The Patriots looked out of sync offensively Sunday afternoon, and it’s easy to understand why.
New England’s Week 6 matchup with Denver marked its first game since Oct. 5. Cam Newton, who returned to game action against the Broncos, was coming off an even longer layoff, as he hadn’t played since the Patriots’ Week 3 win over the Las Vegas Raiders on Sept. 27.
The lack of practice clearly paid dividends for the Patriots in their second consecutive loss, which dropped them to 2-3 on the season. Tony Dungy believes New England very much needs more time on the practice field as it looks to develop cohesion.
“They need chemistry. They need time together,” Dungy said Sunday on NBC’s “Football Night in America.” “What they’re going to have to do is build chemistry between Cam Newton and those receivers because people are coming in and playing them now saying, ‘If we can take away the running game, take away Cam running, these receivers can’t beat us up the field.’ “
Concerns about the Patriots’ offense are warranted. Rex Ryan, for one, believes the unit currently looks like a “disaster.”
But Newton and Co. showed glimpses of what it’s capable of over the first two weeks of the campaign, so there’s reason to believe they could turn things around as the season unfolds.
