issue, but looking a little closer while they were ranked 15th in the league with 37 sacks last season, they were actually tied with the Super Bowl Champion Ravens with that total and just one behind the Ravens' opponent, the San Francisco 49ers, who finished the year with 38. This preseason New England has looked fairly decent in that area, with Brandon Spikes (2 sacks), Rob Ninkovich (1.5 sacks), Tommy Kelly, (1.5 sacks) and Chandler Jones (1 sack) each having some early success. Hopefully that will carry over as they get ready to begin the regular season.

As we know, those two areas obviously directly affect each other. So if they can prevent those early on this year, they'll hopefully avoid dropping a couple of early games the waythey did last season. In two of their first three losses in 2012 they gave up 3 plays of over 40 yards in each one, both of which were on the road to the Baltimore Ravens and Seattle Seahawks. Playing on the road is tough enough, but giving up plays like that just makes it that much more difficult.

They're in better condition this time around. Talib has a full season under his belt and having come back on just a one-year deal he's in a contract year, so he should be at the top of his game. His acquisition stabilized the secondary last season and his presence seemed to take some of the pressure off of safeties McCourty and Steve Gregory. For McCourty, after struggling early on at