DENVER — Standing here in the wake of the New England Patriots disappointing 20-18 loss in last year’s AFC Championship game, you could look at a roster boasting Chandler Jones, Jamie Collins and Rob Gronkowski and feel like you knew what the 2016 Patriots were going to be.
The team that showed up in Denver on Sunday had none of those men. At various times since last January, the Patriots lost them, forcing New England to remake itself over and over and over. This team has been a continuous work in progress, and after Sunday’s smothering 16-3 victory over the defending Super Bowl champion Broncos, it’s now clear what the 2016 Patriots are: Whatever they need to be.
In securing their 14th division title in 17 seasons under Bill Belichick, the Patriots had their best defensive performance of the season and their offense leaned more heavily on the run than in any other game Tom Brady has played in this season. The end result was a slow, methodic, drama-free suffocation of the Broncos, a team that beat New England twice on this field last season. As a result, the Patriots will absolutely not have to return here in 2016, and control their own destiny in the race for the top seed in the AFC playoffs.
Any Belichick team is going to be adaptable, but this team may be his crowning achievement in amorphous excellence. Playing with virtually no stars on defense, losing their most disruptive weapon on offense and still showing a wide range of players who can not only execute but shine on whatever given Sunday the team needs them to. This week, it gave them a crucial win on the road, in the thin air, on a short week against a team with a winning record.
The defense, severely criticized in the wake of a 31-24 loss to the Seahawks in Week 10, played its best game of the year on Sunday, and it’s starting to seem as if Belichick really did have a vision of improvement when he shipped Collins to Cleveland on Halloween. The Patriots have won five consecutive games by a combined score of 124-67. Maligned all season as the surefire reason this team would not win a Super Bowl, the defense has allowed just 13.4 points per game in that span and a league-best 16.6 points per game on the season.
“We were doubted all year,” said cornerback Logan Ryan, who caught his first interception of the season. “You said we sucked, and we heard about (the Broncos) secondary and their defense, so we wanted to come out here and prove something.”
On Sunday, the defense absolutely won this game, forcing two turnovers (special teams added a third) and sacking rookie Trevor Siemien four times. They held the Broncos to just three points, and allowed only two third-down conversions on 12 tries (17 percent).
Meanwhile, with Tom Brady struggling early (he was 0-for-6 passing in the first quarter), the Patriots kept Denver’s vaunted defense at bay with a consistent ground attack. LeGarrette Blount scored the game’s only touchdown, giving him a team-record 15 on the season, but the Patriots also had room for something new, making Dion Lewis their workhorse back for the first time this year. Lewis had a season-high 18 carries, ran for 95 yards (5.3 yards per carry), and helped the Patriots win the time of possession battle, 33:36-26:24.
“We knew it was going to be a grind, but we knew we had to run the ball,” Patriots tight end Martellus Bennett said. “Everyone bought in and everyone just stuck to it. No one was worried about getting the ball, where the ball was going. Not that we ever do, but we just wanted to do whatever it took to win.”
Beginning the year with Tom Brady serving a suspension and mixing new components into the defense, the Patriots have rarely looked like the exact the same team in consecutive weeks. The ability to become something new late in the season is a rare and potent trick in the NFL. It’s the kind of thing that allowed the 2007 Giants and 2012 Ravens to come from nowhere and win Super Bowls. In spite of losing only two games, the Patriots may – surprisingly – be the surprise team of 2016.
If you thought you had the Patriots figured out back in November, think again. They are now the NFL’s great mystery, and this is the best time of year to be a mystery.
(Follow Dave Brown on Twitter @ThatDaveBrown.)