", that writer deserves to be bombarded with links to this article.

Division records since 2000:
AFC East -- 653-595-0 -- .523
NFC East -- 634-612-2 -- .508

Division records, excluding division winner, since 2000:
AFC East -- 428-516-0 -- .453
NFC East -- 421-521-2 -- .446

I am so sick n tired of this crap argument.

If the Patriots were a paper tiger they would have always crashed n burned in the playoffs vs better teams home or on the road.

Good teams win in the playoffs. Pretenders don't.

 

[hornetfb85]

I will say though that I get an enormous amount of pleasure and satisfaction from the fact that our ass kickery of the NFL for the last 15-20 years has completely mind (censored) the league that now the media are producing piece of crap evidence/research like this to put us down. Makes me grin from ear to ear.

 

[Ice_Ice_Brady]

Easy explanation: they play us; we play them.

This. We know their SoS is already skewed because of having us on the schedule and vice versa. It goes even beyond that.

We often repeat opponents from the previous year that we beat, leading them to a worse record. Here are the repeat opponents from last year:

Buffalo - 0-2
NY Jete - 0-2
Miami - 1-1
Pittsburgh - 1-0
Houston - 0-1
Kansas City - 0-1

So that’s a 2-7 opponent record from 2018 because these teams played NE, and this is similar every year.

Patriots play a first place schedule every year. It’s absurd to argue they have the actual easiest schedule, and they wouldn’t if they didn’t directly effect the w/l percentage by virtue of their own previous year’s performance.