I was at the game yesterday

[Peter Pat]

This is the 1st time I have travelled to Miami for a game since the 2000 season. Good to see how Pats fans still show up strong down there.

Anyways after a great weekend in South Beach, I had to endure what was an agonizing game. But what struck me as the Pats main deficiency. (besides the fact that the punter is god awful, and has no business on the football field.) is that the Pats have the worst group of WRs I have ever seen.

I watched the WR closely all game, not only do they not get even a spec of seperation, but they get routinely pushed down, and knocked off their routes. Miami played preseed man coverage, most of the time with no safety help, as they were bitzing safeties all day, and these useless WRs could not get open. I mean not even a little. They could not win one matchup against a corner all day. Miami only gave safety help to the LBs covering the TEs. (by the way nice drop by Watson, when he got crushed, Tony G. amd Gates make that catch, it only hit him in the numbers).

Back to my point, there will not be one team that, will not copy Miami's gameplan, and press our useless WRs, knowing they will not get open, even with man coverage and no help, and just blitz 6 guys every play. Brady had no where to go, I mean no where. I am the 1st here to blame the QB, but he literally could not throw to an open WR. Maybe the Pats scheme was wrong and they never adjused to Miami's gameplan, but what can you adjust when the WRs are being knocked down at the line, and have no speed to get open, against a very average Miami secondary.

I was talking to a Fins fan, who was telling me how their corners against any other team, would just get burned because they are not great in man coverage, but against this awfull group of wide outs the Pats had, their average corners looked like all Pros.

The Ppats need to upgare this position pronto in the off season. the Branch trade looks worse and worse.

 

[BelichickFan]

I don't think you can blame the Branch "trade", more like blame the team for not developing some young WR knowing that Branch and Givens would get big money soon enough.

Meanwhile we need to get back to 40 runs a game, pass off it and play good defense. Oh, and replace Walter.

 

[JR4]

This is the 1st time I have travelled to Miami for a game since the 2000 season. Good to see how Pats fans still show up strong down there.

Anyways after a great weekend in South Beach, I had to endure what was an agonizing game. But what struck me as the Pats main deficiency. (besides the fact that the punter is god awful, and has no business on the football field.) is that the Pats have the worst group of WRs I have ever seen.

I watched the WR closely all game, not only do they not get even a spec of seperation, but they get routinely pushed down, and knocked off their routes. Miami played preseed man coverage, most of the time with no safety help, as they were bitzing safeties all day, and these useless WRs could not get open. I mean not even a little. They could not win one matchup against a corner all day. Miami only gave safety help to the LBs covering the TEs. (by the way nice drop by Watson, when he got crushed, Tony G. amd Gates make that catch, it only hit him in the numbers).

Back to my point, there will not be one team that, will not copy Miami's gameplan, and press our useless WRs, knowing they will not get open, even with man coverage and no help, and just blitz 6 guys every play. Brady had no where to go, I mean no where. I am the 1st here to blame the QB, but he literally could not throw to an open WR. Maybe the Pats scheme was wrong and they never adjused to Miami's gameplan, but what can you adjust when the WRs are being knocked down at the line, and have no speed to get open, against a very average Miami secondary.

I was talking to a Fins fan, who was telling me how their corners against any other team, would just get burned because they are not great in man coverage, but against this awfull group of wide outs the Pats had, their average corners looked like all Pros.

The Ppats need to upgare this position pronto in the off season. the Branch trade looks worse and worse.

Thanks Peter, this very enlightening and as you say other teams will do
the same thing. That is why I was really hoping Jackson would contribute
big time this year and why I have been so disappointed in his
incureable (so far) injury infection. .
He has the speed and may be physical enough not to get knocked down.
PATs need at least one WR like that.

 

[Peter Pat]

I am not agreeing with you, or NOT agreeing with you,. but if this is the case, sholdnt some adjustments, or changes, be tried to attempt to correct this problem?

I agree, I even mentioned in my post that it could have been a scheme issue, and there was little adjustment. The Pats were putting Wr in motion, but it wasnt helping, I am not sure what plan would have helped. The WRs have so little skill, if they cant catch the ball in traffic, and they cant get open, what can they do?

 

[Michigan Dave]

I agree, I even mentioned in my post that it could have been a scheme issue, and there was little adjustment. The Pats were putting Wr in motion, but it wasnt helping, I am not sure what plan would have helped. The WRs have so little skill, if they cant catch the ball in traffic, and they cant get open, what can they do?

They could spread the field better. They ran way too many tight and bunch formations yesterday. If you spread the field, you force the corner to respect the receiver, or to make the defense cheat the safety over. They're not going to try and press all day when you've got your receivers out wide, because all it would take would be one good release, and the guy is gone. That also would free up the run. I'm not saying go 5 wide and fling it all day, just spread the field more. It would do wonders for a back like Dillon, too. The short yardage situations we had were frustrating, too. We ran the 3 receiver bunch right twice, and that formation is killer IMO in that scenario. I would like to see us get back to having our receivers split wide on short yardage, too, allowing for the quick check off to the 0 cut. I don't remember the last time we ran that. It allows your receiver to get the ball off the quick stepback, and make a move on the corner. Gabriel or Troy could play that role this year (ChadJack, too, if he were ever healthy). It's another effective tool we've thrown away this year for no reason.

 

[PatsFan37]

I watched the WR closely all game, not only do they not get even a spec of seperation, but they get routinely pushed down, and knocked off their routes. Miami played preseed man coverage, most of the time with no safety help, as they were bitzing safeties all day, and these useless WRs could not get open. I mean not even a little. They could not win one matchup against a corner all day.

Assuming that's true, and I have no reason to doubt you (on TV, all I could see was Taylor using Light as a motionless blocking sled) I have to wonder why they don't see this and correct in practice. It's not like it's the first time they've been beaten by press coverage.

They've got Samuel, who's a pretty good corner, and Scott, who can't chase anyone downfield, but is strong in press coverage. You'd think Gabriel and Gaffney, who are big enough receivers, could work against Scott and Samuel to learn how to break free against press coverage. It's been a weakness all season.

How they do in games reflects how they do in practice. Watson gets open downfield in part because he's learned to release from LBs and run like the wind. That was no accident and it took coaching.

So I don't know if I'd blame this entirely on a bad crop of WR's. I see other teams lose a WR and plug in someone off the bench, and suddenly some cast-off 5th round pick is open and catching a pass for 25 yds. And then again.

So why not us, with our starting WR's who are seeing 20-30 snaps a game.

I just don't believe they're all slow and they all suck. And I don't believe it's all play calling (please don't hijack the thread, there are other threads on play calling). Something else is going on that we can't see during the game. And I don't know what it is.

 

[Tunescribe]

When I saw the title of this thread, I had an overwhelming feeling of sympathy. I'd like to make the Miami road trip, but we seem to play like crap down there no matter how good we're supposed to be. The Pats' record in Miami is now 8-31.