On Tuesday night the NFL released the potential schedules for the 2011 season.  I use “potential” because with the lock out now well over 30 days and no end in sight as of this minute who knows when we will see NFL football in 2011, if at all.

The New England Patriots schedule is as follows, I have included the pre season schedule which was released last week.

The Patriots will play two home and two road games in the preseason and conclude with the traditional game against the New York Giants.  Due to the schedule rotation, the Giants will also visit Foxboro in the regular season.

Other potential regular season games of note include home games with the Dallas Cowboys and a Sunday night tilt with the Indianapolis Colts and big road games against the Pittsburgh Steelers, Philadelphia Eagles and Oakland Raiders.

For the first time in four years the team will open the regular season on the road.  They also have 3 of their first four games away from Foxboro, which will give them a more heavy home schedule towards the end of the season.

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Here’s the 2011 New England Patriots schedule:

Home Games in Caps

Preseason:

Week 1 August 11 JACKSONVILLE Time TBA Patriots TV Network

Week 2 August 20 @Tampa Bay Time TBA Patriots TV Network

Week 3 August 27 @Detroit 8p FOX

Week 4 September 1 NY GIANTS Time TBA Patriots TV Network

Regular Season:

Week 1 September 12 @Miami 7p MNF ESPN

Week 2 September 18 SAN DIEGO 4:15p CBS

Week 3 September 25 @Buffalo 1p CBS

Week 4 October 2 @Oakland 4:15p CBS

Week 5 October 9 NY JETS 4:15p CBS

Week 6 October 16 DALLAS 4:15p FOX

Week 7 October 23 BYE WEEK

Week 8 October 30 @Pittsburgh 4:15p CBS

Week 9 November 6 NY GIANTS 4:15p FOX

Week 10 November 13 @NY Jets 8:20p SNF NBC

Week 11 November 21 KANSAS CITY 8:30p MNF ESPN

Week 12 November 27 @Philadelphia 4:15p CBS

Week 13 December 4 INDIANAPOLIS 8:20p SNF NBC

Week 14 December 11 @Washington 1p CBS

Week 15 December 18 @Denver 4:15p CBS

Week 16 December 24 MIAMI 1p CBS

Week 17 January 1 BUFFALO 1p CBS

In the event that the NFL lockout stretches into the season the New England Patriots have announced they will refund season ticket holders the face value of the tickets for missed games plus 1% interest.

Season ticket holder MUST renew their ticket plans by March 31st or their seats will be offered to one of the 50,000 names on the season ticket waiting list.

To follow this and any other info on refunds go to patriots.com.

Some people are disappointed with the “stars” that were selected for ABC’s “Dancing with the Stars”. Well producers missed the boat by not signing up NFL MVP New England Patriots QB Tom Brady seen here in action with his ponytail and wife Gisele Bundchen at Carnaval in Brazil:

Last Friday, the New England Patriots made a few changes on their coaching. And again on Thursday, they made a few more.

Here’s the release from the Patriots:

FOXBOROUGH, Mass. – The New England Patriots have announced new position responsibilities for two members on the current coaching staff and one addition to the staff. On offense, Brian Ferentz was named the tight ends coach and Harold Nash has been promoted to head strength and conditioning coach. In addition, George Godsey has been named offensive assistant coach.

Ferentz will enter his fourth season with the Patriots and his third on Coach Belichick’s coaching staff. After serving as a scouting assistant in 2008, he was named a coaching assistant in 2009. Last season, he served as an offensive assistant coach. Ferentz played football as an offensive lineman at Iowa from 2001 through 2005 and then spent the 2006 season on the Atlanta Falcons practice squad.

Nash served as the assistant strength and conditioning coach for the last six seasons. In addition to his strength and conditioning duties, Nash also assists in coordinating the Patriots’ player development programs. After receiving top honors for the teams financial education program for three of the last four years, Nash and the Patriots player development program were awarded the 2009-10 Outstanding Overall Player Development Award.

Nash joined the Patriots following an all-star career as a defensive back in the Canadian Football League with the Shreveport Pirates (1994-95), Montreal Alouettes (1996-99), Winnipeg Bombers (1999-03) and Edmonton Eskimos (2004). He played four seasons as a defensive back at Southwestern Louisiana.

Godsey joins the coaching staff as an offensive assistant coach after spending the last seven seasons (2004-2010) at the University of Central Florida. He was the running backs coach in 2009 and 2010 and the quarterbacks coach from 2005 through 2008. He originally joined the Central Florida coaching staff as a graduate assistant in 2004. A quarterback at Georgia Tech from 1998 through 2001, Godsey played one season in the Arena Football League with the Tampa Bay Storm.

The New England Patriots officially franchise tagged OL Logan Mankins today. Mankins who was eligible for free agency will now remain with the team for at least another season pending a new CBA and the use of the franchise tagging system. His projected 2011 salary if they fail to sign him long term and keep the tag on him will be around $10.1 million.

Mankins was a 1st round pick by the Patriots in 2005 out of Fresno State. He is a three-time Pro Bowl selection, a two- time All-Pro selection and he has started every game he has has played in (89).

