Curran: The Case For Patriots As Nfl's Best Team Despite Easy Schedule

Curran: The case for Patriots as NFL's best team despite easy schedule originally appeared on NBC Sports Boston

Are the New England Patriots the best team in the NFL?

On paper, it’s a simple question with a simple answer. No team in the league has a better record than the Patriots, who are 11-2 after a 33-15 beatdown of the New York Giants on Monday Night Football. Best record equals best team, right?

There’s nuance to the conversation, though, and it involves New England’s historically easy schedule.

The Patriots have enjoyed the league’s softest slate by a fairly decent margin; the combined win percentage of their opponents (.342) is the worst in the NFL, and by season’s end, they’ll have played a whopping 11 games against teams that sit in the bottom 12 of the league’s standings entering Week 14.

So, is Mike Vrabel’s club just beating up on bad teams? Are the 10-2 Denver Broncos, 9-3 Los Angeles Rams or 9-3 Seattle Seahawks the real cream of the NFL crop because they’ve played better competition?

It’s a valid argument, but after witnessing Monday’s rout, Patriots insider Tom E. Curran is ready to declare New England the top team in the league — schedule be damned.

“The 2025 season matters. What you’ve put out there matters,” Curran said on a new Patriots Talk Podcast after Monday’s game. “They’ve played better football longer than anybody else.

“They have wins of 21, 18, 19 and 18 (points) against the ass teams that they used to be eyeball-to-eyeball with. They’ve won on the road against Buffalo. They beat Tampa on the road. They’ve had all manner of games. They’ve had blowouts against decent teams. They’ve won on the road. They’ve won at home. They’ve won in primetime.

“They haven’t played a great schedule, but nobody’s played better than them. So, as a result — they don’t have the best roster. But hard work beats talent when talent doesn’t work hard.”

Put another way: At some point, results have to matter. And unlike, say, the Broncos — who have won their last four games by three points or fewer — the Patriots have been dominating their competition.

New England’s plus-110 point differential ranks third in the NFL behind only the Seahawks and Rams. The Patriots have won five of their last 10 games by double digits and are the only team in the league that’s undefeated on the road (6-0). While other teams have stumbled against inferior competition (see: the Rams, who lost to the Panthers on Sunday), the Patriots essentially have been a wrecking ball after a pair of early-season trip-ups in Weeks 1 and 3.

Of course, Vrabel and his players aren’t in the business of style points, nor are they concerned with whether they’re stamped as the NFL’s “best team.” Their goal after the Week 14 bye should be to hold onto the AFC’s No. 1 seed — which is a very real possibility over the final month of the season.

Check out Patriots Talk for more postgame reaction from Curran and Phil Perry: