Penalty leaders

As corny as it may sound this is a stat we can be proud of because it represents the Patriots playing smart football and in some cases mind over body. Resisting that urge to jump off sides and the like. This record is a bright spot in a year where they faced great adversity through injuries and inexperience backups. Good job Pats!

Chad, the other side of this stat is that it may show lack of aggressiveness which often seemed to be a trait of the Patriot defense. There's no question that the Pats are a well coached and disciplined team, but is there a point of diminishing returns on this? Of course, the one name you don't see is David Thomas, who was likely only penalized one time, but it was a big one (Albeit a BS call).

MIKE VRABEL SHOULD BE RELEASED FOR HIS CARELESS PLAY!!!
6 PENALTIES ARE WAY TOO MANY. lol

The stats are amazing considering Vrabel was on the field for 825 plays.

It's a pretty amazing stat. I've often thought that the Raiders will have a really hard time ever becoming "good" again because they're so undisciplined. Year after year they lead the NFL in penalties. The Patriots, on the other hand, will always be good as long as they stay disciplined. And a fruit of that is this record.
And, what is even more amazing, is all the different personnel the Patriots used because of injuries, EVERYONE on the roster was disciplined. And if you got some bonehead penalty, you're playing time dropped significantly (think Dave Thomas). (The Cowboy's would be the opposite of this).
It's a reflection of who Bill Belichick is and how great he is.

The record for fewest number of penalties is amazing. It's all about coaching and discipline, it certainly has nothing to do with how aggressive a player is..... It shows the discipline of the players.

Think the Pat's will pick up Pacman Jones?

But the biggest penalty of the season, David Thomas 15-Yard Unsportsmanlike @ Indy, cost the Patriots the game and a playoff spot.

mike,
can you give a list of teams sorted by penalty and show their corresponding regular season records? it would be interesting to see how penalties correlate with wins.

The most costly penalty of the year may have been the hold on Vrabel in the NYJ game...and it was a horrible call! Mike, can you give us a snapshot of how many of those penalties were really bad calls?

LOL, Seth they were all bad calls!! The phantom Vrabel hold was brutal but Patrick the Thomas penalty wasn't as bad as Gaffney dropping a sure TD that would have only allowed the Colts to tie us with a TD and not get ahead on the FG. Those are the two games that hurt the most, imagine 13-3 with a first round bye and Brady not even in the line-up.

The most costly penalty of the year may have been the hold on Vrabel in the NYJ game...and it was a horrible call! Mike, can you give us a snapshot of how many of those penalties were really bad calls?

Posted by seth January 8, 09 12:31 PM

Acutally this was a horrible call but didn't impact the outcome of the game. The reason it did not is if the Jets had only gotten a field goal there the Pats would have only kicked a field goal themselves and would not have gone for the TD with 1 second remaining.
Anything could have happened and either team could have missed the FG but in all likelihood it didn't effect the outcome (except that each team would have had 4 fewer points in the end).

It looks like Aiken was the worst infraction, ignoring the situational. He only played 146 snaps, so his rate is over 2% of the plays in which he is involved. Vrabel's rate is only 0.70%, including offense. Since Hobbs, Mayo, and Watson played most of the time their side was on the field, they come out at half of Vrabel's rate. I don't have play counts for the offensive line handy, but it makes sense that a guy who is trying to keep his QB upright and plays off of a tough defensive lineman will take a penalty now and then.