The Buffalo Payments have a chance to take a three-game lead — and maintain the preliminary head-to-head tiebreaker — over the New England Patriots within the AFC East this afternoon, however the actual worth in a win for Joe Brady’s crew in the present day shall be discovered far past the division standings.
It’s early October — considerably too early to crown any crew a division champ within the lengthy, arduous regular-season voyage within the NFL that options ebbs and flows for each crew. Positive, with a Payments win, headlines will come up concerning Buffalo’s stranglehold on the AFC East. They usually’d be in prime place, certain.
A victory in the present day over Mike Vrabel, Drake Maye and Co. could be drastically extra damaging to the Patriots psyche than something having to do with their win-loss file.
Groups rebound from gradual begins or mid-season lulls on a regular basis within the NFL.
Heck, in 2023, the Payments trailed the Dolphins by three video games… coming into Week 14 and chased them right down to win the division.
However the Patriots really feel on the verge of implosion.
And the essence of a crew might be the higher indicator of its resiliency than anything.
It begins on the high with any group, with the pinnacle coach and quarterback, and that’s exactly the place the Patriots really feel exceptionally fragile coming into this recreation in Orchard Park.
A tumultuous offseason for Vrabel halted any momentum he had after main the Patriots to the Tremendous Bowl in his first season operating the present in New England.
Maye was runner-up to NFL MVP final season.
Now the third-year quarterback has one landing to 6 interceptions via three video games. This previous week after a ghastly efficiency in a blowout loss to the Jaguars, all everybody might speak and write about in New England is what appears like a quickly increasing rift between Vrabel and his younger quarterback.
Vrabel didn’t maintain again in postgame pressers, or interviews in the course of the week, nearly leaping on the alternative to criticize some selections and throws from Maye towards Jacksonville. Maye’s hinted at a shoulder harm because the offender of his disastrous begin to the season. Vrabel desires to listen to nothing about it.
Patriots insiders are happening Boston-area radio claiming there’s nothing incorrect with Maye.
Maye was listed on the Patriots harm report all week as “full” with a shoulder harm for the primary time all season.
This New England crew is extremely weak proper now.
Not essentially as a result of they’ll be with out Christian Gonzalez and Christian Barmore, two of the crew’s three greatest defensive gamers. Don’t get me incorrect, their collective absence is main. I’ve lengthy been an advocate of the gamers on the sector really mattering greater than the coaches or the standing of the tradition of a crew.
However I can’t think about the media and fan firestorm for the Patriots if Maye has one other poor efficiency, and the Payments are clearly the higher crew on the sector in the present day inside the brand new Highmark Stadium.
And the psychological toll on this New England crew would possible be huge. I nonetheless imagine within the high quality of gamers being extra essential than anything within the NFL. However I’ve began to understand the human ingredient of these gamers, on this recreation, or any skilled sport, actually, is extra essential than any analyst, report, or fan believes.
And possibly that realization has hit me now as a result of I’ve gotten to know Mitch Morse rather well over the previous two months whereas I’m watching Ted Lasso. Fairly the mixture, proper?
This all means the Payments want to return out with one in every of their most interesting efforts of the season to destroy the Patriots from a psychological perspective. Doing so will imply greater than sending New England to 1-3 via 4 weeks.
