A "Hat and T-Shirt Day" is in the Cards for the Patriots as They Host the Buffalo Bills in Foxborough

What was once so commonplace that it was simply referred to as "Hat and T-Shirt Day", the Patriots are potentially set to have one of those by doing something they haven't done since 2019: Win the AFC East. They'd do so by defeating the team they did to clinch it that year, the Buffalo Bills, who've been just above water since beating the Kansas City Chiefs at 3-2 in their last five. Outside of their win in Pittsburgh, it hasn't exactly been the prettiest football ever for the NFL's resident wagon circlers over the last month, but you're going to have to win ugly or dig deep in some "grind it out affairs sometimes in this league, things you could certainly apply to their home wins over the Bucs and Bengals.

This is also a Buffalo team that, alongside the Pittsburgh Steelers, touts the worst road record among current playoff teams at 3-3, and Josh Allen's road splits don't scream elite as it is, but more on that later. The point is that this is the absolutely perfect time to try to rectify that trend, and at least give yourself a fighting chance for a home playoff game over these final weeks of the season.

Yet another very late bye week for the Patriots in the 2020s may have actually come at a pretty good time when you factor in how quickly things happened on the injury front in the two weeks beforehand. It would appear as if both Khyiris Tonga and Jared Wilson could be back in the lineup on both sides of the line, which would be nothing short of gigantic in a regular-season tilt with these kinds of stakes. It's not just about potentially winning the division anymore, since, as preposterous as this would've sounded back in August, the AFC's No. 1 seed is legitimately in play, and the Patriots' best shot is to win out and hope Denver makes a mistake or two before January. That road starts in just a matter of days now.

Game Info

Date: Sunday, December 14th

Start Time: 1:00 EST

Location: Foxborough, Massachusetts

Stadium: Gillette Stadium

TV Info: CBS (Ian Eagle and J.J. Watt on the Call)

Patriots Uniform Info: All Blue

Players Already Ruled Out Before Sunday

Bills: N/A

Patriots: Terrell Jennings

Buffalo Bills

Defense

Even if you remove the Bills' Week 2 win over the Jets, where they threw for 83 net yards, from the equation, Buffalo would still tout one of the five best road passing defenses in the league this year at 173.6 yards per game. Additionally, Michael Penix Jr. is the only passer to exceed the 200-yard mark vs. the Bills when they're on the road this year, and no QB has had a passer rating north of 100 against Buffalo away from Orchard Park so far in 2025. Some of that can absolutely be chalked up to the level of QBs they've drawn on the road this year, but it's hard to fault them for who's on their schedule, and the fact that Bryce Young happened to suffer a high ankle sprain a week before the Bills played the Panthers.

As for what you can expect the Bills to mix up from Week 5, likely, we'll first talk about blitz rate. Undoubtedly, the key thing that burned the Bills the last time they played the Patriots was the heavy uptick with extra rushers in the second half (50 percent to just 10 percent in the first half). More speciffically, it was mainly the third quarter when the Bills tried to send the house repeatedly, but after a 30-yard catch-and-run by Stefon Diggs early in the fourth, they gave up on sending five or more. You'll definitely see them blitz still since they don't have a ton of pass rush juice this year, and since Christian Benford's corner blitzes worked miracles against the Bengals last week, but if Sean McDermott were smart, he'd take a page out of Todd Bowles' playbook and drop eight into coverage out of sim pressure. That gave Maye some fits when the Patriots were down in Tampa.

Speaking of Benford, whose status is now in question for Sunday due to a foot injury that had him in a "soft walking boot", on Thursday, I'm not as sure as others that he'll be shadowing Stefon Diggs in this one after the latter smoked Tre'Davious White in Week 1. Not that he'll only be on him for five snaps again, but I'm not so sure the Bills would feel great about White on Kayshon Boutte either. Either way, the Maxwell Hariston factor is something the Bills didn't have back in Week 5. While I think it would be worth it for the long haul to make him a bigger part of the Bills' secondary, even after a so-so game against Cincy, it appears the Bills are content keeping him as a rotational piece for the time being, but he'd be thrown in the deep end for the second week in a row if Benford is out.

One final defensive note I'll leave you with is the Bills' rushing defense ranks second best in the last three weeks at 76 yards allowed per, but Cincinnati (who got nearly anything they wanted through the air) and Pittsburgh became the first two teams all year to not run it at least 20 times against them. Not having Ed Oliver (torn bicep) has hurt them nearly all year, but they've gotten some good contributions in recent weeks from guys like DaQuan Jones and Deone Walker. I don't know how much stock I'd put into this quick turnaround, but it's definitely something to keep in mind.

Offense

Historically, Josh Allen has been a great quarterback in December road games, but based on his 2025 outlook heading into this weekend, that trend could be bucked. Through 14 Weeks of play, Allen (with 48 more dropbacks in home games) has a passer rating 37 points lower on the road vs. at home, 77.4 fewer passing yards per game, a 10.3% drop in completion percentage, and an EPA per play 0.34 lower (0.33 at home, -0.01 on the road). Not to mention just six touchdown passes with a matching number of interceptions. Now, typically, you'll see some top QBs have some slightly down numbers on the road, and it'd be unfair not to mention that the Bills' running game was exceptionally potent in two of those road games (at Carolina and at Pittsburgh).

