Patriots defense turns narratives into motivation in the playoffs

'Ignore the noise' has always been a popular mantra around the New England Patriots. During this playoff run though, the defense has seemingly used the 'noise' for its own motivation.

This week, that 'noise' surround the hype for the Denver Broncos' offensive line. Many major metrics have the Broncos' line as the best offensive line in the league, both in terms of blocking the run and pass.

Left tackle Garett Bolles and right guard Quinn Meinerz were both voted First Team All-Pro this season, while right tackle Mike McGlinchey and left guard Alex Palczewski received votes as well. As a unit they allowed a league-low 23 sacks in the regular season, and ranked fifth in the NFL opening up an average of 1.66 yards before contact for running backs.

Yet in the AFC Championship on Sunday, the Patriots' defensive front flipped the script. Quarterback Jarrett Stidham was sacked three times and pressured on 35.1% of his dropbacks per Next Gen Stats, and the Broncos averaged just 3.3 yards per carry on the ground.

After the team's 10-7 win, defensive tackle Milton Williams, who had a team-high eight pressures according to PFF, said the defense took all the talk during the week about the Broncos' offensive line personally - in more ways than one.

As he came off the field, Williams yelled "No. 1 offensive line can kiss my ass,” per Mark Daniels of MassLive. At the podium he wasn't as direct, but got the same message across.

“I heard that all week,” Williams told reporters. “I don’t care about numbers and all that. Whatever. We’ve gotta go out there and we’ve gotta play. All that stuff doesn’t matter. When you get between the lines, we’ll see what’s going to happen. Cut the tape on and see what happened today.”

Defensive tackle Christian Barmore, who also had a dominant game, relayed a similar message from the coaching staff when asked in particular about his matchup with Meinerz.

"First-team All-Pro, you know our coaches tell us all the team that All-Pro don't mean shit," Barmore said in the locker room postgame. "Excuse my language, that mean's it doesn't matter. Our coaches told us every time, 'they All-Pros, they the targets.' That's the mission. He's a hell of a player, but this is for us. This is our team. This is for the Patriots."

This is the second week in a row the Patriots have talked about using a perceived slight from the narrative leading up to a game as motivation. Last week, the unit took it personal that the No. 1 ranked Houston Texans defense got all the attention in the build-up.

"Definitely, it definitely fueled the whole defense," Williams said of that talk last week. "Nobody has been talking about our defense all year. We’ll see what they say today. Every week, we’re trying to come out and dominate knowing that they do have a great defense, but in our minds, it was our defense versus their defense. See who could make more plays, create more turnovers, stop the run and get the ball back to our offense."

"Our guys are prideful men. And they want to compete and they want to win," head coach Mike Vrabel added last week when asked if his team took all the talk about Houston's defense personally. "They deserve the recognition that they're going to get. They're a top-five defense for a reason as well."

If the Patriots' defense is going to continue looking for motivation in people hyping up their opponents, they should find plenty heading into Super Bowl LX. The Seattle Seahawks ranked third in the league in scoring offense and led the league in scoring defense, and trailed only the Broncos (six) with the most All-Pro selections at five. On top of that, the Patriots are underdogs going into this game for the first time all postseason.