New England Patriots: 3 takeaways from subpar Week 2 performance in Seattle

New England’s running game struggles again

The New England Patriots once again struggled to run the ball. This is an aspect of the game that they need to fix quickly.

Now New England was without James White who didn’t play after his mother and father got in a car crash. White’s father passed away and his mother was in critical condition.

That meant that we got to see plenty of Sony Michel and Rex Burkhead. This was there chance to shine. They didn’t exactly do that.

Once again Newton was the leading rusher for New England but he only had 47 yards. After that was Michel with 19 and Burkhead had a measly two yards.

Michel continued to struggle to gain yards in bunches. Once again he averaged under three yards a carry. If Michel wants to be New England’s feature back, he needs to do better than that.

At this point, it seems time to give J.J. Taylor some serious playing time. He is someone who can run and catch the ball and Michel just isn’t performing well. It would be interesting to see what Taylor could do with more than a handful of carries.

So the Patriots are 1-1. They had a chance to win but didn’t. That will take some getting used to.