What was the Offensive Gameplan...? (and other thoughts)

[aluminum seats]

--After a couple of games with an outstanding ground game, one school of thought was we might see that again. Or, because that would be expected, maybe the Pats would air it out. While the Pats did throw it more, and when little seems to work I understand that an offensive "plan" is often hard to find, I honestly don't know what Josh's plan was here.

First couple of series, they threw short on first down, ran on second, got third and short, then threw. Not sure I get it.

--Man, Brady & the deep pass. Sometimes that's very frustrating.

--The one thing I really didn't want to see was a Pats' injury affecting the game. Of course, it did, and with the guy you'd guess. I don't really know what kind of offer the Pats make Talib. Very good corner, really has trouble staying on the field.

--Amendola was disappointing. Not much more to say. Hopefully he'll be better next year.

--Defensively, didn't see a "star" performance out of Collins, but that's tough to ask of the kid. He showed the stuff to grow on. Chandler Jones has started strong for two years, then faded. Need to get more guys on that line so he's around for the second half of the season & playoffs.

--There's a hell of a lot to like about this team. I truly hope next year will bring #4 for Brady. Forced to guess, I'd say it will. Hope springs eternal.

 

[DropKickFlutie]

Completely abandoned the run after the first quarter.

Not surprised. This offense goes spread vertical even when the personnel has no deep threats.

 

[hwc]

The Pats game plan was to pass, pass, and pass some more. Like a flashback to 2007. Didn't work. Not really surprising. They don't have the receivers and tight ends to throw the ball all day.

 

[IcyPatriot]

The plan was for Brady to go to the line and find something to exploit ... and he gagged.

Many loyalists will defend Brady ... but he's a man .. he can take it ... he choked.

 

[Jangles]

The plan was for Brady to go to the line and find something to exploit ... and he gagged.

Many loyalists will defend Brady ... but he's a man .. he can take it ... he choked.

How's that

 

[chicowalker]

Has there been any mention back east (radio, local coverage, etc.) about whether Blount got hurt?

Not only did they abandon the run -- which infuriates me -- but he barely saw the field. Not just on offense, but kickoffs, too. (Granted, they didn't expect to be returning many kicks.)

 

[TomPatriot]

Matt Chatham said it best: Denver was stopping the run without putting 8 in the box.

That's a huge victory and it means the Pats blocking up front was poor.

The Pats were manhandled across the board. Everyone is to blame, including Brady and BB.

 

[Fencer]

Matt Chatham said it best: Denver was stopping the run without putting 8 in the box.

That's a huge victory and it means the Pats blocking up front was poor.

The Pats were manhandled across the board. Everyone is to blame, including Brady and BB.

Right. Whatever the role of ground offense was supposed to be, that part of the gameplan didn't work.

They still got play-action bites; Brady just missed Edelman on that much-discussed TD opportunity.

 

[Archeryaddict12]

The plan was for Brady to go to the line and find something to exploit ... and he gagged.

Many loyalists will defend Brady ... but he's a man .. he can take it ... he choked.

Icy, he did not. He didn't choke. Look at his game stats. It doesn't help he had to throw against coverage to short receivers, no gronk and the oline was giving up sacks and pressure. Tom did well enough for us to win.

 

[SalemPats]

Icy, he did not. He didn't choke. Look at his game stats. It doesn't help he had to throw against coverage to short receivers, no gronk and the oline was giving up sacks and pressure. Tom did well enough for us to win.

Agreed, Tom did everything he could

 

[IcyPatriot]

Icy, he did not. He didn't choke. Look at his game stats. It doesn't help he had to throw against coverage to short receivers, no gronk and the oline was giving up sacks and pressure. Tom did well enough for us to win.

16 points vs a high scoring offense is not good enough ...

He did not make 1 deep or intermediate pass all day ...

Sorry ... that is a choke.

Just 1 of those passes completed and we were in the game

... at that level those just 1 play needed must be made.

If you cannot make a deep pass whose fault is it that the box is stacked?

 

[Brady_to_Moss]

The plan was for Brady to go to the line and find something to exploit ... and he gagged.

Many loyalists will defend Brady ... but he's a man .. he can take it ... he choked.

I disagree, if anything that was one of his better AFC championship game. Sure he missed some deep throw down the field, but lets be honest the way Manning was moving up and down the field ,a few more completions would not have made any difference.

 

[Rob0729]

They probably should have ran Vereen more outside. The Broncos have two monster sized DTs. I think they might have exploited the outside more.

What the Broncos did was take away the short passing game and blitzed Brady a lot. They gave Brady the outside and deep know the Pats didn't have someone who could consistently beat them. I think if Dobson was healthy, the Pats might have destroyed them. But clearly he wasn't 100%.

 

[QuantumMechanic]

Completely abandoned the run after the first quarter.

The running game could only have so many shots. If it wasn't working, better to try something else rather than keep doing something that wasn't working and giving the ball back to DEN. And DEN was being like BB -- they played to take away what we've been doing best. And then once NE fell behind by multiple scores with DEN eating up six minutes a drive, they had to abandon the run to try to score more quickly.

The other guys get paid too, you know.

 

[Observer]

I don't know what a choke is but Brady did not live up to his billing. The offensive line was poor as usual but we knew that.

 

[Sciz]

The game plan was most likely what it has been, run to set up the playaction. The run never really worked outside of the last drive, and the playaction had just enough success despite the lack of a running game to disappoint us when it didn't work.

Now obviously having a healthy Gronk and fully healthy Dobson would have helped (and Thompkins may have too), but I don't really see how they fix that running game without new players on the interior line.

 

[DropKickFlutie]

In response to a few back and forths in this thread, to chime in the score was 23-3 after the first 53 minutes of play. So, okay, it ended up being 26-16 but the offense was completely shut down for most of the game.

Also, can anyone give a rationale explanation for the random deep bomb to Slater ?

 

[Uncle Rico]

I made comment earlier in the week that perhaps all the injuries have forced the Pats to return to a championship-style offense. Watching today, maybe not.

Certainly the long drives the D surrendered hurt. But today's loss follows a pattern that it pains me to mention:

26-16
28-13
21-17
28-21
33-14
17-14
38-34
27-13

Those of the scores' of the Pats' last 8 playoff losses. They went over 20 points only twice, and one of those times it was just barely.

I'm far from down on Brady — quite the opposite. But with all the offensive firepower this team has had over recent years, these point totals in the biggest games are disappointing.

 

[PATSYLICIOUS]

Eh, I've been pretty critical of the playcalling in recent playoff failures but I think this one was mainly execution.

-Brady missed 2 open recievers that possibly took up to 10 points off the board.
-Run blocking was a major fail today, pass blocking broke down in some key situations when the plays looked like they would have worked. Resulted in punts or loss of downs.
-Defense didn't get off the field at all after the first drive, making it nearly impossible to establish a rhythm or identity on offense.

JMD did not have alot to work with. If our defense would have bothered to show up and we weren't in a situation where we were forced to go for 4th and 2 in the 3rd quarter, then we didn't leave those 10 points on the field on Brady's misthrows, that's a potential 13 points on top of what we had. That's with us not being able to get anything established whatsoever on the ground.

 

[tobias funke]

The entire team choked. You can't lay it on Brady any more than you can lay it solely on McDaniels, the receivers, the RBs, the O-line, the 3rd-down defense, or the injuries. They just didn't play well across the board in the biggest game of the season.

It is what it is. As far as I'm concerned I enjoyed the season. I felt like they were playing with house money at this point and going to the SB was gravy. After the letdowns this team has had before, this is nothing. The better team won the game, good for them. Excited for next year.