Bye, Injuries!

Yes New England Patriots fans, it's that tricky week of the season where you have no idea what to do with yourself. It's the bye week. And with Pittsburgh Steelers @ New York Giants being the only actual good NFL game on offer this week 9, only NFL Redzone can keep us entertained...

However, let's look on the bright side: At least we're not going into the bye off two very shaky performances. We're going in at 5-3, the same as in 2011 (where we made the Super Bowl, if you pessimists have forgotten), and off a nice big win on the longest road trip of the year.

 And, as far as I see, we have a chance to get 9 key players back to full health:

Brandon Bolden, Patrick Chung, Dan Connolly, Steve Gregory, Rob Gronkowski, Aaron Hernandez, Dont'a Hightower, Logan Mankins and Jerod Mayo have all been missing games or running on less than 100% the last few weeks (145 yards and 2TD's is less than 100% for the Gronk). And this is a great opportunity to get these guys up and running again.

There's a good feeling around the Patriots again. We've known all year that we can beat teams 45-7, but we've been beating ourselves. And when the secondary can keep things under wraps, we can be in the elite of the NFL. The fans are starting to realize what this team can be, the players are certainly shifting through the gears, and with a fairly simple run after the bye, and a hopefully healthier team, a first round bye or the number one seed don't seem too far away.

On twitter? Give me a follow here, @brendanannely