What Patriots fans are saying...

[Jeremy Igo]

Took a gander at a Patriots board to see what they are thinking. 

It is easy to tell which of them have watched the Panthers this year and which have not. 

Here are some of the highlights. Overall, they seem pretty realistic. 

On Christian McCaffrey

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McCaffrey is an incredible receiving talent at the RB position. I hope the Pats don’t get cute with him considering how underwhelminng the Panthers WRs are. 

If he splits out wide, put Butler or J. Jones on him. He’s their only scary receiving threat.

 

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He (McCaffrey) should get the Tony Gonzalez treatment. Just bracket him every time he runs a route. The Panthers don't really have anything else to threaten us with, so might as focus hard on him.

So CMC is starting to raise eyebrows and will be getting more attention as the season progresses it seems.

 

On missing Greg Olsen

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Greg Olsen out! just contain Kelvin Benjamin...Devin Funchess stinks, Christian McCaffrey can ball. Short week I would save Hightower for Thursday Night I think we can take that Carolina's Offense with our Defense. We need to jump on them and make game a laughfer that would bode well for Thursday Night.

Can't say this is wrong at all. 

 

On the Patriots Defense

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For me, my concern is the defense. giving up way too many big plays and yards at the moment. The offense is carrying the team at the moment..

New England ranks last in the NFL in total yards (461) and passing yards (331) allowed per game.

On the other hand, the Patriots far and away lead the league in total offence (441 yards per game, 41 more than second place Minnesota) and passing offence (340 per game, 49 more than second place Green Bay). Only the L.A. Rams (?!) are scoring more points per game (36) than the Pats (33).

Yards allowed don't matter when the Panthers offense craps the bed in the red zone constantly. They could have a 500 yard performance and 12 points to show for it. 

 

On Patriots offense

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Dwayne Allen/Hollister are going to be really important this game, mainly because Gronk is going to face his hardest test this year in Luke.. guy is a freak. Hopefully someone might stand on him Shaq Mason... this could be you..

All in all it's going to be another thriller. Hopefully the D will turn up this week. Panthers are good but we played one of the Best D in the league last week and still Put up 35+ points...

All the Defence needs to do is stop giving up the big plays. Play as a unit. Not as individuals. They should have a long hard look at themselves because they have been poor. By poor I mean the secondary who we all thought would be ridiculously good this year but that hasn't been the case. The front 4 have been good and the linebackers are doing OK. But secondary has been woeful.

Key here is they the Patriots have played good defenses this year and still put up 30+. The Panthers just played the worst defense in the league at home and looked awful. 

 

On Panthers offense

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The Panthers offense has been absolutely stagnant for the first three weeks of the season and, even though they have a mobile QB and the team's game plan against them is curious, they do not have the weapons the Texans have. Set the edge against Newton and focus on McCaffery and you should be able to shut them down.

This guy has watched the games. 

 

On Cam Newton

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Nothing, this is a get right game for the defense Cam Newton stinks right now.

....so has this guy. 

 

Conclusion

This should be a win for the Patriots in every way, shape, and form. 

The only bright spot here is it takes the pressure off the Panthers. No one is expecting them to score, much less win. Maybe that will help them to finally loosen up a bit and start having some fun. If Cam can just get out there and play, not overthink things, and get back to what he does best.... maybe.... just maybe the Panthers can surprise the Patriots on national TV. 

[DaveThePanther2008]

I don't see much off base from these guys.   I just hope we figure how to play without Olsen and KB this week.  

I wish this was going to be on AFN.  The Panthers were on TV the first two weeks and last week I had to stream it.

Looking at the schedule there are far more exciting games than ours.

Det vs MINN

Pitt v Balt

Tenn vs Hou

I would venture to say the LAR vs Dal

AFN has surprised me before so maybe I'll get lucky (unless we get our ass whooped again)

[Saca312]

Yeah. Going into the Saints, they still had a respectable front four. I figured that’d be an issue. They had the 17th ranked defense against the run.

Patriots have the 31st ranked run defense. They have the 32nd ranked pass defense. 

Tom Brady isn’t infallible either. I dare say he had the same amount of mistakes Newton had (except he threw far more, as Cam barely even had attempts to pass).

Defense should be back in nickel, and we could shut down their offense. Patriots are capable of slicing us up like the Saints, but that involves Wilks not learning and redoing the scheme he called.