Last season, Mankins was a restricted free agent and was tendered at $3.25 million for the season but due to his hold out they were able to lower the tender to 100% of his previous years salary or $1.54 million. He missed the first seven games of the season and played in the final nine earning a pro-rated version of the tender offer. Despite his hold out he was still named both to the Pro Bowl and the All-Pro teams.

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Update: Here’s the release from the Patriots.

FOXBOROUGH, Mass. – The New England Patriots announced that they are utilizing the franchise designation on guard Logan Mankins. Last year, the Patriots used the franchise designation to retain the rights to Vince Wilfork. The designation was later removed when the two sides agreed to a long-term contract extension.

Tonight, the Patriots confirmed the use of the franchise designation and issued the following statement: “Logan Mankins is a tremendous player. He has been a fixture on our offensive line since we drafted him in the first round of the 2005 NFL Draft and he remains an important part of our future plans. Unfortunately, we have not been able to reach a long-term agreement, despite many attempts and proposals by both sides. That remains our objective in utilizing the franchise designation and we are hopeful that Logan will be a Patriot for many years to come.”

Mankins has started 89 regular season games and 10 postseason games at left guard since joining the Patriots as a first-round draft pick out of Fresno State in 2005. He has earned three Pro Bowl honors (2007, 2009 and 2010) and has been selected to the Associated Press All Pro team three times (2007, 2009 and 2010). Last season, he earned the honors despite missing the first seven weeks of the season. Mankins joins Hall of Famer John Hannah as the only Patriots’ guards to earn Pro Bowl bids since the 1970 merger.

Since entering the starting lineup as a rookie in 2005, Mankins has been part of an offensive line that has helped the Patriots’ offense finish in the top ten in total offense five times: 2005 (7), 2007 (1), 2008 (5), 2009 (3) and 2010 (8).

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Photo credit: Getty Images

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Last Friday the New England Patriots made some changes to their coaching staff for the 2011 season, as long as it’s played in whole or part. First off the team let defensive backs coach Corwin Brown go. The move wasn’t a surprise as the defensive backfield play had been suspect for the last few seasons. Josh Boyer was retained as secondary coach.

Brown, a 4th round pick of the Patriots in 1993, played 4 seasons with the team including in Super Bowl XXXI and then played two seasons with the New York Jets and two seasons with the Detroit Lions before retiring after the 2000 season. He started his coaching career with Al Groh at Virginia as a special teams coach for 3 years, then was a DB coach for the Jets for 3 seasons and spent three seasons as Charlie Weis’ Defensive Coordinator at Notre Dame before returning to New England this past season.

Linebackers coach Matt Patricia is now going to coach the safeties. He becomes the fourth safeties coach in the last four seasons. Defensive assistant coach Patrick Graham replaces Patricia as the linebackers coach, while assistant coach on offense/special teams Brian Flores becomes a defensive assistant to Bill Belichick. It appears Belichick will remain as the defensive coordinator for next season as well.

Bill O’Brien who was the quarterbacks coach in 2010 will now add offensive coordinator to his responsibilities as well. O’Brien had been the de-facto offensive coordinator as he called all the teams offensive plays last season.

And finally Mike Woicik, the strength and conditioning coach the last five seasons, has left for a similar job with the Dallas Cowboys. It’s expected that his assistant Harold Nash could be his replacement.

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In addition to the league wide predictions for the 2010 NFL season, I also gave you a game-by-game prediction for the New England Patriots. You got the opponent; my predicted result and a comment for each game along with the teams running record and a recap of the wins and losses at home, on the road,in the AFC East, against the conference and against the NFC.

Here’s how I did:

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Predicted Home Record: 7-1
Beat: CIN; BUF; MIN; INDY; NYJ; GB; MIA
Lost: BAL

Actual Home Record: 8-0
Beat: CIN; BUF; BAL: MIN; INDY; NYJ; GB; MIA
Lost: none

Predicted Road Record: 5-3
Beat: MIA; CLE; PIT; DET; BUF
Lost: NYJ; SD; CHI

Actual Road Record: 6-2
Beat: MIA; SD; PIT; DET; CHI: BUF
Lost: NYJ; CLE

Predicted Vs AFC East: 5-1
Beat: MIA ;@MIA; BUF ;@BUF; NYJ
Lost: @NYJ

Actual Vs AFC East: 5-1
Beat: MIA ;@MIA; BUF ;@BUF; NYJ
Lost: @NYJ

Predicted Vs AFC Conference: 9-3
Beat: CIN; BUF; @MIA; @CLE; @PIT; INDY; NYJ; @BUF; MIA
Lost: @NYJ;BAL;@SD

Actual Vs AFC Conference: 10-2
Beat: CIN; BUF; @MIA; BAL; @SD; @PIT; INDY; NYJ; @BUF; MIA
Lost: @NYJ; @CLE

Predicted Vs NFC Conference: 3-1
Beat: MIN; @DET; GB
Lost: @CHI

Actual Vs NFC Conference: 4-0
Beat: MIN; @DET; @CHI; GB
Lost: none

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New England Patriots head coach Bill Belichick has been named AP NFL Coach of the Year.  This is the third time Belichick has been honored as the AP NFL Coach of the Year. He also won it in 2003 and 2007.

