The Patriots gave up 538 yards and 41 points in the Super Bowl. Just horrific numbers any way you slice it. And that's for sure colored how we view the defense moving forward.
It seemed like a replay from the first four weeks of the year. During those four weeks, the Patriots fielded the worst defense in history, yielding an average of 457 yards and 32 points a game. Just atrocious. So in the Super Bowl, they were WORSE than they were during this historically awful four-game stretch.
But it's more than that. Without looking it up, can you all guess how many times since 2001 the Patriots have given up 41+ points and 530+ yards in a game?
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The answer is ONE. They've played 309 regular and post season games in those 17 years (an average of more than 18 games a year - think about that...they AVERAGE two playoff games a year!), and in those 309 games, they've allowed 41+ points and 530+ yards TWO TIMES.
The other time? The first game of the 2017 season, against KC, where they allowed 537 yards and 42 points. So the 2017 season was bookended by the two worst defensive performances in the BB/TB era. Incredible.
They've had some other bad games of course, but nothing quite like these two. Here are the other games during this 17 year period where they've been kind of close to as bad:
2014 vs KC - 41 points, 443 yards
2012 vs SF - 41 points, 388 yards
2009 vs NO - 38 points, 480 yards
2008 vs Mia - 38 points, 461 yards
2007 vs Ind - 38 points, 455 yards (AFCCG)
2005 vs SD - 41 points, 431 yards
2005 vs Ind - 40 points, 453 yards
But none of those are as bad as the two 2017 games. So I don't think it's remotely fair to say that the SB represents the true level of this Patriots' defense. They're not a top 5 defense, but they're not CLOSE to this bad. So our lasting memory of the 2017 team is the Super Bowl defense, but it really was a terrible statistical outlier and should not remotely be the gauge by which we evaluate their true level.
It seemed like a replay from the first four weeks of the year. During those four weeks, the Patriots fielded the worst defense in history, yielding an average of 457 yards and 32 points a game. Just atrocious. So in the Super Bowl, they were WORSE than they were during this historically awful four-game stretch.
But it's more than that. Without looking it up, can you all guess how many times since 2001 the Patriots have given up 41+ points and 530+ yards in a game?
...
...
...
...
...
...
...
...
...
The answer is ONE. They've played 309 regular and post season games in those 17 years (an average of more than 18 games a year - think about that...they AVERAGE two playoff games a year!), and in those 309 games, they've allowed 41+ points and 530+ yards TWO TIMES.
The other time? The first game of the 2017 season, against KC, where they allowed 537 yards and 42 points. So the 2017 season was bookended by the two worst defensive performances in the BB/TB era. Incredible.
They've had some other bad games of course, but nothing quite like these two. Here are the other games during this 17 year period where they've been kind of close to as bad:
2014 vs KC - 41 points, 443 yards
2012 vs SF - 41 points, 388 yards
2009 vs NO - 38 points, 480 yards
2008 vs Mia - 38 points, 461 yards
2007 vs Ind - 38 points, 455 yards (AFCCG)
2005 vs SD - 41 points, 431 yards
2005 vs Ind - 40 points, 453 yards
But none of those are as bad as the two 2017 games. So I don't think it's remotely fair to say that the SB represents the true level of this Patriots' defense. They're not a top 5 defense, but they're not CLOSE to this bad. So our lasting memory of the 2017 team is the Super Bowl defense, but it really was a terrible statistical outlier and should not remotely be the gauge by which we evaluate their true level.