New England Patriots Revisiting 5 Bold P

Back on September 8, I came up with for the 2021 season Rickey Henderson Jersey . The point of these "bold predictions" was to find scenarios that would most likely not happen, but still find enough evidence to prove that they could come true.With that said, let's look back at the five bold predictions I made for the Patriots heading into the regular season. It will certainly be interesting to see how my predictions panned out.Prediction: The Patriots will lead the NFL in sacksVerdict: Wrong Surely a bold take, but after Bill Belichick's offseason spending spree, I had high hopes.New England finished the season with 36 sacks, which ranked them at No. 19 in the league. Matthew Judon did his part Glenn Hubbard Jersey , finishing with a career-high 12.5 sacks.Kyle Van Noy finished with 5.5 sacks, which is right on par with what he has typically averaged during his tenure in New England.Other than that,Dont'a Hightower and Deatrich Wise Jr. contributed three sacks each.I should have known better, taking into account that the Patriots dont stack up high sack totals. With Belichick's Andrew Triggs Jersey scheme,the defense did not blitz much this year. In fact, they finished at the bottom third in the league in blitzing and also the bottom third in pre sure percentage.As I was predicting a high sack total, I did not consider the fact Belichickprefers his defensive ends to set the edge. Players in Belichicks system cant just freelance and rush the pa ser. Belichick expects his players to maintain their lane to avoid giving up a big play. Prediction: Stephon Gilmore will not play a single snap for the Patriots this season. Verdict: CorrectThis seemed like an obvious prediction, just not very popular with the fanbase. Ideally, Gilmore would have finished the Reggie Jackson Jersey season and revisited his contract situation during the offseason.That is not how it played out.The Patriots placed Gilmore on the Physically Unable to Perform List(PUP)list, which led him to mi s at least the first six games of the season.New England then went on and traded the two-time All-Pro cornerbackto the Carolina Rollie Fingers Jersey Panthersfor a 2023 sixth-round pick, hours before the team planned to officially release him. Gilmore made three Pro Bowls in four seasons in New England, starting 56 of 64 games from 2017-2020. He won one Super Bowl as well as the NFL Defensive Player of the Year honor in 2019.He did not play a single snap for the Patriots.Scroll to ContinuePrediction: Damien Harris rushes for 1200 yards.Verdict: WrongI am still in shock that Harris came up short of this milestone.Harris is now in his third season with the Patriots after being selectedin the third round with the 87th overall pick of the 2019 NFL Draft.He finished the season with a career high 929 yards and 15 touchdowns.Perhaps that one mi sed game due to a hamstring injury kept his rushing total Dave Henderson Jersey down? The good news is that his stats and games played continue to improve year after year, so maybe I was just a year too early with my prediction?Prediction: Jakobi Catfish Hunter Jersey Meyers will lead the team in receptionsVerdict: Correct I admitted back at the beginning of the season that this is probably my least-bold prediction.That remains to be true.For an undrafted player that was unable to make it into Tom Brady's circle of trust in 2019, Meyers has developed into a nice player. In fact, this year was by far his best season.How is this for a stat line: 83 catches, 866 yards, and two touchdowns. All career highs.I was expecting Meyers to catch 90-100 balls so he obviously came up a little short. Meyers symbolizes everything Belichick wants in a player regardle s of where theyve been drafted. The third-year receiver has shown versatility too. He can Terry Steinbach Jersey line up for a pa s, jump in under center to play quarterback on a gadget play, and contribute on special teams.Prediction: The Patriots will finish at 10-7 and win a playoff game Marcus Semien Jersey during Wild Card weekend.Verdict: Correct/ TBDWell, I nailed the final record. I remember when I initially predicted 10-7 and the fanbase was all over me saying this team was going to win 12-14 games. I had to read and listen to a lot of, "In Bill, we trust" commentary.So why did I predict 10-7 when the rest of New England was waiving their Patriots pom-poms?It's simple, just like I said back in September, having a in a 17 game season is impre sive.As great as the Tom Santiago Casilla Jersey Brady Era was, winning at least 12 regular season games 13 times from 2001-2019, it was completely unfair to put that kind of pre sure on rookie Mac Jones. Expecting the same results in year one is just absurd.It remains to be seen if the Patriots win their playoff game during Wild Card weekend. Kickoff is set for this Saturday at 8:15 PM.