The Patriots Have Become the New “Drought” Buffalo Bills
The Buffalo Bills have come a long way since their 17-year playoff drought, which lasted from 2000-2016.
The Bills have made the postseason three straight seasons and four of the past five, with another playoff berth looking all but certain in 2022.
The Bills drafting quarterback Josh Allen is the biggest reason for the turnaround.
Allen become one of the best quarterbacks in the NFL, if not, the best and is on pace to be named league MVP. Buffalo is 5-1 and atop the AFC standings, leading the best offense in terms of yards per game through the first seven weeks of the regular season.
The Bills AFC East rival, New England Patriots, are going the opposite direction though.
Nee England dropped to 3-4 and sole possession of last place in the division after getting dominated by the Chicago Bears, 33-14 on Monday Night Football.
The Patriots sputtered on offense, outside of two drives; which were both led by rookie quarterback Bailey Zappe.
Starting quarterback Mac Jones was pulled in the second quarter for Zappe. It was Jones' first game back since suffering a high ankle sprain three weeks ago.
The Patriots looked abysmal on offense. Zappe held his own at the start but eventually threw two interceptions on the way to the loss.
The one to fellow rookie Kyler Gordon was really bad.
After watching last night, it's clear that the Patriots success on offense last season was due to offensive coordinator Josh McDaniels, who is now the head coach of the Las Vegas Raiders.
Matt Patricia is handling the play-calling and as most expected, it's going terribly.
Mac Jones has regressed and so has the offense. Zappe should be given the starting job, since unlike Jones, he has led New England to two convincing victories in the previous two weeks.
The tables have completely turned on the Bills and Patriots franchises. The Bills are the new New England and the Patriots are the new Buffalo.
Are the Patriots the worse team in the league? No, they aren't. However, the Bills drought teams of the 2000s and into the 2010s also were never the worse team in football. Twice they came close in 2001 and 2010, but the Bills were never bad enough to pick in the top five outside of those seasons and stayed in medicroty for a majority of the drough.
6-10, 7-9, 8-8, 9-7 were the common records of those Bills drought teams. Good enough to avoid being lumped in to the worse teams in the league, but nowhere near good enough to compete with the big boys of the NFL.
That's the Patriots right now. They had an abysmal 5-11 season in 2020. They did make the playoffs in 2021 and as we saw, got absolutely destroyed by the Bills in the AFC Wild Card round. Now, they are back to being below average with no answer at quarterback.
That kind of team is all too familiar with Bills fans. Josh Allen is on pace to dominate the division for the next 8-10 seasons and the Patriots are left to contend with that new Bills team and even battle the Miami Dolphins and New York Jets, who both have winning records and in the Jets case, exceeding expectations with a stud defense.
The Patriots are the new drought Bills.