FOXBORO, Mass. — Parity has ruled the NFL over the last decade, and it's been taken up a notch again in 2010.
Patriots head coach Bill Belichick said Monday that is one thing that has really stuck out about the league this season.
"I'd say, like usual in the NFL, pretty much anything can happen any week," Belichick said. "Teams that you might expect to win, don't win. Teams that you might not expect to win, win and win big. A lot of real close competitive games come down to the last possession, the last play, one key play right at the end of the game. It looks very, very competitive to me all the way across the board."
The NFL won't file its current week's statistical trends until the conclusion of the Monday night game, but after Week 4, there were 23 teams that were either in first place or within a game of first place, which was the most ever through four weeks of action.
Also, the Chiefs were the last unbeaten team to fall this season, and their loss Sunday signified that there wouldn’t be any 4-0 teams in the NFL for the first time since 1970.
With the level of unpredictability, Patriots director of player personnel Nick Caserio preached the importance of the franchise's famous one-game-at-a-time mantra and how that will pay dividends at the end of the season when the playoff race will certainly be tight.
"It looks like every week you have to be prepared regardless of who the opponent is," Caserio said. "I mean, it's such a competitive league, and it looks like games are going to come down to 'X' amount of plays, whether it's in the Raiders game [against the Chargers on Sunday] — a couple of blocked kicks turned into points — or turnovers or penalties. There are always five or six critical plays in every game that are going to make the difference, and it looks like it's going to be competitive for the duration of the year."
