Patriots beat Bills, extend streak to 10

The Patriots were without Julian Edelman Monday night, but Danny Amendola stepped right in and gave the Bills all sorts of trouble. “Rex Ryan!” Asked if there was a message in it, Brady struggled to suppress a smile. I said it last week that I’m not sure the Bills would have beaten the Jets without his contributions, and he was nearly as good against the Patriots. “I think some of the things that we didn’t do well had nothing to do with missing some of the guys”.

“So we got to look at that”. They test you in the run game.

“It’s not about me; I don’t want to make it about me”.

He produced 141 yards from scrimmage including a pretty 27-yard touchdown run that tied the game in the third quarter.

Referee Gene Steratore defended the decision to end the game, saying that Watkins had “given himself up”, thus indicating that the clock should continue running.

Buffalo’s Jerry Hughes applies one of the many hits that Patriots quarterback Tom Brady took Monday night.

“We were down to two healthy receivers”, Brady said. Because if he keeps getting pounded like he did Monday night and into early Tuesday morning and pops a shoulder or a wrist or a knee or a neck, you can kiss the Super Bowl good-bye. There were three times the Patriots looked like the dream of perfection would end. I could sit here and say I need the ball 10 times. “That’s what championship teams do”. “For one reason or another our communication between all of us needs to be able to improve so that we can have the confidence to stand in there and make the plays when they are there, make the reads and so forth”.

New England Patriots quarterback Tom Brady (12) is upended by Buffalo Bills free safety Corey Graham (20) during the first half at Gillette Stadium.

That number didn’t account for the hit he absorbed after throwing what would have been a first-quarter Buffalo interception had it not been for offsetting penalties that negated the play.

In the third, both teams fumbled on the same punt. They, and the Carolina Panthers, an NFC team led by quarterback Cam Newton, are still flawless.

Taylor finished 20 of 36 for 233 yards. On another, the play after the inadvertent whistle, Brady may have had LaFell deep, but he couldn’t step into the throw because Cannon was beat by Buffalo defensive lineman Alex Carrington, who walloped Brady as he released the pass. The ball fell short of LaFell down the middle of the field. Chung has evolved into an every-down player (all 71 snaps), and had a great day in coverage other than one 14-yarder to Charles Clay. He had a nice little 12-yard run on a screen pass to open the game, accelerating away from two defenders.

The difference Monday was that Brady couldn’t just dump the ball to Edelman or Lewis on a 3-yard route and let them pick up 8-10 yards after the catch. In September, Brady threw 59 times, completing 38, for 466 yards and three touchdowns in that wild 40-32 victory.

Brady said yesterday the game plan will have to be different again this week to account for the new injuries, be it Amendola and Aaron Dobson, who also went down in the Bills game. With the crowd booing, the Patriots kept moving and Gostkowski missed wide right from 54 yards – ending his streak of 31 straight field goals overall and 52 at home.

The Panthers took the other two first-place votes. He was also held to just one rushing yard on four attempts.