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Originally Posted by ChainLegacy
Probably not going to get a good test of how much the D has really improved until the playoffs. Hopefully it won't be another one-and-done but at this point I'm skeptical they're any different from last year.
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The biggest improvement I've seen is in tackling at which they were pathetic last year and again at the beginning of the season. Edelmann is a good case study. Watch his three tackles in yesterday's game; they were all solid grabs that put the opponent on the ground. His sack on Young was another example.
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They might not have been torching Edelman when he got in on D, but if what you said that Arrington is the only true NFL caliber starter (probably true with current injuries), by definition they had to have targeted the weak points every once in a while.
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We haven't seen enough of Patrick Chung this season to know how good he could be. Last year he averaged over seven tackles per game and maintained that pace again this year. Unfortunately he's only played in seven of the eleven games so far.
http://espn.go.com/nfl/player/stats/.../patrick-chung
I'm too skeptical a personality to qualify as a fanboi in most cases, but I do think the defense has improved considerably over the past few games. In their best years, the Patriots defense consistently held teams to under seventeen points; they're at twenty now, but the trend looks to be favorable. (Without that meaningless touchdown at the end of the game, yesterday's victory would have pushed the average lower.)