Patriots ‘capable’ of winning AFC East amid Bills upset | Chris Simms Unbuttoned | NFL on NBC

Patriots ‘capable’ of winning AFC East amid Bills upset | Chris Simms Unbuttoned | NFL on NBC

All right, Chris, we got a great film review for this week because it was the Sunday Night Football matchup as the Patriots went to Buffalo. They upset the undefeated. We were all sitting here like, when are the Bills going to lose a game? Yeah. And I had fell victim to that right away. I was like, I don’t think the Bills are going to lose for a long time. We’re going to know anything. Well, they got their challenge. And I think a lot of it in this one, what was surprising was the Patriots offense jelling together against the Bills defense. I I I think that’s a big part of it. Um, you know, I I think the the thing is I have more concerns I feel like about the Buffalo Bills than the rest of the public, right? I’m not sure the way they play. It’s still really good. Do I sit here and just go, “Oh, damn. They’re going to the Super Bowl and all that?” No. They got flaws on their football team. They do. The New England Patriots match up really well with the Buffalo Bills. The New England Patriots are capable of winning the AFC East. Do you hear that, everybody? The Patriots can win the AFC’s. The Patriots should be four and one just like the Buffalo Bills. They’re just their only thing they’re overcoming or working with right now is a young team that’s learning to a new way of life with Vrabel and McDaniel and a new quarterback and all that. But as you’ve heard me say, right, the the Bills always struggle with teams that have balance because I don’t believe the Bills are all all that super talented on the defensive side of the ball. And what I mean by that is if you’re really good at one, the Bills are the Bills can stop you because McDermott’s so smart and they can do things to game plan you to go, wait, if you’re just awesome at the run game, he’ll come up with ways to stop that. If you’re just awesome at the pass game, he’ll come up ways to stop that. But when you’re balanced, this is where he has problems. And yes, New England is showing the ability to be balanced. I think I would say like early in the game with the Bills D and the and McDermott with Josh McDaniels versus Mcder they were feeling each other out, right? It was like 66. Yeah, there was no nothing going on in the first half. The Bills the Bills are the kings of giving you different looks, never giving the same pre-nap look as the snap, you know, as you see after the snap. The Bills are the king of, “Hey, it’s Tampa 2, it’s Tampa 2, blue 45, blue 45 said hut.” Oh, it’s not Tampa 2, it’s cover three. Or it’s a Blitz man or at the last second. So, it’s always like, or it’s, hey, it’s Blitz, said Hut. Oh my gosh, they all dropped out there just as I was saying, set hut. And they played coverage and dropped him in his zone, right? That’s what they do. They play with you that way. Early on, I feel like Josh McDaniels and the Patriots were conservative and they tried to do misdirection stuff. a little play actions, a reverse, right? Bootlegs. I think also just to combat a little bit of like these late stems to different defenses that the Bills do. And I think just taking a conservative approach, just feeling it out that way. I think after the first half, if I would go away with one theme from the first half, I would go the Bills were more concerned about the run game of the Patriots and the Patriots probably could have thrown the ball more in the first half. I mean, the Pat the Bills defense was basically begging the Patriots to throw the football and they really didn’t let him. They didn’t really they didn’t let them and early on and and I don’t think the the Patriots were really fortified or stubborn in trying to throw the ball. They were just kind of like, “Okay, it’s okay. Hey, our defense is doing good. We’re slowing down Josh Allen. Let’s not take any chances and all that.” But then the first drive of the second half happens. Josh Allen goes right down the field. And I think that was the moment they went, “Okay, Josh Allen might get h get hot. they might figure us out a little bit here. We got to start to push the envelope on the offensive side of the ball. And to me, that’s when, you know, they changed a lot and started to throw the ball and be aggressive throwing the ball down the field a little bit. And listen to this, Chris. Drake May against the Blitz in this game, he was 6-9 for 92 yards. That’s over 10 yards per attempt. Weeks one to four against the Blitz, the completion percentage was good. It was at 71%, but he was only averaging 7.4 yards per attempt, and he took five sacks. He really wasn’t doing a lot against the Blitz. In this game, he was pushing the ball down the field and attack. He was counter punching the Blitz. Exactly. We haven’t seen enough of that from him until this game. Definitely not. Definitely not. This was the best game of Drake May’s career. The Bills played not to let the Patriots run the run the ball and they said, “We don’t think Drake May can beat