Things For Pats Fans to Feel Good About

In no particular order..

Mental toughness, displayed by rallyng after falling behind away from home and losing their best defensive player.

They were playng almost lights-out defense for three quarters. Looks like the front is getting more clever, pulling more tricks like the Anderson outside-to-inside move to get to Tebow's face.

They were solid on special teams.

Aaron Hernandez is looking like he's at preinjury form. Explosive. Last year the same couldn't be said.

They grabbed Vincent Fuller who is now the most experienced DB on the roster. Could be better then Meriweather and all the bums we currently have besides for Chung. The bar is awefully low.

Speaking of Chung we should have him and Brandon Spikes back. Didn't I say that last week?

Ochocinco proved he can do the dirty work with some nice blocks downfield. Plus that one 33-yarder for a TD shouldn't be overlooked. He can break man-coverage which is an area of need. Now if only he could work on his relationship to Brady.

DE/OLB Markell Carter. He might not be Andre Carter, but he'll add depth behind Anderson and Ninkovich.

DT Ron Brace. He was getting some nice push against the pocket and made a great play for the ball.

An improved running-game from what we had last year. At this point last year BJGE and Woodhead were our two running-backs. Add in Ridley and Faulk and we're much deeper at RB. Plus when healthy there's Vereen. Also, there's the following point which is connected to the run-game.

An improved offensive-line from what we had last year. Do you think Sebastian Vollmer would have shutdown Von Miller? Nate Solder did. Then there's Marcus Cannon for greater depth. Plus there's Matt Light playing like his old-self. At Guard, Dan Connolly is no longer starting at RG. Brian Waters is and his leve of play at that position has been elite.. Logan Mankins is finally starting to play like Logan Mankins again. At Center, Ryan Wendell had a bad snap vs. Denver but other than that he had a fairly solid game. Don't hold that holding call against him; there wasn't much he could do there. Definitely looks better than Connoly or McDonald, and maybe just as good if not a tough better than Koppen. He just needs to be more consistent with the snapping.

For those that forget, the New York Jets came up with the anti-Brady gameplan in the 2010 post-season. Lots of dime subpackages to cover up all those shifty receivers and increase the chance for turnovers. How is that countered? By a strong O-Line and RB corps. What did Belichick prioritize over a pass-rusher? O-Line and RB. With that 2 TE set you got some bigger bodies on the field to smash into those smaller DBs and keep defenses honest..

Things not to feel good about;

DE/DT Shaun Ellis, LB Gary Guyton, S James Ihedigbo, S Matthew Slater, and S Sergio Brown saw snaps on defense. They played about as poorly as they've played all season.

LB Dane Fletcher had a couple of nice plays to go with some bad ones.

DE/DT Brandon Deaderick doesn't look bad but doesn't look great. Better than Shaun Ellis.

Chad Ochocinco and Tom Brady still aren't on the same page.

The Patriots have 2 more games in which they will worry about injuries more than ever this season.