Why Miami is anticipating a quick trigger from Tom Brady Sunday

FOXBOROUGH -- Five random Patriots’ statistics — and what they might mean when it comes to this weekend's game against the Dolphins — for your Wednesday afternoon:


2.13: The average time of Tom Brady’s snap-to-throw delivery last Sunday against the Vikings. By our estimates, it represents the fastest average delivery of the year for the quarterback. Per usual, he averaged a faster delivery on his completions (2.1 seconds) than his incompletes (2.3). The challenge of facing a quarterback with a quick trigger is something Miami’s Adam Gase is stressing the week in practice.

“It’s not an easy task,” Gase said of the challenge that comes with facing Brady and getting him to hold on to the ball a little longer than he might like. “Guys have to do a great job of understanding how to be in attack and take the No. 1 read away to the point where (Brady) has to hold on to it longer. That’s probably the hardest part, because the tighter you start playing, they’re going to go to something else and take advantage of a different matchup. That’s what Josh (McDaniels) has always done well. He adjusts really well during a game. I mean, I watched it for two years working for him, and since I’ve been back here, I’ve gotten to see it multiple times.”

For what it’s worth, in their first game against the Dolphins -- a 38-7 with for New England -- Brady averaged 2.29 seconds from snap to throw.

10: If the Patriots win Sunday, they'll clinch their 10th straight AFC East title and become the first franchise in NFL history to earn a playoff berth in 10 consecutive seasons. New England is tied with Dallas (1975-83) and Indianapolis (2002-10) as the only teams to play in the postseason for nine straight years.

10.5: The number of career sacks Miami defensive end Cameron Wake has against Brady. Only two defensive players — Aaron Schobel and Jason Taylor — have more career sacks of the New England quarterback than Wake, who could top them both with a big afternoon Sunday.

“(He has a) great motor and great technique — he’s really a good technique rusher,” Bill Belichick said of Wake on Wednesday. “He does a really good job of attacking the blockers, defeating the technique that they’re using, whatever it is – offset, quickset (or) hand punch. He’s got good counters to all of those, and he’s got a really good motor.

“Athletic, hard to knock off his feet — cut blocks and things like that, he just steps right over them. He’s quick enough to turn the corner. He’s got a good inside move. He takes the deep-set tackles and powers them back and is disruptive that way. He’s very experienced, and can adjust quickly to however the set or the play develops with his rush.”

(For the record, these sack totals represent sacks of Brady, not of New England. If we were including career sacks of the Patriots, we’d have to include Joey Porter, who has 11 career sacks against New England, but five of them came against Matt Cassel in 2008.)

87.75: The number of rushing yards Sony Michel needs to average over the final four games of the regular season to finish the season with 1,000 rushing yards. Michel has 649 rushing yards on 144 carries (4.5 yards per carry) and five touchdowns. If he continues on this pace, he would be just the sixth back of the Belichick/Brady Era to finish with an average of 4.5 yards per carry (minimum 100 carries in a season). For the record, the final four teams left on New England’s schedule are all over the place when it comes to run defense: Miami (144.7 rushing yards allowed per game, 30th), Pittsburgh (100.4, 8th), the New York Jets (128.3, 26th) and Buffalo (107, 14th).

(One other note on Michel — if he hits 1,000 yards in a season and maintains his 4.5 yards per carry average, he would be just the second back in franchise history to finish with more than 1,000 rushing yards in a season and have an average of 4.5 yards per carry or better. Corey Dillon had 1,635 rushing yards and 4.74 yards per carry in 2004.)

1,330: Including last year’s playoffs, Joe Thuney has gone wire-to-wire in 17 straight games and played (by my unofficial count) 1,330 consecutive snaps. He's the only guy on the roster to play every possible snap on their side of the ball through the first 12 games of this season.