SB Thoughts

[Ring 6]

Watched the game again. Here are some thoughts.

For the second time, I felt like I was caught in slow motion. Things just never really got started. I guess it had to do with the limited amount of possessions. It was 3 quarters of nothing particularly good and nothing particularly bad happening. We just missed often and it felt like the next chance everything would be fixed, and the game just melted away.

The biggest problem with the offense was not the sacks, but the amount of times Brady was hit WHILE throwing. He had a bunch of open receivers that he would have hit, but the throw was knocked off line by him being hit in his throwing motion. It happened a lot. We left a ton of plays on the field that we would have hit if Brady had a split second longer.
I heard today Brady was seen with a pronounced limp. I thought while watching the game the 2nd time that he was very hesitant to get away from the pressure by moving around. It was the least I saw him move all year, and can only assume he was uncomfortable throwing the ball on the move.

One thing that STOOD OUT LIKE A SORE THUMB was the Giant passing game strategy. It was blatantly obvious to me that 90% of the time, and whenever he needed a play, he would simply drop back and watch whoever either Gay or Harrison was covering and throw to them. Not that he surveyed the field and found them open, but that before or at the snap, he picked one reciever, the guy either one of them were covering, followed him alone, and threw to him. Watch again, and Manning almost never takes his eyes off the guy he throws to and almost every completion was to a guy covered by Gay or Harrison.

MY LAME "THEY SCREWED US" COMPLAINT.
I watched this at least 20 times, forward, reverse, slo mo, etc. On the 4th and 1, Brandon Jacobs DID NOT GET THE FIRST DOWN.
now I will qualify it with the play is almost always called this way, even though it is incorrect, and that it was very, very close, and I probably could not have decided it in the time allotted for a review.
The giants needed to get slightly beyond the yard marker (38, IIRC). Jacobs runs into the pile. If you slow down and freeze, his knee has hit the ground by the point his left (non-ball carrying hand) hits the ground. It hits the ground right on the 38. When it hits the ground he is twisted with his left side forward, and his right--with the ball---behind. When his knee hit the ground his left hand was right on the 38, the ball in his right, which was behind his left side. I went back to see the previous measurement and he had to get at least an inch or 2 beyond the 38. When he was down the ball was not yet to the 38. They spotted the ball where it was when the ball hit the ground, well after when his knee did. Again, this will get called that way 95 times out of 100, but it was the wrong call.

Watching the game the second time, I have 2 opinions of Eli.
First, no way he played well enough to be the MVP. We could have (probably should have) intercepted him 4 times. Hobbs had one. Gay dropped one right in his hands. Samuel dropped one right in his hands. Meriwhether dropped one right in his hands. Those are only the ones I would expect to be held onto 90% of the time, nothing spectacular.
Second, I DONT KNOW WHEN I WILL EVER GET OVER ALLOWING 150 PASSING YARDS IN THE 4TH QUARTER TO THAT GUY, AFTER ALLOWING 100 IN THE FIRST 3.

To anyone who is blaming the offense more than the defense, consider this.
At 14:52 left in the game, the Giants started on their own 20.
At this point our defense had not allowed a TD in 10 quarters. Had held the Giants to 3 points in 45:08. All they had to do was finish for us to be perfect.
They went on to allow 152 passing yards, and 14 points. Perpsective? Our D played for 1 quarter the equivalent of allowing 56 points and 600 passing yards. (Oh and dropped 2 easy ints too).
The entire season came down to 14:52 and our defense played, in its most important quarter as bad as any defense in the NFL did all year.
Those things happen, they happen to good teams, they do not happen to Champions 14:52 away from being crowned the best team ever. Everything else that happened in that game combined doesnt come close to causing the defeat of a Champion than that.

Mankins has gotten ripped, and he was not real good, but Kaczur was worse. Awful day by him.

Could it be that the spaztic KO by Gostkowski after the first TD was the reason BB didn't have him kick the FG?
I disagreed with the decision at the time, and still do, but I am sitting here and BB has 3 rings as a HC, and gets paid 5mill+ to make those decisions so who am I to criticize.
I didnt buy the field position reasoning (otherwise just punt) because it was 7 yards of field position. I think the real reason was BB wanted to go for the throat. I think he felt we had a good drive going there, f-ed up 3rd down, and he wanted to take a chance to go up 14-3.

