The New England Patriots are again headed to the AFC Championship game. Or to be more precise the AFC Championship game is again coming to the New England Patriots. Sure there is the great feeling of being able to play for the chance to go to the Super Bowl. Of being one game away from getting into the building where we could hoist a forth Lombardi. Yet some feel compelled to look at the potential problems for the Patriots saying that the defense is living on borrowed time or that they are one windy snow storm away from collapse. These people look at the fact that the Jacksonville Jaguars played the Patriots even for more than a half and that had their receiver Dennis Northcut made that one catch, they could have maybe pushed the Patriots to the brink. And while all of those things are true or contain a thread of potential, I contend that the simple fact that the Patriots won their Divisional playoff game, that there is an awful lot to like about the way this game was played and how it was won.

The Patriots kept the powerful running game of Jacksonville in check. Kevin Faulk continues to produce and make key plays. That one handed catch in the 3rd quarter was so, so pretty. The offense switched from methodical pace to no huddle and back to keep the Jacksonville players from getting their big linemen off the field in passing situations. The team made several in-game adjustments to what the Jaguars were doing. Maroney had a great day on the ground and in the air.

On this last point, I have been asking for several weeks why the offense has not had any screen passes. Finally, they emerged and sliced through the Jacksonville defense like a hot knife through butter. The first time they ran a screen Maroney went for 33 yards.

In fact the status quo yet again remained constant. The Patriots offense keeps scoring and the defense slows down the other team just enough until the opponent finally cracks under the pressure. Everyone knows that the Patriots are going to score points and lots of them. With this knowledge, the other teams eventually begin to feel the pressure and at some point crack. We saw it in Baltimore. We saw it in Indy and we saw it in this game against Jacksonville. I think we are going to see it again when we host San Diego next Sunday.

Quantities of 17’s
One of my lucky numbers for many years has been 17. The fact that this was going to be the 17th possible victory for the Patriots inspired me to drive all the way from Chicago to Foxboro for the game. And then when I began to look at what was going on, there were 17s all around me. They were everywhere I looked. This was the 17th game of the season. The Patriots were going for win 17. This was a chance to win our 17th playoff game against AFC opponents. It was announced that No.17, Chad Jackson would be playing and returning kicks for the injured Ellis Hobbs. And then the final omen. When my friend handed me the ticket for my seat, it was No. 17. How could we do anything but win?

Quicker Trigger
On the Jaguars opening drive there was a chance for BB to maintain a statistic that was really very impressive. During the 14 post season games the Patriots had never ever allowed any points of any kind on the opening drive. Here David Gerrard was able to drive his team down the field and make a TD pass to Jones. But in the process of throwing the ball, the Jacksonville QB was being dragged to the ground by Mike Vrabel. Coach Belichick was very close to throwing out the red challenge flag. He had the flag out but failed to throw it before the Jaguars kicked the PAT. Normally BB is on this kind of thing like white on rice. But I am guessing that the intel he was getting from the boys upstairs on the replay was too slow in coming. I believe that had the flag been thrown that the play would have been overturned. Still I am somewhat surprised that BB, who is a bit of a risk taker, did not go for it and try to take those Jacksonville points off the scoreboard. Would that have stopped the Jags from kicking a field goal on the next play and still scoring points? Maybe, maybe not. But it would have been interesting to see what would have come.

Quite Inauspicious Start
When the Pats finally got the ball on offense the first play was a 4 yard loss when Tom Brady got sacked. Sitting in the upper deck I was about to turn to the woman beside me and say, “Well that is quite an inauspicious start …” when her friend turned to her and said “That is an inauspicious start.” Despite the freaky coincidence, it was true, that is not how you want your team, the No. 1 offense in the league to come out and answer an opening drive touchdown by the opposing team in the first round of the playoffs. Ironically, that was the only time all day that the Jacksonville defense would drop Brady.

Quiet
Quite a bit of press has been put out about the fact that the new stadium is just not as noisy as the old Foxboro stadium was. And some say that this is because the winning of the team has attracted new fans who don’t understand the importance of noise at the right time. Yet this evening there was something I had never heard before. Silence.

Just before the first play with the Patriots on offense I could hear a very clear drop in sound level as Brady steps into position. In fact it was so quiet you almost felt like you could hear Brady breathing on the field. Having since watched a replay of the game, the silence was far more impressive than it was on TV. The upside to all of this is that the fans in the stands seem to becoming more aware of their role in the game. This in comparison to the week 15 game against the Jets, where the south endzone fans made more noise when the Brady was trying to direct a score than they did when the Jets had the ball.

