New England Patriots Discussion - Page 46

ElectricEye · 10-03-2009, 11:21 AM

I know that. He hasn't been open that much when he has run deeper down the field though. Can't catch anything when he does actually get thrown at either.

Nalej · 10-04-2009, 04:35 AM

Looks like Seau is gonna make his way back into a Pats uni
Like I said before- we need the bodies. I don't see him as anything more then giving someone a breather

http://sports.espn.go.com/boston/nfl...ory?id=4529613

Don Vito · 10-04-2009, 03:36 PM

Dodged a bullet there with that Clayton drop. Overall, I'm happy with the performance. The Ravens are a very good team and our defense played pretty well despite some scares late. Meriweather is coming into his own.

Nalej · 10-04-2009, 03:37 PM

I didn't see the game but I'm glad we won. Ill have to wait for SportsCenter to see how Clayton gave up the game.

Bigburt63 · 10-04-2009, 08:37 PM

I agree with Vito. Meriweather is starting to make big plays and be a real leader on this defense, making it seem to be true that most defensive players take a few years to excel in this defensive system.

Overall I am happy with the performance. The offense showed signs of life, finally, and Brady looked MUCH better than he has the 3 weeks before this. I'm still not happy with alot of the playcalling, particularly with the lack of screens/draws, but they started to run some of those today. That last offensive series was garbage, too conservative and predictable.

Defensively it's very frustrating. The bend but don't break motto is good that you don't typically give up a ton of points, but they let people drive up and down the field. I was very happy to start to see some pressure on the QB though, sometimes with just 4 rushers. Guyton looked good too, which is an awesome sign.

On a related note, where is Ron Brace? Pryor played today and has other weeks, but I haven't seen Brace.

Nalej · 10-11-2009, 08:13 PM

Anyone hear anything on M.Light?
U don't know what u have until he leaves injured and his backup rookie allows a sack on the potentially game winning drive at the end of the fourth

Bigburt63 · 10-11-2009, 08:45 PM

that was mankins that gave up the sack not vollmer. vollmer will be fine.

I will admit it...we are not a very good football team. A good football team takes the first posession of the 2nd half, goes down and makes it a 24-7 game. Instead, no pass rush, bad play calling (again!), 0 pass rush, even less pass rush than before. Brady does not look right at all. OL had a decent day, Wilfork is a beast, and Welker played great.

AntoinCD · 10-12-2009, 12:30 PM

A few points I noticed from yesterday.

Brady has missed Moss on every depp ball he has thrown this year and is now just keying in on Welker. 15 targets yesterday. Too much for my liking. Teams will take their chances with Brady throwing to Welker rather than cover Moss one on one.

The defensive 'no names' will have names by the end of the season. Mike Wright, Gary Guyton etc have all played very well this year and the secondary has been very good with little help from the pass rush. Leigh Bodden has been great, Springs has done ok and Darius Butler has looked good in limited action. I've been very impressed with Brandon McGowan from what I've seen and Brandon Merriweather is a thoroughbread. I now believe he is the best safety to come out of that great class three years ago.

Maroney is gone, I have no doubt. 27 carries, 5 for Maroney. He is just not getting it done.

The offensive line is playing a lot better than I expected. Light's injury is a worry but I am quite excited about Vollmer. Even though it wasn't a huge play, one of the first he had when he came he had no one to block in pass protection so he went and found Elvis Dumervil and knocked him about four yards backwards. That nastiness is good to see.

Last week the Patriots blitzed the Ravens who were in the top 5 in total offense and Flacco could do nothing. This week the let Kyle Orton stand in the pocket and beat them. With no pass rush from the front, the Pats will need to blitz more and trust the athleticism of the back end to keep them covered.

ElectricEye · 10-12-2009, 01:28 PM

Tom Brady has no ******* deep ball and only throws screens and dumpoffs. What the hell happened?

So, so, so disappointed in our offensive execution. It's killing us. Absolutely murdering us.

EvilNixon · 10-12-2009, 01:41 PM

When the Pats' corners came up and they blitzed from their front 7,they looked great. Unfortunately most of the time the corners were 5-10 yards off the line and just conceded those passes,and it cost them the game.

Brady looked good early on,but it's obvious his deep ball is off. The running game looked solid.

