What is going on with the Patriots in Primetime?

By Eric B

Last Monday, the then 3-3 New England Patriots squared off with the 2-4 Chicago Bears in Primetime and entered the game as 8.5-point favorites. The Patriots performance shocked most fans and analysts as the Bears, who scored more than 20 points in only 2 of their 6 games to start the season, blew-out the Patriots who were at home, 33-14. During the game, someone on Twitter asked a question wondering when was the last time the Patriots actually looked prepared in a Primetime game and that really got me thinking. The previous few Patriots Primetime games were disasters where they lost to the Buffalo Bills in the playoffs last year 47-17 and lost to the Indianapolis Colts last December following their bye week 27-17. Some additional Primetime games from the previous few years that also came to mind were the December 2020 games at home vs the Bills where they lost 38-9 and on the road vs the Los Angeles Rams 24-3, as well as 2019 road losses to the Houston Texans 28-22 and Baltimore Ravens 37-20.

This made me decide to analyze this trend further to see if recency bias is contributing to this thought that lately the Patriots have not looked good in Primetime or if there really is something to this. Since 2 of the games that came to mind were in 2019 with the aforementioned losses to the Ravens and Texans, and since 2019 was when Steve Belichick took over as Defensive Coordinator, I decided to break up the analysis into 2 timeframes: 2001-2018 and 2019-present. Also, due to the different nature of the playoffs, I decided to limit this deep-dive to only regular season games.

From 2001-2018, the Patriots played in 72 Primetime games and went 50-22 (69.4% winning percentage) averaging 27.9 points per game (PPG) and allowing 21.2 points per game (PAPG). From 2019-present the Patriots have played in 16 Primetime games and have gone 7-9 (43.8% winning percentage) averaging 20.9 points per game and allowing 21.1 points per game. Further dissecting this a little more, the average margin for victory for the Patriots wins were 13.9 points from 2001-2018 (31.2 PPG vs 17.3 PAPG) vs 17.5 from 2019-present (27.6 PPG vs 10.1 PAPG). In their losses though, the Patriots average margin of defeat was 10.0 from 2001-2018 (20.3 PPG vs 30.3 PAPG) while being 13.9 from 2019-present (15.8 PPG vs 29.7 PAPG).

Table 1: Record and Performance in Primetime Games

Now, what may have contributed to such a drastic difference performance during these 2 time-periods? For one, the greatest QB of all time, Tom Brady, was the Patriots QB for most of the games in the first time period (65 of 72) and was only their QB for a few in the second time period (5 of 16). But that does not account for all of the differences. Irrespective of the time period, with Tom Brady as QB, the Patriots were 49-21 in Primetime games (70% winning percentage) vs the Patriots being 8-10 in Primetime games with someone other than Tom Brady as starting QB (44.4% winning percentage). One difference is the Patriots have played stronger teams in the second period vs the first. From 2001-2018, their opponents finished with an average of 8.7 victories while from 2019-present they finished with an average of 9.5 victories (this does take into account that an additional game was added to the schedule in 2021). From 2001-2018, 39 of the Patriots 72 games (52.2%) were against teams that finished the season with a winning record (Patriots record in these games: 21-18; 53.8% winning percentage) while 10 of the Patriots 16 games from 2019-present (62.5%) were against teams that finished with a winning record (Patriots record in these games: 2-8; 20% winning percentage). Additionally, the Patriots faced only 5 teams that finished with at least 13 wins from 2001-2018 (6.9% of games; They went 1-4 in those games), while the 2019-present Patriots faced 4 such teams (25% of games; They went 0-4 in those games). While the second time period did face better teams in a higher percentage of their Primetime games, when comparing the Patriots success in these games, the 2019-present Patriots have not had as much success when facing the better competition in these games.

Figure 1: Yearly Performance in Primetime Games

Figure 2: Annual Winning Percentage in Primetime Games from 2001-Present

What are the implications?

The Patriots have at least 4 more Primetime games remaining this season (possibly 5: The last game of the season vs the Buffalo Bills game time has yet to be announced) vs the currently 6-1 Minnesota Vikings, 6-1 Buffalo Bills, 3-5 Arizona Cardinals, and 2-5 Las Vegas Raiders with all 4 games in 4 consecutive weeks and 3 of the 4 being on the road. The Patriots are currently 4-4 and if they want to make the playoffs, they are going to have to likely win at least 2 of these games. Two of the games as mentioned above are vs teams with winning records and although the Raiders do not have a winning record and have underperformed this season, Bill Belichick has had some trouble throughout his career when facing his former assistant coaches or players (17-16, Winning %: 51.5% vs Head Coaches who were his former assistants or players; 308-144, Winning %: 68.1% vs all other Head Coaches). One main takeaway when looking at the data from the Primetime games is that even though the Patriots have not been as successful lately, they are allowing approximately the same points per game both overall (2001-2018: 21.2 PAPG; 2019-present: 21.1 PAPG) as well as in their losses (2001-2018: 30.3 PAPG; 2019-present: 29.7 PAPG). However, they are scoring about 1 less touchdown per game in their recent stretch overall (2001-2018: 27.9 PPG; 2019-present: 20.9 PPG). If they want to be successful going forward, their offense is going to have to start picking up the slack. The Patriots struggles over the last 3.5 years in Primetime games have certainly been surprising, and time will tell if the Patriots are able to flip this new narrative.