BSJ subscriber Glenn Trost asks via e-mail: "Hi Miguel, I thought you might have tracked this, or have the data to figure it out: How many players have been on the roster for all eight AFC championship games?"
Barring something crazy between now and Sunday, four players will be on the Patriots 53-man roster for their eighth straight AFC championship game on Sunday:
- Tom Brady, Devin McCourty, Matthew Slater and Stephen Gostkowski
While there are no Patriots who will be playing in their seventh straight AFC championship game, these two Patriots will be playing in the seventh of their careers:
- Patrick Chung - spent the 2013 season with the Eagles
- Marcus Cannon - missed the 2017 AFC title game because he was on IR
Two players will be on the Patriots 53-man roster for their sixth straight conference championship:
- Ryan Allen, Duron Harmon
These three players will be on the roster for their sixth AFC championship contest:
- Dont'a Hightower - missed the 2017 AFC title game because he was on IR
- Nate Ebner - missed the 2017 AFC championship game because he was on IR
- Julian Edelman - missed the 2012 and 2017 games because he was on IR
James White will be on the Patriots 53-man roster for his fifth straight. Rob Gronkowski and James Develin will be on the Patriots 53-man roster for the AFC title game for the fifth time in their careers. (Gronkowski missed the 2012, 2013 and 2016 games because he was on IR, while Develin missed the 2015 AFC championship game because he was on IR.)
These six players will be on the roster for their fourth straight conference championship:
- David Andrews, Malcom Brown, Joe Cardona, Brandon King, Shaq Mason, LaAdrian Waddle
These six players will be on the roster for their third straight AFC title game:
- Trey Flowers, Chris Hogan, Ted Karras, Elandon Roberts, Joe Thuney, Kyle Van Noy
These eight players will be on the roster for their second straight AFC title game:
- Dwayne Allen, Stephon Gilmore, Lawrence Guy, Rex Burkhead, Deatrich Wise, Adam Butler, Phillip Dorsett, Brian Hoyer
Jonathan Jones will be playing in his second AFC championship game. He missed the 2017 game because he was placed on IR days before the game.
These eighteen players will be playing in their first with the Patriots:
- Danny Shelton, Jason McCourty, Adrian Clayborn, Cordarrelle Patterson, Sony Michel, Trent Brown, Duke Dawson, Keion Crossen, JC Jackson, James Ferentz, Stephen Anderson, John Simon, Ufomba Kamalu, Albert McClellan, Obi Melifonwu, Ramon Humber, Derek Rivers, Keionta Davis
These players will have been on the Patriots AFC Championship game 53-man roster the duration of their NFL career. This is simply amazing.
- Ryan Allen, Harmon, White, Andrews, Malcom Brown, Joe Cardona, Brandon King, Shaq Mason, Karras, Roberts, Thuney, Wise, Butler, Michel, Dawson, Crossen, Jackson
Have a question for a future PatsCap mailbag? You can send those to him at any time via email (patscap@bostonsportsjournal.com), or you can Tweet them to him here.