Questionable Call?
After the Jaguars scored a touchdown on their first drive, the Patriots knew that they needed to reply in kind to keep the Jaguars from getting an advantage. Yet here they were with the ball on the Jaguars 40 yard line facing a 4th and 4. A collective groan of frustration came from the crowd, knowing that this even this was too much yardage to try and go for it. The team would have to punt. However a strange thing happened. Tom Brady stayed on the field and punter Chris Hanson stayed on the sideline. Bill WAS in fact going for it. The crowd around me screamed in approval. It was clear that Belichick believed that he needed to score on this drive.

Since everyone knew this was too far to try and run the ball (especially after getting stuffed for a 3 yard loss on 3rd down) there really was no sense in camouflaging the team’s intent. Brady was in the shotgun with Maroney lined up to his left. Stallworth was split on the LOS 3 yards outside the left tackle with Welker far left. On the right Gaffney was lined up on the LOS 2 yards to the right of Kaczur with Moss another 4 yards further to the right. Just before the snap Welker comes in motion to the inside and stops directly behind Stallworth. Maroney releases to the LOS and crosses to the right as a safety valve. Stallworth runs an inside route and while Welker runs a down and out to the sideline. Gaffney is also running an underneath route. This allows Moss to run a deeper route and to get open on a delayed slant pattern. He makes the catch for 14 yards. In a big time situation a big time player steps up. In hind sight it seems crazy to have even questioned the decision.

Quirk Kicks
Early in this game Stephan “Ghost” Gostkowski was getting the job done, even if some of the work involved luck. On the opening kick off he booted the ball into the end zone so that Jones-Drew decided not to bring the ball out. This was a nice change as it had been quite a while since Ghost had been able to kick off with no return. Then on the 3rd kick off of the game, early in the 2nd qtr. He kicked a very ugly ball that was headed for the sideline. Jax return man Maurice Jones-Drew seemed wise to let the ball hit as it surely was going to go out of bounds. However when the ball hit at the 7 it bounced back into the center of the field at an odd angle. And the ball slipped through his hands and he was fortunate just to have recovered it at the 4. But the magic for Ghost did not last as his field goal attempt near the end of the first half was wide right and subsequent kickoffs landed short of the end zone. No doubt some of these were intentional, so as to keep the ball away from Jones-Drew, who, the week before, had returned a kick for a TD.

Quality Catch - First Patriots’ TD
When I first saw the pass into the EZ in the direction of Ben Watson, my immediate reaction was “No! He can’t catch that!” The next thing I knew the back judge was throwing both arms up in the air. When your offense is in synch, anything is possible.

Quote #1
“This offense cannot be stopped.” – Darren D.

Darren was sitting in the seat next to me. Sure the offense was marching up and down the field at will. But talk like that will bring that kind of string to an end fast.

Quit on the Play
On the first drive of the 3rd qtr Brady delivered one of the best fakes in the history of the game of football. It was later reported that the play was only added on the Friday before the game. The play fake fooled everyone on the east and south sides of the stadium. For a second it also fooled the TV cameraman. Certainly having Kevin Faulk slide in front of Brady as the ball arrived gave the impression that it was one of the famous direct snaps to the RB plays which the offense runs about once each playoff season. Instead, Brady kept the ball against his body as he spun away from the play. The result was that a number of the Jacksonville players on the line and in the secondary just about quit on the play. When Brady finally turned around, there were no Jacksonville players anywhere near him. Wes Welker was likewise alone, in the endzone.

Quote #2
“Brady has not had an incompletion yet.” – Darren D. Spoken in 3rd Qtr.

Two plays later Brady had his first incompletion. This reminded me of the game against the Houston Texans in 2003. While waiting for Vinatieri to attempt a FG to win the game a friend behind me stated out loud “Adam has never missed a kick in doors.” As soon the words were out of her mouth she knew what she had done and neither of us was all that shocked when the kick was no good.

Quintessentially Brady
If his season of perfection was not enough, Brady in a serious groove against the Jaguars. And as the exception proves the rule, the missed passes of this game proved what kind of day No. 12 was having. He completed every pass he threw in the first half. When the smoke cleared, only 2 passes fell to the ground as Brady was 26 of 28, completing 92.9% of his passes for a league post season records.

Then there was a classic Brady reaction to the second incompletion of the day. He swung his arm in frustration at having missed the completion. I believe that he actually believes that he should complete every single pass he throws. I also wager that if at that point, you had asked him what his completion percentage had been for the day, that he would have had no idea. He lives in the now and does not dwell on the past.

