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Analysis

Patriots’ Warm Butter Defense Can’t Stop Panthers

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The only feel-good moment from an otherwise maddening loss.

The Patriots fell to 2-2 on the season Sunday, losing to the Carolina Panthers 33-30 on a last-second field goal. The Panthers scored on six of their nine possessions, with a fumble, an interception and a punt the only time the Patriots defense got off the field without surrendering points.

Despite Tom Brady’s best efforts, leading the Pats back to tie the game from 14 points down late in the fourth quarter, the defense was unable to get a final stop, taking two penalties on the final drive that helped set up the wining field goal.

There’s little time to sulk, with a quick turnaround to a Thursday night game in Tampa Bay. Perhaps that’s for the best. But it’s unmistakable that this Patriots team has serious issues on both sides of the ball and they must get them fixed quickly.

Here’s how the grossness went down…

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Patriots Pull Out Win vs. Texans

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Tom Brady threw for 378 and five touchdowns, leading a last-minute comeback drive to dispatch the Houston Texans 36-33 in Foxboro on Sunday. It was a surprisingly close game with Texans rookie quarterback Deshaun Watson escaping numerous tacklers and making multiple plays that gave Houston the late lead.

But Tom Brady is still Tom Brady, leading the 50th (!!!) fourth-quarter comeback of his career in victory. The Pats now move to 2-1 on the season and will face the Carolina Panthers next Sunday who are coming off a 34-13 loss to the New Orleans Saints.


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Notes on the Patriots-Saints Re-Watch

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At second glance, this game wasn’t as close as it seemed to be live. Remove the tension of a “Brees carving our defense in a comeback win” and it was a pretty methodical strangulation by the Patriots. While I’ll await the Coaches tape before doing any real X-and-O deep dives, there was still plenty to digest here.

Here’s something that stuck out to me.

— If ever there was a picture to sum up how calm, cool and collected Brady was in the pocket check out the shot below. Brady completes this pass to James White (circled). Completely unfazed by Cameron Jordan literally right in his face. It was that kind of night for Brady.

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Potential Defensive Adjustments vs. Saints

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I try not to look at any kind of stats until Week 4. It’s just too small a sample size and too easy to overreact, and that’s certainly the case this morning as I took a peak at my stats site of choice FootballOutsiders.com.

The Patriots defense? Ranked 32nd in overall defense, 30th against the pass and 32nd against the run. Nowhere to go but up, right!? I like Football Outsiders because it’s not based on one random analysts grades but by efficiency in the context of the situation. It gives us a good sense of how the team executed. And clearly the Patriots didn’t execute well at all.

By historical comparison, and again, this is just for shits and giggles at this point, here’s how those numbers stack up.

Of course things will get better, but it won’t exactly be handed to the Patriots, especially with a tough matchup against a great quarterback at his homefield this weekend. Here’s a few thoughts on some personnel switches that might help improve things and be better suited to handling Drew Brees and the Saints diverse attack.

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Patriots Should Embrace Palate-Cleansing Loss

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I usually avoid most of the hot take media, especially in days after losses. No one knows how to overreact quite like Patriots fans and pundits, but after a couple days to sit on the game and review it, I feel like this loss was a nice hit of the reset button that should re-focus the 2017 team on 2017. You can even check the NFL odds by BetOnline to see that yes, the Patriots are still favored in New Orleans against the Saints.

The Patriots aren’t going anywhere. I know it. Vegas knows it. And most of you probably know it too. But for those of you still running around screaming that the Patriot sky is falling, here are some things to keep in mind.

Let’s break down what’s actually worrisome and what we can just chalk up to September being an extension of the preseason.

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How Did Patriots Use Their Running Backs vs. Chiefs?

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While the Patriots played about as bad as one could have possibly imagined Thursday night, the sky is indeed not falling in New England, contrary to popular belief. Sure, the defense looked abysmal (at best), and the offense sputtered throughout the majority of the second half, but the 2017 Patriots are still a team loaded with talent that every team in the NFL should fear, and in an otherwise disappointing effort, the weapons out of the backfield showed a mere glimmer of how hard this Patriots offense will be to stop once it hits full gear.

The trio of Mike Gillislee, James White, and Rex Burkhead were a few of the lone bright spots Thursday night, with Gillislee as the unquestioned star of the show in his Patriots debut, racking up 45 yards on 15 attempts, finding the end zone on three occasions, and dominating the touches in the red zone. White also contributed 68 yards on 13 touches, and Burkhead gained 23 yards on his four touches.

Having three running backs of the caliber of this trio is an incredible thing, and I think we saw just the tip of the iceberg in terms of what these three are capable of.

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Patriots Defensive Focus: Winning First Down

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As you’d expect there’s plenty of panic about the Patriots’ defense after Thursday night’s blow out loss. Last year the defense led the league in points against but people were still worried that they actually were not good. So after giving up the most points and yards under Belichick it’s understandable that the defense is a major focal point of the ire.

Discerning between what problems are real and what problems can be chalked up to the first game of the season on a short week against a good opponent is the key here and when you really break things down the real problems are obvious. Whether or not the Patriots have the personnel at this point to fix those problems will be a point of debate, but I think we can all agree that the defense is always in a somewhat experimental phase in September and that they’re always far more sound down the line, even when they have to throw guys like Joe Vellano and Chris Jones in the heart of their defense early on (2013).

One point that’s very much worth pointing out is how effective Kansas City was at exploiting the communication issues on defense. Eric Mangini said when he was with the Browns, a big offensive focus for going against the Patriots was having multiple shifts and motions that forced the Patriots to adjust their calls. He called the Patriots defense “rule-based” so every movement by the offense required 11 adjustment calls on defense. The more movement the more chance at miscommunication, and the Chiefs seemed to do that repeatedly.

Their pre-snap motion seemed to mix the Patriots up quite a few times, resulting in blown coverages and too many wide open receivers. First, not all teams have the kind of versatility that the Chiefs have in this regard, especially with a mobile quarterback. Second, this communication will improve for the Patriots, whether Dont’a Hightower plays every single game or not.

There are just two simple keys for the defense as we move on to the Saints — win on first down and don’t give up big plays. That’s how simple it is.

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