New England Patriots: Keys to victory vs. Jameis Winston and the Tampa Bay Buccaneers

Players need to step up

While the play-calling has its own problems, the players are putting themselves in bad situations on both sides of the ball. They need to start acting more like a team, especially on the defensive side of the ball. The defense almost feels like how we talk about our fears of the Boston Celtics not jelling. It seems like they are not in the right places at the right time.

There are communication break-downs every game. There are an elevated number of defensive penalty calls in critical situations, and offensive penalty calls as well, though as

Rob Gronkowski rightly stated:

"“If the consistency was there 100 percent then I’d be cool whatever it is. But one week we’re told we can play [and] it really isn’t going to be called. They can hold and you can slap off their hands and then the next week it’s if you touch the guy it’s a P.I. I just wish I knew the consistency so then I can base my game off that in practice and be prepared for the game and know the rules going in.”"

Bill Belichick once said that he would rather his whole team did the wrong thing than some players do it right, because if the whole team does it wrong, at least there is good communication. This is the type of communication the captains of the team need to get the team in line.