The New England Patriots have been an offensive juggernaut for the better part of the past decade, but the makeup of their current squad is more similar to what we saw during the early part of the Tom Brady era. Following another uninspiring offensive performance on Sunday, the 42-year-old quarterback acknowledged that.
In his weekly appearance on WEEI’s “The Greg Hill Show” Monday morning, Brady sounded like he has accepted that the Patriots’ offense is not going to be very good this year. He said defense and special teams are the strengths of the team, and the offense just needs to take advantage when opportunities present themselves.
Tom Brady on @TheGregHillShow:
"The strength of our team is our defense and our special teams. So on offense, we’ve just got to take advantage of our opportunities and understand where our strengths lie and try to play to them."
— Darren Hartwell (@darren_hartwell) November 18, 2019
Earlier in the season, Brady often spoke about how the Patriots needed to get better offensively. He usually said things like “we’re not where we want to be,” but his latest remarks indicate he knows there may not be a fix.
Brady threw the ball a whopping 47 times against the Philadelphia Eagles on Sunday, and he completed just 26 passes for 216 yards and no touchdowns. New England only mustered 17 points, but their defense shut the Eagles out in the second half. It was the same type of performance we have seen all year from Belichick’s defense aside from their one slip-up against the Baltimore Ravens prior to the bye week.
The good news for the Patriots is defense is typically more important than offense in the postseason, especially when you secure home-field advantage. If they can somehow improve in pass protection and run blocking, that would go a long way toward being able to move the ball more efficiently. They also may have to break out a few more trick plays like the one they executed on Sunday, but 17 points should be enough most weeks with how dominant their defense has been.
