There is something truly beautiful about the first week of the NFL season. Sure, baseball has the “Opening Day” market cornered, but the baseball game played on Opening Day is still just 1 of 162, or exactly %0.61 of the season whereas the first football game of the season is 1 of 17 or %5.9. Almost 10x more important. If the Red Sox lose on Opening Day, they get right back out there and play again 24 hours later while a loss for the Patriots this Sunday means a week of second-guessing and sports radio slander. Opening Day in baseball feels like a celebration that the season is back and that summer is right around the corner. The first game of the football season feels important.
Speaking of important, heavens to Betsy is this an important season in Foxborough. As we enter year 4 post-Brady, the Patriots have missed the playoffs twice (getting demolished in their lone postseason appearance) and have made a series of head-scratching mistakes that have left many across New England, and the NFL community as a whole, wondering if Belichick is the right man to lead this franchise moving forward. I won’t get into all of the quizzical moves, but I do think it’s important to mention a few as a way to set the table for how very important I believe this season is for the franchise.
When Brady walked away, everybody assumed Belichick had a plan for the quarterback position. Whether it be addressed via trade, a free agent signing, or drafting a signal caller, at that point Belichick had the reputation of being one step ahead and this was surely going to be no different. Instead, they watched every other quarterback-needy team make a move to address their own situation and settled for the last option on the market, Cam Newton. The 2020 season was a disaster because of Newton, but the court of public opinion was still on Bill’s side with many saying they were due for a cap-reset year and they’d be back in 2021. 7-9, no playoffs.
The Patriots spent BIG in 2021 free agency, inking two TEs, Hunter Henry and Janu Smith, DB Jaylen Mills, and All-Pro edge rusher Matthew Judon, to large contracts. Two months later, Bill stood pat in the draft and took Mac Jones at #15, the last of 5 first-round QBs taken. The return on those moves was mixed. Judon came as advertised, Hunter Henry caught 9 TD’s and Mac Jones was the best of the rookie QBs for a Patriots team that won 10 games and made the playoffs. Dynasty is back on, right?
Nope. Josh McDaniels took the head coaching job in Vegas, and instead of finding a competent offensive coordinator to back-fill McDaniel’s slot, Bill promoted Matt Patricia and Joe Judge to co-offensive coordinators in one of the craziest moves I’ve ever seen in all of football, not just in New England. From day 1 fans, media members, and the players themselves were skeptical of the move and wondered aloud if a defensive-minded coach and a special teams coordinator could run an effective NFL offense. The answer was a resounding NO, so much so that Robert Kraft wrote a letter to season ticket holders apologizing for the awful season that ended at 8-9 and promised major changes were on their way.
Enter Bill O’Brien. Former Patriots OC, Texans HC, and most recently Alabama’s OC. Bill O’Brien (BOB from now on) is a known NFL commodity who has proven he can orchestrate and run a competent NFL offense, which is all anybody in New England was asking for. Throughout training camp, reports about the offense were glowing, and it wasn’t necessarily that Mac was wowing people, or that Kendrick Bourne was burning DBs, simply that it looked like an NFL offense again. Pairing a competent NFL offense with a solid defense, you would think, should have Patriots fans optimistic for the 2023 season, right?
Maybe.
But the division is loaded with Aaron Rodgers joining the Jets while the Patriots schedule is daunting with games against the Eagles, Bills (2x), Dolphins (2x), Jets (2x), Cowboys, Chiefs, and Chargers, all of whom figure to be a better team than New England. If the Patriots are going to have a successful season, they’ll need to beat some teams that are more talented than they are, and that starts this week against an infinitely talented Eagles team in an important first game of the season.
I ran out of time to write a great breakdown but here is the synopsis. I think the addition of BOB and, therefore, a real, professional offense will be enough for the Patriots to score in the low 20’s. Add in the fact that there’s literally no film on what this new offense will look like, I think they’ll even flirt with 30 points. The Eagles’ defense is no joke, but their strength is their pass rush, and if I’m BOB and Mac, I’m getting that fucker out early.
On the other side of the ball, the Pats have a good defense that just ran out of gas last year since they were on the field constantly. The Eagles offense is legit, but Belichick and Sons have had all offseason to scheme something up for this. Eagles score in the 20’s but they won’t hang a 40 burger on them.
I think the Pats squeak out a season-opening win in an eye-opening performance. 27-24 Pats.