Don Vito · 10-13-2009, 11:44 AM

Trade deadline is coming up and I would love to see us make a move. The Raiders might be trying to move Asomugha and if we could hose the Raiders yet again I wouldn't be opposed to it whatsoever, he is the best corner in the league (no, not Revis) and it would be nice to add a guy who doesn't give a 10 yard cushion every play.

Derrick Johnson of the Chiefs is officially on the trading block too, I know he may not be the best 3-4 fit but he is an explosive athlete who could possibly play all over the field for us with us drifting away from our traditional 3-4. The guy has been playing on terrible defenses in KC and is not in there plans, he is still young with plenty of upside.

FlyingElvis · 10-13-2009, 01:53 PM

Not sure I see the need to go after Aso - though I certainly would never be opposed to adding him. This team needs help along the o-line and at LB so I'd rather see those spots targeted.

Zero pass rush (why aren't we blitzing more?) and Brady's inability to connect on the deep ball is getting tough to watch.

On the plus side, we can send Tennessee to 0-6 with a win Sunday and hope for a very early second round pick from them. Jax is not doing well either, so those 2 extra seconds are looking nice right now. Cross your fingers and hope BB sees fit to actually use them for a change.

Wootylicous · 10-13-2009, 02:15 PM

I want Eric Norwood so badly.

ElectricEye · 10-14-2009, 12:40 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Wo_oT88

I want Eric Norwood so badly.

We won't draft him. He isn't 6'4 and he'll run better than 4.8. Much too explosive. Horrible fit. Athletic OLB in a 3-4 suck. Everybody knows that.

Nalej · 10-14-2009, 05:04 PM

*sigh* (10 characters)

FlyingElvis · 10-15-2009, 01:41 PM

We can at least take heart in our next 2 matchups. Home for Tennessee and then the miserably bad Bucs across the pond bode well for a 5-2 record heading into the bye week.

Then an extra week to ensure we don't look silly against the wildcat (with a little bit of work on stopping the Colts thrown int) should help, too.

ElectricEye · 10-18-2009, 08:30 PM

Oh hello, I'm the running game. Nice to meet you.

Seriously, so many things went right for us today. Titans played about as bad of a football game as I can remember, but there were major signs of life for us, defensive ineptitude or not. Receivers getting open deep was not the problem for us, Brady hitting them was. He looked absolutely locked in today. The throws were easy, but they were the same types of throws he had been missing on a consistent basis for the weeks prior to this.

You have to be encouraged with our secondary play as well. Wilhite is really starting to impress me. Didn't do anything in the box score at all, but he played the zone well all day.

The biggest thing today was the improvement along the line. We gave up some sacks to Jason Jones, but our run blocking was night and day different on the left side with Vollmer in. I'm not sure Light starts over him when he's back from injury. Not only was he mauling and getting the second level(thanks to nice chips on DE's from our tight ends) on run blocks, when he did lock up with Vanden Bosch he didn't lose a single time. He had help all day, but he stood on his own two feet and was really a physical presence there.

Matthew Jones · 10-19-2009, 09:13 AM

Lots went right yesterday, but it brought up some questions about a few more players who could get the boot after the end of the season. I don't think anyone would argue that Joey Galloway will be re-signed - he's gone, especially with Edelman and Aiken playing well. Leigh Bodden is in the same boat now - he did a pretty good job so far this year, but Butler and Wilhite both did really nice jobs yesterday and I expect both of them to get more playing time. Shawn Springs could be out after this year too, just for being old/expensive/injury prone.

I also wouldn't be surprised if RB got a shakeup. Faulk's deal is running out, but I think he'll be back with Maroney and Green-Ellis. However, Fred Taylor could be out after getting hurt very early into the year, and Sammy Morris (as much as I love him) could be out as well. That knee injury didn't look good, and so far he just hasn't been durable enough for my tastes. Great runner, but it would be hard to bring him back with Maroney and Green-Ellis starting to step up.

Matt Light could find himself out of a job pretty soon as well. Really liked what I saw from Sebastian Vollmer and Light's going to be out some more due to that injury, I believe. Probably the most important, however, is Adalius Thomas. He'd bring a big cap hit, but he was a healthy scratch from this game and hasn't really performed at a very high level this year. This team is starved at linebacker, paying Thomas a ton of money, and they still can't convince themselves to put him on the field. That's scary. This team severely needs linebacker help.