With that said, it's those EPA number drops that jump out to me more than anything. I'm not going to sit here and say I'm a complete expert with EPA or that it's a perfect stat, but that's a steep, steep dropoff. And to sum it up, when the Bills' running attack gets bottled up on the road and/or things end up on Josh Allen's plate more than on the ground, it's led to nothing but losses and ultimately some pretty poor outings. Can't give him much grief for that Texans game, since it's...well...that defense, but in the Miami and Atlanta games, he wasn't good enough, point blank.

Now let's talk about that running game and more speciffically James Cook, who had a night full of tough sledding the last time these two teams played. It'd be hard to say that his three best rushing performances of 2025 happened in the three Bills road games this year isn't a coincidence, but in any case, if you want to draw a line in the proverbial sand, his magic number would be 120 yards. Believe it or not, he did crack 116 yards against the Texans' All-World defense, but the three times he's gone over 120 yards this year, it's resulted in Bills road wins with four touchdowns in those three games.

There's certainly more than one way to take James Cook out of the picture, but even more than Allen, who'll undoubtedly make some plays himself, stopping Cook is the Patriots' best path to victory. Lastly, Cook has four fumbles over the last two weeks, with two resulting in turnovers. You can bet your bottom dollar that every defender down in Foxborough is aware of that going into this matchup.

New England Patriots

Defense

This is a matchup where the Patriots couldn't afford to be without both Milton Williams and Khyiris Tonga, and luckily, the latter has been a full participant in practice all week and will be back in the mix on the interior defensive front. Tonga was a big part of why Cook was bottled up as much as he was, but without Williams, this is another week where guys such as Cory Durden and Joshua Farmer are needed now more than ever, and based on the last couple of games, it'd be hard not to have some legit faith in Durden.

One thing to keep in mind is that the Bills did a few weeks ago: they found a matchup on the line they liked in the run game, attacked it vigorously with specific play calls, and rinse and repeat until the cows came home. Believe it or not, it was T.J. Watt and the left side of the defensive formation that the Bills attacked early and often, and with the Steelers not being big on adjustments, OC Joe Brady essentially just spammed the same run concepts over and over again with James Cook. I say this all to bring up that if the Bills were to do this, look for them to isolate K'Lavon Chaisson if the Patriots opt not to bring in Jahlani Tavai down on the line in base sets, which they have done this year, and in years past in some nickel fronts. I thought the Bengals had some more than usual success on the handful of plays they ran it at him, and there could be some more designed QB runs/options to worry about this week, which gave him, and Harold Landry, for that matter, against the Jets.

Much like the first round of Patriots-Bills this year, the key guy that'd worry me for the Patriots is Dalton Kincaid, and I'd expect him to have a similar impact in this game as what Cade Otton did against the Patriots several weeks ago in Tampa, but a sneaky huge story in this game is Khalil Shakir. If you remove his big outing vs. Houston from the equation, he has just four catches on 10 targets for 18 yards in three of his last four games. Keon Coleman has done next to nothing either since coming back from his benching while we were here.

In theory, it seems like a really good matchup for the Patriots' corner trio of Christian Gonzalez, Carlton Davis, and Marcus Jones, but it'll really come down to these middle third defenders (Marte Mapu, Jack Gibbens, and Bob Spillane mainly) and their ability to slow down the Bills' tight ends.

Offense

Regardless of wheter or not the Patriots get Jared Wilson back in the lineup at left guard, which does seem likely at this juncture., Vederian Lowe putting in another (relatively) big performance at left tackle would be nothing short of massive with AJ Epenesa and Greg Rousseau on deck after dealing with Abdul Carter and Brian Burns.

We've talked about the fact that the Bills could be without Christian Benford, and the fact that the Bills may want to drop as many defenders in coverage as possible. But if Benford is out, the Bills might not have much choice but to bring extra guys, and that'd be a huge plus for the Patriots. Combine the fact that Drake Maye has been nothing short of marvelous against extra rushers all year with the Bills being one of the least productive blitzing defenses in the NFL, it's of the upmost importance he gets off to a good start as a passer and forces Buffalo's hand. I wouldn't expect as many rollouts to Maye's right either. That torched Buffalo repeatedly back in Week 5 if you recall.

Betting Info

Points Spread: BUF -1.5 (-108) | NE +1.5 (-112)

Moneyline: BUF (-120) | NE (-100)

Over/Under: O 49.5 (-110) | U 49.5 (-110)

Lines via DraftKings as of Friday, December 12th. Always Bet Responsibly.

This'll mark the seventh game of 2025 in which the Bills are favored on the road, and their ATS record is a 1-for-1 match with their outright road record this year. Over the last three years, they've been one of the least reliable "good" teams when it comes to covering as road favorites, sitting at 9-7 and just ahead of the Eagles, who are 10-9. For the Patriots, this is just the second time all year they aren't favored at home, and the first since Week 3, when they lost to Pittsburgh. An intriguing matchup given these are two of the six best cover teams in the NFL (depending on your book), but my gut play if I was laying anything down would be Patriots both ways and the over. I'd feel good enough about both teams scoring 20 here, but 49.5 would make me nervous as a total.

Prediction

Outside of the Tom Brady return game in 2021, this is without question the biggest Patriots home game since the last AFC East clincher back in 2019 against these very Bills. These two teams are definitely in different places from where they were back in Week 5, but especially with the recent Christian Benford news on top of some of the road trends for both the Bills as a whole and Josh Allen, I would be lying if I said I didn't feel good about the Patriots this week. Inclement weather or not, they get this done against a Bills team with nothing to lose but everything to gain, and re-adjust their focus on the AFC's top seed.

Final Score: New England Patriots 27, Buffalo Bills 24

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