Patriots vs. Dolphins Predictions: New England Should Easily Handle Miami

The 2011 NFL regular season has been one of the most anticipated seasons in recent memory, and most of that could be due to the mostly locked-out offseason.

Either way, football is back and it's back in a big way. 

One team that made a lot of noise in the short few weeks of free agency was the New England Patriots, who acquired Chad Ochocinco and Albert Haynesworth, to name just two of their handful of acquisitions. 

Ochocinco, Haynesworth and the New England Patriots will open up on Monday night against their AFC East rivals, the Miami Dolphins. 

The Patriots are entering Monday night's game in Miami as 6.5 point favorites, but I am having other thoughts for the result.

On paper, the Dolphins are no match for the Patriots. New England simply have too much overwhelming talent at all the key positions, not to mention that Bill Belichick is a far superior coach to Tony Sparano.

If you had both teams play each other on 10 occasions, I would only pick the Dolphins to win once. The only way that they can come away with a victory on Monday night is if they put pressure on Tom Brady and Chad Henne plays a perfect game.

During last year's matchup on October 1, which happened to be a Monday night game as well, the Dolphins were able to bring down Brady on three occasions.

Even so, Brady was simply unstoppable. He completed 79.2 percent of his passes, which is somewhat of a shocker.

As of late, when Brady is being hit and faces pressure, he is not as effective as he usually is. Quite frankly, he performs pretty poorly. 

Most recently, in the team's playoff loss to the New York Jets on January 16, Brady was brought down on five occasions and faced consistent pressure. He posted an 89.0 quarterback rating, which is nearly six points lower than his career average.

As Brady was knocked around, he was simply not the same quarterback as the one that was unanimously voted the 2010 NFL Most Valuable Player.

If Miami puts pressure on Brady, they will significantly open their chances of winning. However, it's still not a guarantee that they'll win. Henne still needs to be close to perfect.

Henne being perfect against the Patriots? I don't think so.

Just a year ago, Henne struggled to complete passes against New England's secondary—especially passes that were intermediate and deep down the field. In his two games against the Patriots, he completed only four of his 12 passes that were greater than 11 yards downfield and was intercepted twice. 

Entering 2011, Belichick has revamped his defense with the additions of Haynesworth, Andre Carter, Shaun Ellis and Ras-I Dowling to create a new-look 4-3 defensive attack. 

New England's defense should be able to contain Miami's offense. The key is for Devin McCourty to shut-down or at least limit Brandon Marshall. Either way, no matter how poorly McCourty plays on the outside, New England's offense is simply too much for any team to handle.

Brady will enter 2011 with Ochocinco, Wes Welker and Deion Branch as his top wide receivers, as well as tight ends Rob Gronkowski and Aaron Hernandez.

If Brady is protected, New England's offense is unstoppable and their running game, led by BenJarvus Green-Ellis and Danny Woodhead, is extremely productive. 

With all of that being said, what is my prediction for the game?

Final prediction: New England: 34 Miami: 20

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