FlyingElvis · 10-19-2009, 10:16 AM

Adalius contract (from rotoworld)

3/3/2007: Signed a five-year, $35.04 million contract. The deal included a $12 million signing bonus and an $8 million option bonus in the second year.

2009: $1.9 million, 2010: $4.9 million, 2011: $5.9 million, 2012: Free Agent.
Cap charges: $6.4 million (2009), $9.4 million (2010), $10.4 million (2011).

Yikes. The big question will be how much it costs to cut him if he really sucks as bad as he's seemed thus far. Hopefully he's just really slow to return to form.

I think the uncapped year could allow Light to become a FA next season, but he's definitely up after 2010. Either way he will have to work for his spot back next year. I don't know that he loses his position to Sea Bass this year, simply b/c Light & Vollmer are a much better combination than Vollmer & Kaszur. Volmer definitely looks beastly out there and that is impressive from a rookie.

I'm not sure what to think about the defense overall. They take heat (Electric calling them inept - lol) but they are now officially a top 10 D. 6 overall, 6 vs. the run and 20 vs. the pass, and ranked 3rd overall in scoring. 23rd in sacks which sucks, but BB always says sacks are over rated. Getting pressure is more important and right now it's tough to argue the stats.

ElectricEye · 10-19-2009, 11:22 AM

I was referring to the Titans D in that post. Our defense has really played great this year outside of the pass rushing problems. I agree that sacks are overrated, but it's not like we're getting a whole hell of a lot of outside pressure either. Only real heat we ever put on the quarterback comes from Wilfork or Warren collapsing the pocket and forcing it outside....where we mostly don't do much damage. There were a few times this year where quarterbacks getting outside and not getting punished for it really hurt us.

FlyingElvis · 10-19-2009, 12:43 PM

Ah, my bad. Read it the wrong way.

The pressure is definitely sporadic and always seems to come from the linemen. Tully BC has disappeared, though I don't think anyone was expecting much from him.

I guess at this point we can take some solace in the lack of production all the OLB/DE prospects have shown thus far. Even the first round guys (Maybin, English) have done nothing.

Maualuga looks nasty. :(

nepg · 10-19-2009, 04:45 PM

The only time I've been impressed with Thomas in New England is when he played ILB in 2007.

I think the rebuilt secondary has been the key to the defense's turnaround so far. I'm not worried about the pass rush. It'd be nice to get lots of sacks, but the main philosophy of the defense is to keep everything in front of you. I've liked what I've seen from TBC this year. He's quietly made a lot of plays and really makes the offense work to keep him out of the backfield.

The defense is fine. The whole team has just taken awhile to put things together after the massive turnover they dealt with in the off-season.

Splat · 10-19-2009, 05:39 PM

Pats bounce Banta-Cain

I'm going to go a head and say he will be a Chief with in two days.

Nalej · 10-19-2009, 07:36 PM

TBC is gone now. Interesting. Our LB core reminds me of the Stephen King movie "Thinner"

ElectricEye · 10-19-2009, 07:37 PM

That one is strange. He hasn't been a factor lately, but he's been our best pass rusher this year in spurts. A pretty good candidate to be a Chief or Bronco in a few days.

Oh, and we need to talk about Myron Pryor more. He does something right every time he's in the game.

It's also extremely good to see BJE finally get some carries. As much as I loved Sammy Morris in years past, he's past the point where he's going to be a productive player. Good guy for short yardage situations, but I'm not sure BJE doesn't do that better at this point as well. He's going to be an extremely important piece going forward given that we can't possibly expect to get what we got out of Maroney last week on a week to week basis. Maroney is fools gold. Everybody knows it. He has one game like the last one every year and proceeds to hurt his shoulder and dance his way out of carries. The running game is far and away the most interesting thing that happened last week outside of Brady finally looking right. Things could end up going a million different ways. Assuming Vollmer is legit and contributes to our running game like he did yesterday, can Maroney keep it going? Can anyone else step up? The Titans have been EXCELLENT against the run this year outside of yesterday. Only team that ran on them was Jacksonville, they've held everyone else to 2 yards a carry. Snow or not, that's a good run defense and we ran the ball at will on them.