Patriots Sadly Given ‘Pretenders’ Label Among Other 2-2 Teams
The New England Patriots are riding high this week after a 42-13 victory over the Carolina Panthers at Gillette Stadium on Sunday. Entering Week 5, the Pats are one of nine NFL teams with a 2-2 record, along with the Arizona Cardinals, Atlanta Falcons, Chicago Bears, Cincinnati Bengals, Denver Broncos, Kansas City Chiefs, Minnesota Vikings, and Washington Commanders.
On Monday, NFL.com’s Jeffri Chadia did an interesting exercise — Chadia broke the above 2-2 teams into two categories: “contenders” and “pretenders”.
And Patriots fans won’t be thrilled to learn that Chadia classified New England in the latter group.
“There are things happening in New England that you want to see at the start of Mike Vrabel’s tenure as head coach,” Chadiha wrote.
“Second-year quarterback Drake Maye has shown signs of improvement, as he’s completed 74 percent of his passes with seven touchdowns and two interceptions through four games. After a season-opening loss to Las Vegas, the Patriots also have two wins over teams more in their weight class (a 33-27 win over Miami in Week 2 and Sunday’s 42-6 beatdown of Carolina).”
“The problem is New England has never felt like a team capable of an instant turnaround,” Chadiha continued. “It isn’t brimming with talent and the competition for playoff spots in the AFC is going to be fierce. You already have the usual suspects when it comes to championship contenders, a group that includes Buffalo and Kansas City. The road to the postseason for an upstart team gets even tougher when factoring in those squads that have started the year hot (which includes the Colts and Jaguars) and those that are good enough to rebound from slow starts (Baltimore, Denver and Houston). New England already looks better with Vrabel at the helm. But don’t get too crazy with this one. It’s going to take some time.”
Surely, Chadiha will have to change his stance on the Patriots if New England can pull off a massive upset on the road against the Buffalo Bills this Sunday night.