Game Preview: Week 16, Patriots vs. N.Y Jets

The good news is that most teams that go deep in the playoffs go in with a head of steam, a nice streak of games that they play well and put up W's. Let's have a look at the playoff-bound teams and their recent history.

Let's start with the formerly prohibitive favorite Indianapolis Colts. Well, this is almost exactly how you don't want to do it: a long winning streak followed by an emotional loss on your home field to a good team, followed by a half-hearted effort in a road loss to a good team, followed by mailing it in to a lousy team at home, followed by an off week. Add coach Tony Dungy's personal tragedy of losing his son this past week, and it bodes ominously for the Colts.

Denver is doing it as well as their schedule allows right now. The Broncos are on a three-game winning streak, but only against the likes of Baltimore, Buffalo and Oakland. Before that, they lost a close one to Kansas City at Arrowhead Stadium, and before that, they beat Philadelphia, Oakland, the N.Y. Jets and Dallas -- hardly league elites, even if Dallas makes the playoffs. Denver wraps up the regular season next week at San Diego, which may or may not be a legitimate test, now that the Chargers are out. Still, a 4-game streak, if they win, is momentum.

Cincinnati, who hasn't had the most brutal schedule this season, lost this week to Buffalo -- at home -- after beating up Detroit and barely squeaking by Cleveland at home. The Bengals are at Kansas City next week, and the Chiefs still have something to play for, so that will be a good indication where Cincinnati's head might be.

Jacksonville is a wild card (pun not intended until the last split-second) with the injury to Byron Leftwich. Their last game against a tough opponent was three weeks ago, a loss to Indianapolis, 26-18. Before that was a streak of five wins against lousy and marginal teams. Since Indy, they've beaten San Francisco, 10-9, and Houston, 38-20. Next week, they play Tennessee at home. Jaguars.com says Leftwich could be back for the season finale and almost definitely for the playoffs. That makes the Jags an interesting case.

Pittsburgh lost three in a row to Baltimore, Indianapolis and Cincinnati before reeling off three against Chicago (21-9 at home), Minnesota (18-3 in Minn.) and Cleveland (41-0 in Cleveland). They host Detroit next week, an expected win, putting Pittsburgh in that category of "pretty good run at the finish" category. If Pittsburgh beats Detroit, K.C. is out of it, so I'll skip the Chiefs. They've only been playing well against teams in their own division lately anyway.

In the NFC, Seattle becomes your prohibitive favorite by this week beating the previous prohibitive favorite as part of an 11-game winning streak. The Seahawks travel to the recently powerless frozen tundra, so you can expect Shaun Alexander to break the single-season touchdown record that he tied this week. Seattle is a juggernaut I told you to watch out for about six weeks ago. Everyone's listening now.

After snapping an eight-game winning streak with that 21-9 loss at Pittsburgh, Chicago manhandled Atlanta at home and then hung on to stave off Green Bay, 24-17, on the road. They travel to recently eliminated Minnesota next week. If Mike Tice still has a job, he'll be trying to get his team to make sure he keeps it, so the Vikings just may put up a fight. The outcome of that one tells you how much of a real threat the top scoring defense in the league is.

The N.Y. Giants rather embarrassing loss to Washington sends no signal that they're ready for the playoffs. A three-game winning streak home against Dallas, at Philadelphia and home against Kansas City, all pretty close games, weren't particularly compelling. Before that was a loss to Seattle. The Giants are at Oakland late New Year's Eve, not much of a test, should they survive unscathed.

The next four teams are not guaranteed playoff spots yet.

Win-and-in Tampa Bay has looked pretty good, except for a 13-10 home loss to Chicago four weeks ago and a 28-0 trouncing here at New England last week. There were wins at Baton Rouge and at Carolina in between, and this week, the Bucs eliminated Atlanta from the party with a 27-24 home win. Far from impressive, but if they beat New Orleans next week, which they definitely should, of course, that could give them a bit of a nudge of momentum.

Win-and-in Carolina lost their last three games against contenders: Dallas this week, Tampa Bay two weeks earlier and Chicago three weeks before that. They've beaten some patsies in between. They're at Atlanta next week.

Win-and-in Washington is on a four-game winning streak, having last lost to San Diego, a heart-breaking 23-17 at home. Since then, the Redskins have beaten St. Loius, Arizona, Dallas and the Giants. Not particularly impressive, but it's what they've had to do. The Skins can still win the division by winning in Philly this week and the Giants losing to Oakland. Still, Washington is one of the few NFC teams with significant momentum heading into the tourney.

Finally, Dallas needs to win and for any one of the previous three teams to lose for the Cowboys to make the playoffs. Dallas has lost three of their last five, and even if they beat St. Louis this week and either Tampa, Carolina and Washington loses, the Cowboys don't seem to be much of a threat to go deep.

That leaves us with New England, and as I mentioned earlier this week, the Patriots have positioned themselves perfectly after the NFL's mandated eight-game caning to start the season. All the injured who are coming back are back and nearly 100% healthy. New England is on a three-game streak, having pummeled the Jets, Buffalo and Tampa Bay. If New England finishes strong tonight and next week, they will have as much momentum as anyone except Seattle.

And that brings us to tonight's Monday Night Football swan song. The Patriots (9-5) face the Jets (3-11) in the Meadowlands. The Jets are on the cusp of the Reggie Bush sweepstakes. The Patriots are on the cusp of history. The Jets have divisional pride and Herman Edwards' job to play for. The Patriots have Destiny to play for.

New England dominated New York when the Jets visited Gillette Stadium a few weeks ago. The game was not nearly as close as the 16-3 final score indicated. And this week, the only player listed on the Patriots injury list is Tom Brady, who has been on the list all season with an undisclosed shoulder injury. The Jets have a few injuries, none overly significant, and none that should have a real impact on the game.

The Jets lost seven straight before beating Oakland and then losing to Miami. There will be no beer sales at the Meadowlands tonight. It will interesting to see if (A) the Jets show up, and (B) the fans show up. The Jets are the only team not to score at least 200 points this season (189, followed by Cleveland with 212).

There's very little compelling about this game otherwise. New England will start its starters in preparation for the playoffs. The Patriots will work on the running game, kick return coverage and passing defense, the three problems that have plagued them all season. The running game has improved with the health of the major players, most especially Corey Dillon.

The pass defense, likewise, has improved with the return of players from injuries and the peripheral improvement of the run defense and the pass rush. How to improve the kick return squad, well, that's what Belichick does. He studies film and he finds the little issues that magnify themselves during the course of a game. What he does to solve some of them remains a mystery. Let's just hope he maintains his record here.

I really have nothing else to say.

Prediction: Patriots, 38-12.

Al Michaels has your play-by-play on ABCS (Channel 5 locally) and John Madden is your analyst. This the final broadcast of ABC's Monday Night Football. As usual, you can catch a better audio description of the game on WBCN 104.1 FM with Gil Santos and the Patriots No. 2 all-time leading scorer Gino Cappelletti.

Ed Hochuli's crew officiates today's game. Hochuli's crew is probably the best in the game. Not that they're infallible, but they usually make fewer mistakes.