WEEK 2 PREVIEW- PATRIOTS AT SEAHAWKS

With one game in the books, it's still pretty hard to predict what we have with this year's Patriots team.  While Cam ran like Cam and gave the offense a different look, we all know how quickly an offense can change when a key player gets injured.  

SCHEDULING ADVANTAGE-  Tonight's game in Seattle is definitely a scheduling advantage for the Seahawks.  Seattle is an NFL best at 29-7-1 in primetime games since 2010.  Having wondered if there is an advantage to being a west coast team and playing in primetime games, I looked into it in 2016 and 2017.  There is a definite advantage especially when getting to host a team with at least a two time zone difference.

Seattle's league leading record for primetime of 29-7-1 comes from:

• 21 games being played against teams 2 or more time zones ahead (18-3)
• hosting 16 of those 21 time zone advantage games (15-1)
• 22 home games (19-3)
• 1 away game which was in London (1-0)

NO #12- Nahh, I'm not talking about Brady.  Seattle won't be playing in front of fans tonight, so that may be beneficial to the Patriots.  Not that I feel that Belichick teams get rattled from fans, but more from the Seahawks getting pumped up by them.

NEWTON- Cam is 1-5 vs Seattle with 1,144 passing yards, 5 touchdowns and 4 interceptions.  He is also 8-11 during primetime games.  

KEY OFFENSIVE WEAPONS TO STOP- In my opinion the Patriots need to focus on second year receiver DK Metcalf and anyone who happens to be playing tight end at any given moment.  Hopefully they don't give up a big play to any of their former players (Phillip Dorsett II or Jacob Hollister).

WIN SPECIAL TEAMS- Jake Bailey was perfect with getting the ball inside the 20.  In his brief career he is pinning teams inside their 20 46% of the time and only allowing returns 35% of the time.  Seattle punter Michael Dickson doesn't have as good career numbers and has his punts returned 46% of the time.  Of course, ideally we let have Dickson win today's battle by making sure Bailey gets his time holding extra points and kicking off and Dickson is punting early and often.  

​GET THE BALL INTO THE ENDZONE-  It's been a year and the Patriots are still playing without a reliable kicker. Such a weird thing to experience.  Since field goals aren't automatic and we've already had the dreaded fumble through the endzone, if we could just make sure red zone trips result in endzone trips, we should be in good shape.  If we could continue to build on the 75% rate that we going right now and avoid last year's abysmal 49%, that would be spectacular.  Last year things were so bad for New England that I took an end of season look at the Patriots red zone woes. Today I just googled "Cam Newton red zone" and ran across many articles touting him as one of the best in the red zone, especially during 2018.  Here are some career stats:

• Red Zone- 225/457 49.23% 114 TD passes 13 int 199 rushing attempts 57 rushing TD
• Inside 10- 98/194 50.52% 70 TD passes 6 int 123 rushing attempts 48 rushing TD
• 10-20- 127/263 48.28% 44 TD passes 7 int 66 rushing attempts 9 rushing TD

If you are thinking that Tom Brady was spectacular in the red zone, so having Cam won't we an advantage.  I'd look a bit closer at his more recent red zone stats (regular season) and not his career numbers.

• 2019- 13 TD passes 3 rushing 2 int
• 2018- 18 TD passes 2 rushing 1 int
• 2017- 26 TD passes 0 rushing 0 int
• 2016- 20 TD passes 0 rushing 1 int
• 2015- 27 TD passes 3 rushing 3 int

Leading up to the 2018 Super Bowl I researched Tom Brady's red zone stats in the playoffs, at that point he had thrown 6 red zone picks (2 in Super Bowls).