I'm just glad people are still trying to get into the season so, so too early. Thank you for joining me.
Now let's stop thinking end-season stats, just to humor a homer. That is actually the name of my charity, Humor a Homer.
Think where we stood and how we were performing mid season, before the bye. Let's play make-believe. What if... the post-bye swoon was us looking like our worst game for a protracted stretch. A rookie wall for Mac, and a "this ain't the year" swoon for everybody else not on a contract year. (Maybe not all of 'em but work with me.) When you can divide a Patriots season into quarters and see that swoon at the end, I think that's just got "correctable" written all over it. I also think we ALWAYS look back at the offseason threads about "if we only had player X" or "now that we have player X it's all gravy" and they're always wrong. Come on. A seven-game winning streak, then a bye, then 1-3 down the stretch? We just didn't get back up off the canvas after the Colts.
Yes, we are re-building a defense here... Or, we're catching up to the speed of the game as its evolved & getting younger... pay your money, take your choice. Who here thinks BB can't build a D or turn up defensive talent? What this team does is makes a name out of a no-name, then (usually) lets somebody else pay name-brand prices.
Thing 1: I think we'll be mentally tougher, with no momentum swing or quarter having the outsized influence they did last year. Mac is more in command, and has a full season under his belt himself. On the defense, see above. Questions all over the place, okay fine, questions aren't answers, and I'm guessing we can play us some catchup these days.
Where to start - keep beating the JETE despite everything they did to get better. Did they get 41 points better? Because that's what we beat them by that second game. There's a reason they always have excellent draft capital. The most important fact about everybody that team drafted is that they were drafted by the JETE. Until that fact pattern is somehow gainsaid, I don't know what to tell you. I don't buy it. I'm calling Jete games Ws, maybe slightly more nervous Ws.
I WANT to reverse the 2 losses to the fins, but let's call it a split.
Guess what, doomers, we split with the Bills last year. You want to call that two Ls (in the regular season?) I'll give it to you but you have to give me the sweep of the fins. Otherwise I'm calling it a split again. That's 4-2 in the division with a definite maybe admitted homer slant. Could go any way, of course. If I really had to stake my life on it I'd say 3-3. But 4-2 isn't exactly way at the tail end of the distribution. I'm calling it 4-2.
The rest of the sched? You guys saying there "aren't that many wins on this schedule?" F that, you remember how we were never beating those big bad Browns or Titans or God forbid, the Bills IN Buffalo? Who had a 2-point loss to the Bucs? The Big Bad on schedule reveal day is not the Big Bad in mid-season. But we know what teams were last year, we know how some commentators believe everybody drafted, we know where some of the FAs went, in short, we know what they seem to be this year. So let's talk about where my other 8 games are coming from (cuz I am taking my 4 from the AFCE)
Game 1 at the Fins, in Miami, in (barely) September? Yeah that's the one the Fins get. Note: Even if we win that one, just bank it against one of the hopefully jump-ball games later.
0-1
Game 2 at the Steelers? The mighty mighty 9-7-1 Steelers (last year)? The gave up 55-more-ponts-than-they-scored Steelers? The just-drafted-a-quarterback-named-"Pick it"-and-a-receiver-named "Pickin'"? Seriously, a lot is riding on the rooks, if they're indeed starting. I mean, it can work out... It's just rare. He's no Mac Jones. Wait wait wait, we could end up facing Mitch Trubisky....
W.
1-1
Game 3, home vs. the Ravens. "Sweep the leg." Seriously, Lamar Jackson is supposedly looking good in camp, because he's not hurt yet. You really want the Ravens later in the year, but heck, you never know. Again - we know what they did last year. Cincinatti made noise, nobody else in that division did. Might they this year? Sure, but I'm taking another W.
2-1
Game 4 at Green Bay before it gets really cold. Fuggit that's all I got, since discount double-check is staying. I can't do it, Pack gets the Win.
2-2
Game 5 Lions at home. F U, that's a W.
3-2
Game 6, at the Brownies. DeShaun Watson, wow wow wow. Kraft is going to go nuts just swapping notes about massage therapists, right? So two things can happen, either he plays in 2022, in which case wellll, he's a tough out, but we've dealt with him before... or he doesn't play, in which case, rut roh Cleveland. Who knows, it's the off-season, and right now Watson looks like his off-field troubles will dominate the year, but he could be in mid-season form and meshing with, well, the Brownies. Gimme that win.