us.” That’s what they did. We don’t think and then it became wait May is pretty good but we think if we blitz him and pressure him a little bit he won’t know where to go with the ball and we’ll beat him that way and he beat that to your point. Exactly right. I mean that that to me the first drive started out in that second half with he made they made two big throws down the sideline and then they tried the flea flicker and there nothing there and then I think the Bills after that moment after the first two big throws were like hey let’s start blitzing him and pressuring him let’s see if he knows how to handle that and then to your point they did a good job in picking up the blitz or calling the right protection to kind of combat the blitz and then the other thing that he did at His highest level I’ve ever seen him do was yeah, blitz. Maybe somebody got free. I got out of the pocket and I kept my eyes down the field and I made Josh Allen type throws when I was out of the pocket for big plays that of course is scary when you’re blitzing. That’s what Josh Allen does to a lot of teams and scares them out of blitzing because they’re like, “Oh we’re blitzing and we can’t get there.” Then our guys can’t even cover that long. So, you know, I I think to your point there, yes, that’s why this was one of the best performances we’ve seen Drake May have certainly as clutches in on the biggest stage of his career to this point. And the Stfan Diggs revenge game was real on just 22 routes that he ran. He was targeted 12 times. He caught 10 of the targets, 146 yards. And his energy in this game was unlike anything I’ve seen from him this year. No, I mean, he was determined. It was I I think you know the last two weeks were the first two weeks I feel like I watched him and went I don’t see him favoring the knee anymore. He’s aggressively putting his foot in the ground exploding out. So he looks really good from that standpoint. And again that’s where this is going to be a tough matchup for the Bills because the Patriots if you play zone they have plenty of plays to beat a zone. And then the Bills in this matchup probably worried because they’re not big enough up front about hey the Patriots can run the ball. Their backs are pretty good. They play a physical brand of football that way. Okay, if we want to stop that and load the box and play man, okay, that’s good. But they’re not great at man either. And they have a liability in Tradavius White and man that they have to protect all the time. So that’s where again, if they play 10 times, every one of these ones is going to be close. This isn’t just like, oh, some fluke that the Patriots just came up with a g big game plan and we’re pumped to play in Buffalo. No, they are every bit capable of standing toeto toe with the Buffalo Bills and now this win gives them that confidence to do that as we go forward here. Does it worry you from a Bills perspective at all that now there’s a lot of tape out there on how to be it’s not like one shot in the armor flash in the pan week. We saw what the Ravens did week one the Saints offense was competitive against this team and now you unfortunately have a loss of it where the Patriots offense figured some things out against you in the second half. Like there’s there’s a lot there on how to attack this team right now. I I I think there is and and again I I get back to on that side of the ball. Um you know, not to the same as the Chiefs because I think the Chiefs personnel is better on the defensive side of the ball, but yeah, I don’t think there’s enough big-time players over there and that’s that’s what I worry about. And it’s not I don’t think necessarily like one guy or one thing. I think it’s the unit in itself. And again, like we talked about a little I think yesterday when we were kind of previewing the game al together, right? Like if you show you can kind of do both, they they have a hard time because they have to play guessing guessing game to a degree. They have to play like, oh, we think they’re going to run here. Let’s call one of our disguise coverages and then stop the run. But if it’s the wrong call and they block it up and maybe run a play action, then it’s like, well, damn, they’re going to get a 25 yard gain here. And yes, I worry about their defense. Their defense I know came into the weekend with I believe what the best pass defense in the sport or one of the best pass defenses for sure. Right. Um but but I on the pod last week had said when I broke down the game I was kind of like hey the Patriots are going to be able to throw the ball against this defense. Like I I don’t have any doubt about that because of I think again the fact that I knew McDermott and that Bills defense would be more worried about being run over in the run game by the Patriots and of course that puts them in a bad spot. So this is a Bills defense. If you’re looking for any positives, hopefully at some point they get back their first round pick, Maxwell Haristston, although he’s had a brace during practices and workouts. uh Michael Hoy, Larry Ogen, Joby. I mean, not anyone