Belichick led the team to a 14-2 season with one of the youngest teams of his 11-year tenure, while facing one of the NFL’s most difficult schedules. Also during the season, Belichick moved to 10th on the all-time wins list; he now has 176 wins.

Belichick started his head coaching career in Cleveland where he went 36-44 (1-1 in the post season) in five seasons before being fired.  In 2000, he was hired as the head coach of the Patriots and since then has compiled a regular season record of 125-50 while going 14-5 in the post season and winning three Super Bowls in four appearances.

Overall in his 16 seasons as a head coach, he is 176-100.

Photo credit: AP Photo

New England Patriots QB Tom Brady has been named the 2010 AP NFL Offensive Player of the Year. Brady gathered 21-of-50 votes from the AP writers. Philadelphia Eagles quarterback Michael Vick finished second with 11 votes.

Brady, who led the Patriots to a 14-2 season and the AFC East title, threw a league leading 36 TD passes against only four interceptions. Brady also set a NFL record for 335 pass attempts without an interception.

Brady who was also elected to the Pro Bowl and was a First Team All-Pro is expected to be named NFL MVP later this week. This was his second time being named Offensive Player of the Year having won it in 2007.

Photo credit: Getty Images

Well I guess it’s time to look back on the New England Patriots 2011 season.  A season, which by all accounts, was supposed to be more of a rebuilding year turned into a wonderful regular season that ended once again too early with a disappointing playoff loss.  And a home playoff loss at that.

Back in the preseason I predicted the Patriots for 12-4 with a 7-1 record at home, 5-3 on the road, 5-1 in the division and 9-3 in the conference.  I had them losing to the Jets on the road, which they did.  I also had them taking back to back loses against the Ravens in Foxboro and the Chargers in San Diego.  They actually won those games.  I had their fourth loss in Chicago, which turned out to be a blow out win.  This would have given them the AFC East title in a tie break with the Jets and the #3 AFC seed.  I had them winning in the wildcard card weekend, but losing in the division weekend, right where they bowed out.    So for predictions I thought I did pretty well.

In reality, they finished 14-2 with an 8-0 home record, 6-2 on the road, 5-1 in the division and 10-2 in the conference.  Their only losses were Week 2 at the Jets 28-14 and the disturbing blowout loss at Cleveland in Week 9, 34-14.  They won the division and earned the top AFC seed and got a wildcard weekend bye.  They then lost to the Jets 28-21 in the division round.

As Patriots fans we are all disappointed in how the season ended with what was a pretty poor showing in the playoffs for the second consecutive year.  What we have to realize is that this team, especially on the defensive side of the ball is very young.

Defensively three starters this season were rookies.  CB Devin McCourty, LB Brandon Spikes and LB/DE Jermaine Cunningham.  After that you have many players with only 2 or 3 years in the league like CB Darius Butler, S Brandon Meriweather, LB Jerod Mayo, LB Rob Ninkovich and others.  The defense did a good job growing into the themselves and getting better as the season progressed.  In fact over the last five weeks of the regular season they went from being ranked 22^nd in scoring defense to finishing 8^th.

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They had outstanding contributions from Mayo who led the NFL in tackles and McCourty who was second in INTs to Wilfork who was the true big man in the middle.

Special teams wise this team was well, special.  They had eight non-offensive TD’s this season two of them were KORTD’s, there was a punt return TD, a blocked FG returned for a TD and a blocked punt returned for a TD.  S Patrick Chung, WR Matthew Slater and WR Brandon Tate were exciting to watch all season long.

On offense they were record setting.  nine consecutive games with 30 points scored, eight of them in a row without a turnover.  Probable NFL MVP QB Tom Brady had a 9:1 TD to INT ratio and went an NFL record 335 pass attempts without a pick, throwing only four all season.  The team itself had only 10 turnovers all season establishing a new NFL record.  They played better than expected and we got sucked in.

In the end they just weren’t good enough to get deep into the playoffs.  I heard someone say they remind him of the New York Yankees.  They haven’t won in a while but they’re always lurking, always dangerous to make that run.  They always have a good season and are just a few moves away from a great one.  I believe that the next three seasons maybe the greatest you will ever see a New England team have.  They have the best QB. They’re sold at WR although they do need a deep a threat and getting Chad Ochocinco from Cincinnati or drafting A.J. Green (Georgia) would do them a world of good.  They have two solid backs in BenJarvus Green-Ellis and Danny Woodhead and hopefully Kevin Faulk is back.  They also have some fantastic young TE’s that are here for a while as well in Rob Gronkowski and Aaron Hernandez.

Defensively thought, they need a pass rusher badly.  Someone to terrorize opposing QBs off the edge.  They need a James Harrison; they need a Dwight Freeney; a Julius Peppers.  The back end of the defense in the linebacking and secondary is young and solid as is the kicking game.  This team is good.  This team is just a few moves away from being great.   I trust Bill Belichick will make them so.

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Photo credit: AP Photo