4-2
Game 7, Da Beahs. We got this. Even if they did pick up a guy named Equanimeous (he's no Amon-Ra, but don't sleep on him.) Justin Fields? Welp, hope that works out for you... hasn't yet. A big second year step up won't get him to Mac's rookie year, but a huge one might. Seriously, he's kind of in "give it time but maybe yikes" territory. Not to make this all about QBs. They also have crappy receivers, a crappy D, didnt win anything last year, etc.
5-2
Game 8, Da JETE. We've talked about this. W.
6-2
Game 9. Indy. What happened last year with them... oh yeah. First game back after the draft, the one we were going to win. I gotta admit, Jonathan Taylor scares me, he just does. Matty Ice is legit good. I dunno, they're about like us, no way of knowing who will be up or down by game 9 of 2022... it's almost certain "they're about like us" will look stoopit. (They finished 9-8, we finished 10-7... but lotsa changes.) Hell, I'll take the L.
6-3
BYE WEEK. Now one of two things happens. Thing 1, what happened last year is the new normal. Thing 2, BB WILL. NOT. LET. THAT. HAPPEN. He will mumble undrestated slights and twirl his whistle at guys until it sinks in, by God. Here we go.
Game 10. Da JETE. We've talked about this. W.
7-3. Nothing like a bye week and a JETE week to get your mojo back.
Game 11. At Minnesota. Huh. Hmm. Okay. 8-9. No defense. But they got Kellen Mond in a draft day trade or something? I am trying to be afraid of them, I guess they can pass on ya. Justin Jefferson is for real, you can't stop Kirk Cousins, you can only hope to contain him... I dunno after that whistle-twirling mumbling pre-bye post-Indy dressdown I am saying we got this, especially because we're buckling down to not look past them to the Bills. (notice how "we'll look past them to the Bills" isn't on the menu.) TNF in the Dome, Patriots win.
8-3
Game 12. Bills at home. Both Bills games could be extremely ugly with current personnel in the secondary, or, as usually happens, a top corner could step up. We've been losing our top corner every damn time one emerges since Asante Samuel. Anyway, I gave us a split with Buffalo and a split with Miami, and on TNF at home is where I choose to claim we'll beat Buffalo.
9-3 looking big and bad.
Game 13. At Arizona. Okay, so no, we're not calling this a W, though we could win it. MNF in the desert after a mini-bye. That said, I did just give us 2 TNF wins. Hey anybody else think the NYFL thinks we'll be in the hunt at this point of the season? We also know we're going into the most brutal stretch. But along with saying we split with the Bills, I want to say beating the Cards after the Bills is way 2 much. L.
9-4, rut roh Reorge.
Game 14. At Las Vegas. Okay all you MFs that say Josh McDaniels can't call plays and that sort of thing, payback time. Seriously, Derek Carr's not taking a Season 10 step up. Mac Jones is at this point coming into his own. They have a better Davante though, and as of right now, more Butlers. That said I need to get to 12, I'm taking 1 more jump ball from this stretch and calling it a W.
10-4
Game 15. Cincinatti at home. Are these guys a 10-7 team that played up to Burrow's potential and went almost all the way... but are they ready to settle back in like those Giants teams that kept beating us? Or are they a team getting ready to step up to the next level? Again, I gotta get to 12. They are not all that - they are a team that got hot at the right time. W.
11-4
Game 16. New Years Day, in Foxboro, against the Fins. Yeah I am calling this the W out of our Dolphins split.
12-4
Game 17. I took my Bills steal at Foxboro, they get the win at Orchard Park. I mean, unless the wind kicks up. L
12-5
I mean, I strung out narratives that are not shocking, particularly as they're counterbalanced by normal ebb-and-flow losses that could be wins. This is almost certainly not what'll happen, but I could feel us getting to 12-5 this way.
everybody except us isn't 12 feet tall and bulletproof. Did we get better enough? Put it this way: If Mac's a top 10 QB this year, it's doable. If he crashes through that to unexpected top 5 territory - which I don't believe will happen for lack of elite weapons (at least, known elite weapons) - 12-5 becomes almost a given.
This has been an enjoyable and possibly quite deluded utter waste of time. But there ya go, off-season fantasyland. And... go!
