Deus Irae

S James Sanders -- 45 of 45
S Patrick Chung -- 44 of 45
S Jarrad Page -- 29 of 45
S Brandon Meriweather -- 14 of 45
CB Darius Butler -- 30 of 45
DL Vince Wilfork -- 43 of 45
DL Ron Brace -- 25 of 45

Defensive snaps: Meriweather slips - New England Patriots Blog - ESPN Boston

It looks like the staff was a lot more worried about the running game than about Cutler and the passing game.

Also, good to see that Butler was in for 30 snaps and held up.

__________________
"The object in life is not to be on the side of the majority, but to escape finding oneself in the ranks of the insane."
- Marcus Aurelius

The Dynasty

45 defense snaps is pretty good too. Good 3rd down play and the turnovers helped with that. Wilfork has shown that he can be a 3 down lineman as well. Sanders quietly has had a very very good season.

__________________
"It is what it is" -Bill Belichick

"...as the head coach I can kind of do whatever I want. If I want to coach the punters, I can go coach the punters. If I want to watch the offensive guards, I can watch the offensive guards." - Bill Belichick

PATSYLICIOUS

Did Merri drop on the depth chart? Says he was only in the dime package and Page was in nickel.
Don't remember it being like that before this week

__________________
Organized madness
The young Gott-stra
Young Frank Sinatra

unoriginal

It looked like the Pats played a lot of single-high Cover 1 Man against the Bears with Sanders in the box, so it must have been Pat Chung back there at free safety.

Either Meriweather has fallen down the depth chart, or they moved him to a reserve role at CB/S since they were short on CBs. I think he spent most of his day working in the slot.

363839

I don't think Merriweather is long for this time.
Hope he steps up and proves me wrong.

TX_Patriot

Be careful, I got killed for stating the same thing a while back. lol!

Seriously though, Brandon isn't really a run support guy, and in that weather, his snaps were probably limited to obvious passing downs only.

Rob0729

Anyone actually surprised? In recent weeks before the game, the Bears' offense has shown signs of marked improvement because of the legs of Forte not the arm of Cutler. Of course the Pats were going to stop the run and force Cutler to throw because they knew if they asked Cutler to win the game, he would make mistakes.

As for Meriweather, I wouldn't read too much into his playing time for this week. It is clear they had their best run defenders on the field for most of the time. If we see a continuing trend, then we can read into it. The Patriots are about gearing their team to the opposition. They would sit Wilfork, Mayo, and McCourty if they thought that other players for a particular game gave them a better chance of winning.

patsfan13

BM snaps were a function of the D game plan, more running + bad weather + missing CB (after McCourty departure) = more Page and less BM

__________________
"Some guys play in all-star games, some guys don't. I don't know who picks all those all-star teams. In all honesty, I don't know who picks the combine, for that matter," Belichick said. "How does (Miami-Ohio offensive lineman Brandon) Brooks not get invited to the combine? How did Vollmer not get invited to the combine? I don't know. We can't really worry about that. We just have to try to evaluate them the best we can."

fnordcircle

Pats fans were overeager to crown Meriweather the next Polamalou/non-injured Bob Sanders. He's better than average but he's not a dominant force. Chung and James Sanders are outplaying him.

Sanders, especially, is a leader who lacks Meriweather's physical talents but is a much more football-savvy player IMO.

__________________

sbpatfan

I love Meriweather, he has yet to lose us a game and has set the tone in many. He also has a knack for truck sticking TEs. (Heap, Shockey)