proven to just dominate, but some kind of reinforcement. They need something. They need something right now. They need the versatility. There’s there’s no doubt about that. You know, again, they’re they’re going to be a pain in the butt. I get that. But, you know, they’re they’re the second best pass defense in football. And then to tell you this, they’re the fourth worst the fifth worst run defense in football. So, that tells you something right there, right? And that tells you, you know, to me that, yeah, they have problems stopping the run. And that’s really going to be a big problem when they play teams that can really run the ball, right? And then just have a few threats at the wide receiver position in the quarterback that they’re going to be in a bind. And I think that will continue. So I think that’s going to be the first issue. And then the offense is real good, right? But, you know, it’s still very Josh Allen centric and that Patriots defense is real good, too. Maybe even more impressively was Vrabel’s defense against this Bills offense that when these moments happen that Josh Allen needs to put on the Superman cape, he usually does, but it didn’t look like that throughout this game at times. And Allen averaged uh 3.27 seconds of time to throw. That’s his longest time to throw of the season. That shouldn’t surprise anybody. Anything over three is a very long time in the NFL. And let’s dive into the notebook here, Chris, because it feels like one of the biggest differences right now is that the Patriots got back their number one corner and he’s rolling in Christian Gonzalez right now. And I think the and and you said what was the time of throw there? 3.27, right? For context, like I know Rogers is usually the fastest around 2.2 2.15 for the only guys that are in this range typically is Caleb Williams is usually around 315. Justin Fields is like 3.5, right? Which, by the way, that second doesn’t sound like a lot. It’s an eternity in the NFL. Well, Justin Fields is like, I don’t know what he’s looking at. He’s looking at the rush and not really looking downfield. When you get to Josh Allen and Caleb Williams, they’re going, wait, that guy might have been open a little bit, but I think I can buy enough time to get somebody really open for a big play. Right. It’s a difference there context in that. They hunt big plays. Exactly. Right. Also, I think what plays into that because I love stuff like that. The Patriots are are a team that aren’t going to go all out against a Josh Allen and just go go rush the quarterback and go get him no matter what. As you see in the game here and it’s always hard to stop Josh Allen. We know that. But the Patriots are, hey, let’s not rush him. Let’s try to kind of keep him in the pocket so he can’t run around and do all this crazy stuff and all of that as well. So, you know, that’s what they’re they’re willing to do that to a degree and not get after him that way. So, that kind of plays hand in hand as well. Um, so yeah, you know, the Patriots defense is really damn good and I think only going to get better here. It does feel that way, especially just with Gonzalez back, you know, how does that allow them to kind of change up what they do on the back end because it feels like he’s one of the rare guys in the NFL you could ask him to shadow people. Well, I I know we got a picture of my notebook here, right? We’ll get back right. We had it up before. So, and I know I asked a question and change, but here here I mean, first off, you couple I got this one. Yeah, I think I I’ve been deciphering this. You couple that with the two cornerbacks healthy. Watch out exclamation points. Totally changed this defense. This was the first game uh they had the whole rolodex available. Number seven, number zero, number 25. I would put those three against any three in the NFL. They something concaid. They had to go to concaid. They had to go to concaid because the other three guys your to is what screws me up. That’s the only thing I can’t Now I got it. It looks like a little like like mini star right there. The Bills can’t separate from the Pats versus man coverage. Uh all is that completions for Allen. Uh scrambles buying time. Yeah. And that’s what the stats showed us before. Oh, he had 22 passing attempts over two and a half seconds. So like the initial look is never there. Not there. I I um will sit there. Number seven is Carlton Davis. Number zero is Christian Gonzalez. Number 25 is Marcus Jones. I would say I would put that three against any three in football when they’re healthy. It’s tough. It’s up there. Again, I’m not saying it’s No, but it’s a fair. You have the argument conversation. Right. Right. I mean, because run through my head. Gonzalez is going toville. I mean, he’s that kind of guy. Carlton Davis maybe not in the prime of his career, but still really damn good and has size to go along with it. They’re both longer, taller type of corners, too. And then Marcus Jones is the perfect nickel. I mean, perfect. You You saw the interception he made. That might have been the biggest play of the game. Just