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Quick hit reactions to a dominating Patriots win over the Colts

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Re-watched the game this morning amidst all the Gronk depression and it was mostly good, but of course the Colts played right into the Patriots hands, and the offense was on for the whole game so it got ugly. But not a lot of new stuff learned.

Here are my random thoughts…

– Tough blow losing Gronk but maybe it will give him a chance to get his ankle and hip finally to 100%. While the Pats will miss him in the red zone I’m interested to see how they go about replacing him tactically.

– At least they have the tight end depth this year to overcome it. If this had happened last year they would be in serious trouble. But Fells, Shiancoe and Hoomanawanui should be able to do a reasonable job stepping in.

– Anyone suggesting it was Belichick’s fault for having Gronk on for the PAT is an idiot. How often to players even get hurt on the PAT? I can’t ever recall one.

– Belichick never plays fearing injuries and the suggestion that you should start subbing the “important” players when the game was already decided it a needless exercise. That’s all I have to say about that.

– Of course the thing no one is talking about is Chandler Jones’ ankle injury which could be an even bigger blow than losing Gronk. Ninkovich and Cunningham did a pretty good job filling in, but missing Jones for any length of time would seriously impact the defense.

– I think McCourty and Gregory is the safety pairing the Pats need going forward. With experience together I think they should really settle the back end of the defense down.

– Dont’a Hightower has had a rough couple of games, especially early on against the Colts. They’re blitzing him some more which is good, but his growth in pass coverage seems to be coming along a little slowly, though he did have a good pass defended yesterday.

– When I left Hightower off the big board this draft season it was because he was too similar to Spikes. I’m starting to feel I wasn’t quite as much of an idiot as I thought, because the Pats continue to struggle when their linebackers are forced to cover. Hard to find a SLB who excels in coverage but the combo of Spikes and Hightower, along with Mayo’s “just a millimeter off” coverage, has made for some big gains in the middle of the field.

– Liked what I saw out of Talib, especially the bit of physicality from him. He should only get better.

– Kyle Arrington might be at the end of the line. They still like him in the slot, but he is getting benched consistently now and Dennard has certainly looked just as good, if not better, than Arrington ever has on the outside.

– Feels like we’ve been waiting for a while to see that kind of all around game from Julian Edelman. He needs to continue to build on this game, especially when it comes to earning Brady’s trust. He came up with some big catches against the Colts, which could really mean more than the long punt returns. Making tough catches is what gets you more playing time here.

– Over the next four weeks I wonder who will have more catches, Daniel Fells or Vinsanthe Shiancoe?

– If you’d have told me the Pats would win the turnover battle 4-0 before the game yesterday I would’ve known it’d be a blowout. 14 points of the first two interceptions was all New England needed.

– There was nothing outstanding about the defense yesterday. Obviously the first two drives were atrocious, but after that it wasn’t like they were suddenly lock down. They do what they always do, give up yards, get turnovers.

– They did throw some more blitzes on third downs which was nice to see. Still, it seems like any time they rush only three they give up a completion. I see that as inexperience, just not having a great feel for the holes in zone coverage.

– Lose both our starting guards? No big deal, the offense doesn’t miss a beat.

– Don’t think it’s that easy without Gronk, but I this is still a very tough offense to defend with Lloyd, Welker, Hernandez and Edelman coming on, along with the three threats in the backfield.

– The problem is that the margin for error is really one game. They can lose one more and that’s about it if they want a shot at a bye. If they lose two more it’s entirely possible they’re headed to the four seed and likely hosting the Ravens or Steelers in the Wild Card round.

Breaking Down the Patriots’ Reliance on the Turnover Battle | Bleacher Report

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Breaking Down the Patriots’ Reliance on the Turnover Battle | Bleacher Report

New post up on Bleacher Report from yours truly, breaking down how dependent the Patriots are on turnovers.

