Patriots have only lost one home opener under Belichick.
Patriots with or without Brady are a tough team, as the Cardinals found out.
The Simple answer is yes, the Miami Dolphins can beat the New England Patriots; However, the much more difficult part is actually going out and doing it!
While Miami has split with the Patriots the last two seasons, they have not been able to beat the Patriots at Gillette Stadium in Foxborough since 2008. But this time, the Dolphins will be “lucky” enough not to have to face Tom Brady.
The Dolphins are going to have to play another near perfect game, if they want to have a chance to beat the Patriots. Even though Brady is not playing, Bill Belichick is still the coach, and he showed last week he could go on the road against one of the best teams in the league, and win without future Hall of Famers Brady and Gronk. The best pay per head bookie software in the world has the Patriots as a -6.5 point favorite, and the public has been eating it up, by predominately betting on the Patriots.
The Dolphins are going to have to make it a priority to protect Ryan Tannehill this game, because the Patriots showed last week that they had no problem putting pressure and getting to Carson Palmer. The Dolphins need their offensive line to also open up some running lanes, because they are going to need to establish some kind of running game this week.
Beating the Patriots this week is crucial for the 2016 Miami Dolphins.
Jay Ajayi who was a healthy scratch last week will be activated this game. Considering, he should have even more motivation to play hard this week, I believe that Arian Foster and Ajayi should be a better running back combination this week. Also, the Patriots run defense is not as good as the Seahawks, so Miami may have a better chance to actually get something going on the ground.
On defense Miami needs to just play like they played last week. They did a very good job stopping the run, and they put pressure on the QB — this must continue in spades. The Dolphins must, at bare minimum, put some pressure on Garoppolo. Despite his solid play in Week 1, Garoppolo still only has a extremely limited amount of NFL game time experience, so a healthy and steady pass rush could go a long way in diminishing some of Garoppolo’s new found confidence. Vance Joseph and the defense were very aggressive last week, which was a pleasant surprise. I expect that to be the case again this week.
Miami will also have to make sure they protect the football, because the Patriots always have an opportunistic defense. Then on the other side if Miami can pressure Garoppolo, then they may be able to cause him to either cough up the ball on an errant throw, or a strip sack.
If Miami can play like they did last week, with an extra boost in the offense, then I believe that Miami can pull off the upset this week, and finally beat the Patriots in New England. What are the rest of the Miami Dolphins News fans thoughts about whether or not Miami can win on the road in New England this week?