the fact that they’re up 13-10. The Bills are in the red zone. He undercuts an incut by Shal Khalil Shakir. He’s made to guard guys like that. He’s a jitterbug himself. So, he’s made to guard the the jitterbug slot receiver. On top of that, he’s got three rockets up his ass. So, when he steps on it, it’s like, whoa, it’s 0 to 60. in three steps. That’s where he’s special. And then I I you know, I put like above those notes, I put Pat’s match up uh up with them really good, that’s for sure. And within the rolodex of what I meant by that, the whole rolodex, I meant they could call any defense they wanted. Now, they weren’t worried about, oh, this corner over here is a problem, so we don’t want to play this defense. We got to keep a safety over the top of them. Hey, we can bring some crazy blitz here because we trust our corners that they’ll hold it down for three seconds or so, right? So, they were phenomenal that way. And then I think the other aspect that I just got to bring up with the the Patriots is, see, when the Patriots are healthy at those corner positions, they’re so versatile in their fronts. They’re so versatile with their personnel they can play in their fronts. And where I say they match up good with the Bills again is to go, yes, their corners can shut down the Bills wide receivers and give them tough time. But the Bills, one of the best things they do is, of course, run the football and overpower people. And you’re not going to overpower the New England Patriots. The New England Patriots can get really big on that side of the ball. When you talk about Tonga, Barammore, and Milton Williams as your three down linemen, and then they can go Keon White and and Landry on the outside as outside linebackers, I’d go that’d be a five there with the outside linebackers. I go is going to be as big as anybody in football. And then you got a guy like Spolain who’s an athletic type in the middle, but a thumper and athletic. So, it’s like they got two in one there. And then, of course, the other running the other inside linebackers they have are kind of thumpers that way. So, they’re capable of going, “Oh, wait. You want to play big boy football and play smashmouth? We’ll smash you right back.” And then they also have enough guys to go, “Oh, wait. Now it’s third down and we want to put some few pass rushers on the field and be athletic. We can do that as well.” And that’s where I come away and I think you might have saw this on my notes. Like, don’t be shocked. The the Patriots as this goes on, I think, are going to be become one of the best defenses in football as long as this these secondary guys can stay healthy. Back to that man coverage point. They played man coverage over 32% of the time. cover one over 32% of the time in this game. They also ran cover zero three times. Okay. I mean that was third most in the NFL in terms of cover one. Only the Browns and Giants played more. Okay. And that you know and you know I I think a lot of times teams are scared to do that very because against Josh Allen because he buys so much time that you go well our guys can’t stay with him. But they were like no no we can stay with him and we think we can also you know not let him just scramble everywhere and and make plays that way. Um, but they did an incredible job on that side of the ball. And like I said, and I think you might have saw it at the top of my notes. I wrote, “The Pats can win the AFC East. They are capable with their schedule. And as I’ve said, I don’t think the Bills are, you know, just a stone dominant football team. I think they’re real good with a phenomenal, awesome, maybe the best quarterback in the game.” And that changes our thought a little bit. But I got a few questions about some other things on their football team as well. Well, let’s look at what DraftKings thinks of exactly that. The win total right now for the Bills is at 12 and a half. The Patriots has gone up to nine and a half. Before the season, that was 8 and a half. Both expected to make the playoffs with the odds, especially the Patriots now minus 200. But if you think the Patriots can overtake this division, there’s a lot of value in that at plus 350. We might have to get in on that. That is really interesting, especially since they won on the road and they still have their home game against the Bills, which you’d think would they have to just take care of their business though, the Patriots. Like, you can’t lose to the Raiders. You can’t give like a game you should have won the Steelers, but that’s kind of life with a new staff and a young quarterback. I give them I give them kind of the grace for that. I’d be shocked if it doesn’t all get fixed, right? I I’m that much of a believer in the in the quarterback and and the coaches that I I think they can do that, you know, but but yeah, I I mean, this is the second day in a row we sit here and go, what the betting public is way too betting just on quarterbacks. We saw like Lamar and the Baltimore odds yesterday when we did that to make the playoffs. It’s insane. And then this here for everybody just to be