They’ve been fortunate to continue winning this way in 2012 in what should be called “The Year of the Forced Fumble”. In the last ten seasons no AFC team has topped 18 forced fumbles. The Patriots already have 13. This illustrates that this year’s Patriots are getting their turnovers with physicality more so than the past two years when they were more reliant on interceptions.

New England Patriots with another ugly win over the Buffalo Bills

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I’m still trying to wrap my head around this one. The Bills had:

  • 481 yards of offense
  • 7 of 11 on Third Down
  • 5.8 yards per rush attempt

Yet it was losing the turnover battle 3-0 that did them in.

The Patriots for their part were pretty good on the area that has haunted them all year, twenty-plus passing plays, yet seemingly went to sleep in every other area.

I don’t really know where to start. The run defense? The pass rush outside a few plays? The inability to cover tight ends or anyone else in the middle of the field? 

And then there’s the offense, who still just couldn’t put the game away, even when they had a chance from the four yard line.

It was all brutal. And I don’t think anyone feels confident in stopping Andrew Luck or anyone else at this point.

But it’s a tough way to go through a football season when you know at any moment your defense could just be invisible.

Had the Pats lost today, it would’ve looked exactly like every other loss this year and that is a disturbing trend that continues. The 2012 Pats have just seemed to run out of gas at the end and struggles closing games out.

Relying on turnovers this much is a dangerous way to play, but they got one against the Bills and finished.

6-3. I’ll take it.

But really, let’s hope Aqib Talib adds something. Anything.

5 Points of Emphasis for Patriots vs. Bills

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The Patriots get started on their second half of the season this weekend, and it comes against the Bills, a divisional opponent who almost always give them a tough time.

In Week Four the Patriots nailed all of our five keys, especially with the dominance of the ground game. What could be different this time? Let’s break it down…

1. Take what the Bills defense gives – Perhaps the biggest question this time around is whether the Bills continue to go with more defensive backs and a lighter lineup like they did last time and got run all over, or if they’ll go with more of their base defense and try a more balances approach. From the Pats perspective it doesn’t really matter, because the Pats can attack them where ever they’re most susceptible. But the fact is the Bills are the worst run defense in football and their pass defense isn’t much better. The Pats can plan for a balanced attack and force the Bills to figure out how to stop them.

2. Win the turnover battle – This could obviously be a key any week but against a team like the Bills it’s especially important. There’s no question that the Bills offense will turn the ball over, so the Patriots must take care of the football. If you want to see what can happen when the Pats don’t hold on to the football against the Bills look no further than the 21-7 lead the Bills had in the third quarter last time. Fumbles by Gronk and Welker gave away the lead and momentum and as soon as the Pats stopped fumbling the game wasn’t even close.

3. No break out games for Williams and Williams – The Pats offensive line totally shut down Mario and Kyle Williams in the first meeting, but that doesn’t mean it will be easy this time around. Everyone knows that beating the Pats starts and ends with getting pressure on Brady, and the Williamses are two guys that could cause a lot of problems if the Patriots offensive line is out of sync. Hopefully Logan Mankins should be back and that will give them a boost.

4. Only three twenty-plus passes – This could continue to be a key if the Patriots can’t lock down their biggest problem area, preventing the deep ball. Assuming the Patriots run defense is able to shut down CJ Spiller (no easy task by any means), it will just come down to fixing the one big weakness on the team. Who knows what the secondary will look like from a personnel standpoint, but last time around they gave up their season second-worst amount of bombs (7) to the Bills. Cutting that to 3 would be a positive step.

5. Finish – Despite the Patriots historical dominance over the Bills in the last decade a good portion of the games were significantly closer than their scores might indicated. Let’s not forget Brady had his best comeback of all time against the Bills in the 2009 opener, and the first game this year looked pretty grim as well before the Patriots turned it around. If there’s one key that will be vitally important to the Patriots Super Bowl chances it’s to finish on both sides of the ball.