Revis Leaves and Suddenly it’s Week 4 All Over Again With People Saying It’s Over for the Pats

http://www.spotrac.com/nfl/new-england-patriots/

With the departure of Darrelle Revis, New England is in upheaval. “Belichick let him walk. Blow the whole team up! Who wants Malcolm Butler?! Without Darrelle Revis the Patriots secondary is trash! Belichick can’t draft for shit!” On and on and on it goes. I’m pretty staunch in my “In Belichick We Trust” philosophy but that doesn’t mean I can’t do some digging to find out why we wouldn’t drop 40 million on Revis beyond the tired, “Belichick and Kraft are stingy bastards.”

1. We have to resign ~40 players between 2015-2017 including favorites like: Chandler Jones, Nate Solder, Dont’a Hightower, Ryan Wendell, Alfonzo Dennard, Legarrette Blount, Josh Kline, Dan Connolly, Sebastian Vollmer, Jamie Collins, Logan Ryan, Rob Ninkovich and the list goes on. For those of you keeping track of home that encompasses 5 of the 5 starting O-lineman half of the defensive line, half of the starting linebacking core and a large portion of the starting defensive backs. So spare me this “WE HAD THE MONEY AND WE DIDN’T PULL THE TRIGGER BECAUSE IDK WHY!?!?!?”

2. Call me what you will, but the money will be better spent elsewhere. Jabaal Sheard, a versatile DE/OLB from the Browns was just signed. Jerod Mayo will be signed. Vince Wilfork may come back. CJ Spiller is available. Scott Chandler is available, who would be filthy alongside Gronk. Its very early in the game but there are a lot of upgrades that can be made in this offseason and now the Pats have a plethora of money to throw at people.

3. Without Revis our secondary will not fall back to the disgusting state it once was. Devin McCourty isn’t the safety we want, he’s the safety we need. Rangy, doesn’t let big plays happen. I think people forget that Devin McCourty and whoever our number 2 CB eliminated every big name receiver we played. Revis shutdown Golden Tate III while McCourty and company handled Megatron. We have a stronger secondary than people give us credit for and while Revis, helped quite a bit the pieces are still in place to have a top five defense again this year.

4. You don’t win Super Bowls throwing $40 million in guaranteed money at people. Could you imagine if Belichick paid out that chunk of change and then Revis goes and tears his ACL? People would riot. There would be blood. The Jets will regret front loading his contract like that I guarantee it.

The Bills are the AFC East’s “Factory of Sadness”

http://www.nfl.com/news/story/0ap3000000476192/article/eagles-bills-to-swap-lesean-mccoy-for-kiko-alonso

Seriously, the poor, poor Buffalo Bills fans. Those winters coupled with the fact that they are continually “on the cusp” of being some sort of “contender” is enough to make you jump off a roof. I think its almost worse than just being plain shitty like the Raiders or the Browns. The bar is so low there’s very little room for disappointment. Every offseason, the Bills are poised to somehow beat out the Pats for the AFC east title. Every season, they utterly disappoint.

This trade is the dumbest trade I have seen in quite some time. It makes zero sense. Zero. LeSean McCoy is a very similar back to both CJ Spiller and Fred Jackson. Sure, you can argue McCoy is on another level than them. He was the NFL rushing leader (running behind one of the most athletic and skilled O-lines and having D-Jax as a deep threat might have helped, who can say), he’s certainly elusive and has carried a much heavier workload with less injury than Spiller or Jackson. At the end of the day though, defense is going to win you games. Marshawn Lynch was on the Bills. He had multiple 1,000+ rush yard season. The Bills didn’t win dick. He’s winning now because he’s playing behind the best defense in the NFL and you can afford to run the ball 80% of the time when the opposing offense can’t score points.

With Kiko Alonso, the Bills had a chance at being legitimate. A chance. Rex Ryan has always had the Patriots number and he won 4 games with that trash called the New York Jets. The Bills front seven would have been one of, if not the best front seven in the NFL. Kiko Alonso is a monster. I would have been nervous about the Bills. Now, they’re once again laughable. “Better not load the box against LeSean McCoy because that stud EJ Manuel is gonna be chucking it to Robert Woods and Sammy Watkins.” Classic Bills. I promise you Kiko Alonso is going to be a legitimate candidate for comeback player of the year and LeSean McCoy will have a 1000+ rush yard season and the Bills will go 8-8.

Poor Bills fans. Can’t catch a break.