AFC East: Sunday’s match-ups

The AFC East is looking to be a solid division this young 2015 season and the Miami Dolphins, while taking care of their own business will be looking around the division to see what happens when Sunday is in the books. As of today, each of the AFC East teams enter week two with a 1-0 record but they won’t all leave that way.

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Starting this week we will take a look at the divisional games and/or games that have implications for the Dolphins as the season progresses. The Dolphins will face two of their division opponents in the next two weeks but they have to get through Jacksonville first. Here is a look at the Dolphins division rival games heading into week two.

New England Patriots @ Buffalo Bills

The Bills have made a call to their fan base to step up the crowd noise. In fact the Bills are going to try and break the Guinness record for crowd noise. The Bills have been talking up this weekends game against the Patriots giving New England a lot of bulletin board material. In fact the Bills are proclaiming that then entire NFL fan base, minus Patriot fans, want the Bills to win this game.

Rex Ryan has been his typical boisterous self this week and the players have made it clear that the team and it’s fans are no fans of the Patriots. Stopping the Patriots is another question entirely.

Week one saw the Bills knock around the Indianapolis Colts who looked more like the Tampa Bay Buccaneers than the Colts of 2014. The Patriots knocked around the Pittsburgh Steelers to open the season two Thursday’s ago.

Today’s game is a battle of the Bills defense and the Patriots offense. Rob Gronkowski started the season in midseason form and Tom Brady looked every bit the Hall of Fame quarterback he will one day be. For the Bills, stopping the Patriot offense will be key. The Patriots get running back LeGarrette Blount back from his one game suspension which will allow the team to be less one-sided. Of course the Patriots are very one sided and that is all on the arm of Tom Brady.

Defensively the Patriots played the Steelers very well and the Bills don’t offer a lot of offense from quarterback Tyrod Taylor who is going to try and prove that his solid performance in week one wasn’t a fluke. New England will have to contain the Bills receivers and it’s questionable how much of an impact running back LeSean McCoy will have today as he is nursing a nagging hamstring injury.

Prediction: New Englad 32 – Buffalo 14  I simply see the Patriots going the nickel and dime route against Buffalo. Tom Brady is going to avoid the Buffalo pass rush with very quick hits and the Patriots are notorious for running barely legal pick plays from the slot. I expect more of the same today.

New York Jets @ Indianapolis Colts

The Colts looked horrible last Sunday. Horrible for them at least. The Colts have issues on the offensive line and their defense isn’t playing well either. Andrew Luck is still one of the best quarterback in the league but he struggles against very good defenses and the New York Jets have a good defense. How good is hard to know this early. Last week the Jets played the Cleveland Browns but the Browns have a lot of issues right now so what exactly the Jets have is unknown.

Unlike the Bills, the Jets have a veteran quarterback calling the signals. The problem is Ryan Fitzpatrick isn’t really all that consistent. They do have a solid running game that works behind a very good offensive line. The addition of Brandon Marshall is giving new life to Eric Decker but how long can Marshall maintain his cool if he isn’t being fed the ball? Last week he caught six passes for 62 yards and touchdown.

Chris Ivory posted 91 yards last week and two touchdowns against the Browns and the Browns may have a slightly better or at least close to the same defense that the Colts have. The Jets will likely try and take the pressure off of Fitzpatrick by trying to establish a power running game on the legs of Ivory.

When the schedule came out it was an almost foregone conclusion that the Jets would lose but that isn’t necessarily the case this week.

Prediction: Indianapolis 28 – New York Jets 24  I think this game will be close and the scoring to be honest is a little high as it very well could be a low scoring game. The key to this game is what Andrew Luck can do against a defense that is on paper as good as the Bills.