so like, oh my gosh, yeah, the Bills are the best team in football and all that. I I just I’m shocked by that. I’m just here to tell you they’re not. They’re not. They’re damn good. Don’t get me wrong, but just for everybody to pencil them in at the Super Bowl in the AFC, you’re crazy. You’re crazy. There’s a a lot of teams that are going to be able to match up with them for sure. I mean, I come away, you saw them with the rest of my notes. The only thing working for the Bills offense is Allen’s movement. That was it. Scrambling. There was nothing systemwise working. I mean, when the Pats played aggressive on the defensive side of the ball, they won almost every time. When they played, oh, wait, let’s sit back in a zone. Okay, Josh Allen had some success, right? Right. That would be my thing. You know, even late in the game, the drive that goes down to tie the football game, there was the two personal fouls, a free 30 yards. I mean, nothing was easy for the Bills. They were fighting to get their 20th point of the day. And let me just say that the refs had a horrible weekend in the NFL, but but this one this one was especially bad. They were I mean, this weekend was pitiful. I mean, I saw flags thrown, picked up, not thrown, then thrown. I mean it and no ex no reasons penalties where those two penalties at the the end of the game there. I mean the roughing the passer call that then just don’t even you can’t play football tackle the quarterback anymore. That that’s the NFL should be embarrassed throwing that flag in that moment. And then the other play where Cook is on his foot, right? I I on his knee. Listen, I know it looks egregious when you look at it on TV, but wait, when he’s on his knee and he’s still maybe trying to pitch the ball, the defender is going, “Wait, maybe he didn’t go down on the ground.” Like, there’s got to be a little common sense to be like, “Wait, wait, he got hit cuz he didn’t stop playing. He was literally going like this, going to pitch it to Josh Allen, so then he gets hit.” So, you know that that I don’t love that stuff. And the referees were just way too involved in the games this weekend. Another one I don’t like is when a quarterback is running 100 miles an hour and soccer slides when the defender falls over him or Yeah. the defender’s already low bracing himself. What are you going to do? Most quarterbacks in football who are like this guy are five and 235. Like that’s I think people don’t realize how big quarterbacks are in the NFL, right? Devin McCord’s always says it. He’s always like, “Man, you get to the NFL, you realize, man, these quarterbacks are big.” So, what do you not want these defenders to brace themselves and get ready to hit somebody, right? And then and then they get run over and then they get made fun of on social media and it’s like, well, yeah, because they didn’t know what to do. So, they’re like they’re not kind of should I two hand touch him? Should I do this? What do I do? It’s just it’s not fair. It’s a bunch of BS when it comes to that. I feel bad for defenders. I know they don’t want to slow down the game, but it feels like more than ever we’re almost at the point where roughing the passers need to be treated like touchdowns. Everyone is reviewed by like a party, not with the game. Yeah. But why can’t they just do it just like they do anything else where they they expedite review go to it? Like we’ve seen we saw plenty of plays this weekend where there was pass interference. They picked up the flag because somebody got in their ear and go, “No, it wasn’t.” So like in that play there, go, “Man, he hit him good. He didn’t even land on him. He fell on himself.” They called a penalty. Somebody needs to get in the ear and go, “Hey, pick that up. That was uh that we call that football. We call that um hitting the quarterback.” Like, get the hell out of here with that crap. I hate it. It’s got to be fixed. All right, don’t worry everybody. We’re talking Joe Flacco to the Bengals. You just got to Yeah, you just got to hang around for one more break. We’re taking all of your questions from the chat right after this. DraftKings Sportsbook is an official sports betting partner of the NFL. And new customers can get $5 and get $200 in bonus bets if your bet wins. Just download the Sportsbook app and use promo code punter when you sign up. DraftKings Sportsbook, the crown is yours. Yo yo homies, it’s time to watch some games. That’s right, we’re on to the NFL season here with Chris Sims Unbutton. Hit subscribe to get our weekly pick, Sunday night recaps after every game, and much, much more. Thanks for watching. Peace out, homies. Remember, subscribe. Peace out.

Chris Simms and Connor Rogers go over the film of the New England Patriots’ win over the undefeated Buffalo Bills, detailing why Drake Maye and company are “capable” of winning the AFC East. #NBCSports #ChrisSimmsUnbuttoned #NFL
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Patriots ‘capable’ of winning AFC East amid Bills upset | Chris Simms Unbuttoned | NFL on NBC
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