Will Patriots win? Probably. But can the Panthers win? Absolutely.

[Pejorative Miscreant]

Didn't see any childish takes.  Pretty much spot on with good takes.  Sometimes the truth hurts.  

[rayzor]

after what we saw last sunday, no team has any reason to fear us at all.

i'm hoping that there's a significant turnaround, because there's going to have to for us to have any chance at all.

that team that showed up last sunday won't win another game all year. i trust wilkes to get things turned around on defense quite a bit. i just don't have any faith in the rest of that team. one thing is for sure, you don't go up against a team like the patriots just hoping your defense can win the game. you've got to put points on the board because i don't trust any defense, no matter how good it is, to control an offense like that. you can't depend on defense alone to win games against high powered offenses.

[DaveThePanther2008]

6 minutes ago, rayzor said:

after what we saw last sunday, no team has any reason to fear us at all.

i'm hoping that there's a significant turnaround, because there's going to have to for us to have any chance at all.

that team that showed up last sunday won't win another game all year. i trust wilkes to get things turned around on defense quite a bit. i just don't have any faith in the rest of that team. one thing is for sure, you don't go up against a team like the patriots just hoping your defense can win the game. you've got to put points on the board because i don't trust any defense, no matter how good it is, to control an offense like that. you can't depend on defense alone to win games against high powered offenses.

New Orleans proved your point on Sunday.  

[top dawg]

If we don't really unleash Samuel to at least offer another dimension in this offense to keep the Patriots honest, we have no chance. I'm calling it now, Samuel is the key.

This is all provided that Cam plays worth a damn of course.

[rayzor]

1 minute ago, top dawg said:

If we don't really unleash Samuel to at least offer another dimension in this offense to keep the Patriots honest, we have no chance. I'm calling it now, Samuel is the key.

This is all provided that Cam plays worth a damn of course.

yeah, cmc has already proven himself to be probably the most worrisome thing for opposing defenses to handle. i think i've seen enough from samuel to know that he can be a real threat as well. we've just got to be able to get him involved more in less predictable circumstances.

[PlantBasedPoster]

16 minutes ago, top dawg said:

If we don't really unleash Samuel to at least offer another dimension in this offense to keep the Patriots honest, we have no chance. I'm calling it now, Samuel is the key.

This is all provided that Cam plays worth a damn of course.

Well, seems like Samuel's in game presence has been ticking up each week, so maybe we will see the most we have out of him so far this year...I hope. 

[Saca312]

39 minutes ago, top dawg said:

If we don't really unleash Samuel to at least offer another dimension in this offense to keep the Patriots honest, we have no chance. I'm calling it now, Samuel is the key.

This is all provided that Cam plays worth a damn of course.

Yeah samuel got open on a deep one on a route really easily, and has been open quite a lot. We have to get defenses to respect him as our deep threat.

[OriginalPantherDan]

Panthers and Pats have the same record. That said, if the Panthers are within 20 points by the end of the third, I’ll be shocked. Maybe a pressureless game is what is needed, but this isn’t a pressureless game. The road ahead is covered in potholes, and the Panthers can’t afford to hit many of them. This is one of those potholes that’s more like a sinkhole. Panthers lose big here. 

[Khyber53]

52 minutes ago, top dawg said:

If we don't really unleash Samuel to at least offer another dimension in this offense to keep the Patriots honest, we have no chance. I'm calling it now, Samuel is the key.

This is all provided that Cam plays worth a damn of course.

While I agree with your point, I think the biggest key here will be Ryan Kalil.

[FUMS]

1 hour ago, Saca312 said:

Yeah. Going into the Saints, they still had a respectable front four. I figured that’d be an issue. They had the 17th ranked defense against the run.

Patriots have the 31st ranked run defense. They have the 32nd ranked pass defense. 

Tom Brady isn’t infallible either. I dare say he had the same amount of mistakes Newton had (except he threw far more, as Cam barely even had attempts to pass).

Defense should be back in nickel, and we could shut down their offense. Patriots are capable of slicing us up like the Saints, but that involves Wilks not learning and redoing the scheme he called.

Will Patriots win? Probably. But can the Panthers win? Absolutely.

It's like you're convincing yourself, and then trying to convince us.  When we lose by 10+ points, make sure you're back here to take that L.  Okay?  

[Cary Kollins]

I took the Pats -8.5. 

I’ll be happy to lose that bet but I’m being realistic.