The National Football League will stage ten preseason games today and complete the second full week of their summer games tomorrow when the Tennessee Titans host the Seattle Seahawks.
The games today start early, 9:00 a.m. Pacific time, with the Detroit Lions hosting the Washington Commanders. Last season, neither of these teams advanced to the playoffs but they met two years ago after the Lions had captured the top seed in the National Football Conference with a 15-2 campaign. The top seed did Detroit little good, as the Wild Card Commanders upset the Lions before losing the NFC Championship Game to the eventual Super Bowl winning Philadelphia Eagles.
The Lions, after years of cellar dwelling performances, had a dramatic improvement with the arrival of head coach Dan Campbell. He not only led the Lions to the top seed in 2024; he also had them in the playoffs and were leading the San Francisco 49ers on the road the prior season in the NFC Championship Game.
The Commanders also had a dramatic turnaround in 2024, leaping from last place the prior year to the playoffs and NFC Championship Game. Their turnaround was engineered by head coach Dan Quinn.
Al Davis, the onetime owner of the Oakland Raiders, said, “It is more difficult to maintain success than it is to first achieve it.”
His statement has merit because when a team rises from last place to the playoffs they are pushing against the motivation of prior defeats. That can be a motivational boost, while once at the top the challenge is to keep the edge that got a team there without the natural motivation gained from a need to overcome.
Both the Lions and Commanders lost their edge once they enjoyed success, and that rule applies this year to the New England Patriots.
In his first season at the helm, head coach Mike Vrabel guided the Patriots all the way to the Super Bowl. Despite a loss to the Seahawks last February, New England was way ahead of schedule to achieve success after 20 seasons of dominating play that included six Super Bowl winning seasons. Most often, after a team enjoys a long period of success and then drops to the bottom, like the Patriots did beginning with the departure of Tom Brady in 2020, it takes a number of years to recapture greatness.
New England appeared to be in the early stages of their rebuilding when Vrabel took over the team that finished with only four wins in 2024. They still had not settled on an heir for Brady, and their defense was a sieve. Then, in a remarkable quick turnaround, Drake Maye emerged as a top franchise quarterback, and the defense allowed the third lowest point total in the league. Only the Denver Broncos and Super Bowl winning Seattle Seahawks allowed fewer points than the 320 surrendered by Vrabel’s 2025 stop unit.
So, bottom to first, what would Al Davis think?
He’d think the Patriots are going to have a lot more trouble maintaining their winning edge than first achieving it … particularly in a season so close to two-decades of dominating performances.
Today, the Patriots host the Philadelphia Eagles in a contest between a pair of teams that have participated in the Super Bowl over the past two seasons.
By our numbers and historical precedents, the Patriots are headed into a campaign that will be wrought with disappointment.