BY NICK ST. DENIS
Something had to give.
The New England Patriots' offense is averaging less than five yards a play and 19 points a game, but it took a 1-for-12 day on third down and Tom Brady's first touchdown-less game in 52 tries for them to finally lose.
No matter what the defense did Sunday against the Cincinnati Bengals, it wouldn't be good enough.
"Our defense continued to bail us out and really be the strength of our team," Brady told WEEI Monday. "But our offense has to at some point start pulling its weight.”
The Patriots fell to 4-1 with the sloppy 13-6 Week 5 loss, but they're still very much in control of the AFC East and would need quite the monumental collapse, to their standards, to fall out of playoff contention come December.
“The positive is we’re 4-1 after all the crap that we’ve been through this year," Brady said. "We’re still in a pretty good position within our division and within the conference. We have our whole season ahead of us.
"We need to develop some strengths that we can really build on going forward. It’s only going to get tougher from here.”
New England is giving up the second-fewest points in the NFL with just 14 a game.
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