Quiet the Talk
Given Jacksonville RDE Paul Spicer’s comments in the week leading up to this game and the way the Patriots dealt with the last trash talker they encountered, Anthony “Guarantee” Smith from Pittsburgh, I expected to see plays that would exploit the Jaguars’ No. 95. You just had to know that BB and Josh Mc Daniels were going to find some way to run plays that would beat the Jags lineman. And so they did. With the emergence of Laurence Maroney as a running back it has been clear that his greatest value is using his speed to get to the outside. Yet, with a strong rush from the edge, getting the Patriots’ running back to the outside could be problematic.
Enter Kyle Brady.

3rd Qtr. 1st & 10 at NE 45.
Brady was in the shotgun with Maroney to his right.
Stalworth was right, Moss wide left. Welker in the left slot.
Kyle Brady starts on the left, a yard off the ball. He goes in motion to the right. When he got to the RT he reversed direction and began to move slowly through the back field. As soon as he passed the center, Dan Koppen snaps the ball to Tom Brady. Kyle Brady, who has been in motion and now has momentum on his side as he moves to control the corner and the RDE. Kyle Brady seals off the edge to the point where Maroney, who is running around the left end, gets 7 yards down field before anyone even gets a hand on him. With Moss and Welker blocking for him, Maroney gained 29 yards on the play. On this play Spicer was not in, but the Patriots used the moving Kyle Brady on other plays to stonewall the DE. I guess Spicer is done talking for the year.

¿Quién es mas macho?
Tom Brady o Kyle Brady?
Oh sure, Tom is on the cover of the magazines and is voted awards like Best Male Facial Hair by an athlete. Yet the return of Kyle Brady to the field, seemingly in good health, made for a better day on offense. Besides fulfilling his main role of run blocking, he is a freakishly large target rumbling through the secondary. If you really want to overpower your visual senses, catch a glimpse of Welker standing next to our no.88. It makes Kyle look like Mighty Joe Young.

Quiche
Of all the food stuffs available at the tailgate perhaps none were so tasty, yet so overlooked as a tray of wee baby individual quiches. With the constant parade of asparagus spears, steak tips, hot wings, burgers, more steak tips, brauts, cinnamon buns, cheese on wheat crackers, shrimp cocktails, still more steak tips and Portuguese sausages, it is easy to see how these tasty little cheese and egg tarts could be missed. This was a shame as they were unbelievably tasty. They offered a nice touch of class and refinement to the festivities.

Did I mention there were steak tips?

Quick Flip
1st Qtr 2nd & 3 @ Jax 19 Brady pulls right from center. Fakes the handoff to Heath Evans who dives into the No. 1 hole at right guard. The with the play looking like it is going to the right Brady flips the ball out behind him (ala wishbone offense style) to the left to Maroney. That moment of indecision that this caused the defense helped to spring No39 to the outside. The blocking of WR Jabbar Gaffney on Jax DB Mathis also played a big role in Maroney getting outside for a gain of 5 and a first down.

Quieter
Did anyone else find it ironic that the rookie, wild child, Brandon Meriweather was the won calming down Rodney Harrison in the 4th quarter after Harrison got his second unsportsmanlike conduct penalty? Rodney was just out of his mind with …well with some highly volatile emotion. And here was the kid, keeping the veteran from completely losing his mind and getting ejected from the game. While I have always loved the passion that Rodney brought to the game, I do now have a problem with his performance the last 2 games. He needs to calm down and play within himself. He needs to stop hurting the team with senseless penalties. Both of his 15-yarders in this game came when the result of the play was already decided. His actions on the field approaching a dangerous place where the Kraft family might not want him on the team next year.

Quest For a Ring
I love the fact that Mr. Junior Seau who has not played in a playoff game in 12 years and that now in his quest for a ring and he gets to play against his old team the Chargers. With the win over the Jags Junior is now 60 minutes from a second and likely final appearance in a Super Bowl. I suspect that he is going to have the game of his life this week. Additionally, from a historical perspective, there is a chance for the team to avenge its very first loss in the post season. That loss came in January 1964 in the championship of the American Football League. This coming Sunday will be the first time that the two teams have played in Foxboro in the playoffs. And it will be for the championship of the American Football Conference. How perfect would it be if the Patriots could complete the perfect balancing of scales with a 51-10 New England victory? Ok, it might be a bit of a dream as even with the injuries to LT, Rivers and Gates the Chargers are a sound football team. One to be respected. We can defeat them. We WILL defeat them. Because we have Tom Brady and Bill Belichick. And because this team is play the games one game at a time.

Go Pats!

Erdoboy
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