Other observations:
How does Pierre Woods not recover that fumble?
The holding call at about 1 minute of the half probably cost us 3 or 7 points. We were in good shape with the clock and field position, but it set us back about 14 yards, that took us 40 seconds to regain, and then we were short on time, leading to the strip sack when Brady needed to go deep.
Speaking of the clock, maybe I misunderstand, but what happened at the measurement, at 1:28????? Offical timeout for measurement at 1:28, they do NOT measure, theoretically start the clock, AFTER adding 6 seconds back on from 1:22 to 1:28, and call time out AFTER the next play with 1:22 left. Isnt the measurement stop temporary, then when they don't measure, you start it up? It should have run down to about 1:00 or 1:05 by my count. I didnt know yuo get an extra time out when the refs say maybe I should measure, nah, I dont need to.
What is the ref looking at when you throw a deep pass to a 1-on-1 reciever and the receiver shoves his hand into the defenders facemask and pushes off? Toomer made the worst, most out in the open off pi penalty Ive ever seen, and it was missed. (Probably didnt affect outcome but it was 3rd down and probably cost us 20 yards in the end--punt vs Hobbs Int) Even if tis not pi, its hands to face AND face masking. 3 penalties on one play in the wide open where the ball is and none got called.

In the end, I take 3 things from the game:
1) We just fell a little short of executing all day long. We had the plays, we had the chances, and we missed by just a bit. That happens a lot in the NFL, but this time it happened to our offense for an entire game.
2) Gay and Harrison were isolated, picked on and taken advantage of.
3) Our defense played the worst it has or could at the most important time of the entire season.

Had we won, I'd be saying a repeat is imminent. Having lost, I feel no differently that we should get that Lombardi back next year, but seein ghow we lost, the same thing can happen again if we do not improve our ability to defend the entire field in the passing game, and if we do not (probably the same exact way) turn the defense back into one that will not be abused when protecting a lead.

 

[BelichickFan]

A comment and a question,

My comment is that with so many multi WR sets now, I'm hoping that if we can get two above average CB to replace Samuel and Gay we will be no worse off than 2007 when those two were very good and below average respectively. I doubt we'll spend the money to get someone as good as Samuel but I think we can upgrade over Gay.

My question - with your comments on Harrison, are you thinking it's time to get more speed in his spot ? If we released him (sorry, just a question) we'd save about $2.3M. I think Meriweather will be good next year. Sanders seems OK. Maybe it's time to get younger and more athletic at Safety.

 

[i support BB]

Great post Andy!

Do you think we draft a DB with our #6 pick? or go for a D linemen?

 

[RayClay]

I still say, sometime in the third they should have realized this was not the game we game planned for. It was a sreet fight and we were losing.

I would have jumbo lineup and ran until it worked. Look at the three and outs, nothing else was working. Smash them in the mouth til they don't have the will to rush like mad men, then score some points.

 

[JoeSixPat]

It's funny - I recall a heated argument on this board where it was argued by some that a team's strategy to control the ball to keep it out of Brady's hands was inherently flawed as barring turnovers, each team gets the ball about the same number of times.

Obviously that was wrong. More possessions means more opportunities means more points - and we could have used a few more points on Sunday.

Credit the Giants and credit Coughlin for giving his team confidence against the Patriots in a "meaningless" game in December. Even some Giants fans were ripping him on that one.

 

[mgteich]

You focused on the last quarter. I focus on the last Giant drive. The offense had scored. The special teams stopped the punt return cold. Both these units passed their gut checks. We had one of the great defensive minds on the field coaching the defense. It just wasn't enough.

How could we let Eli Manning go 83 yards in two minutes? Yes, in the end, the problem was the pass defense, and we may very well lose both Samuel and Gay to free agency. Unfortunately, it is much harder to pickup three top corners that it is to pick up three top wide receivers. And we actually brought in four receivers.

Watched the game again. Here are some thoughts.

For the second time, I felt like I was caught in slow motion. Things just never really got started. I guess it had to do with the limited amount of possessions. It was 3 quarters of nothing particularly good and nothing particularly bad happening. We just missed often and it felt like the next chance everything would be fixed, and the game just melted away.

The biggest problem with the offense was not the sacks, but the amount of times Brady was hit WHILE throwing. He had a bunch of open receivers that he would have hit, but the throw was knocked off line by him being hit in his throwing motion. It happened a lot. We left a ton of plays on the field that we would have hit if Brady had a split second longer.
I heard today Brady was seen with a pronounced limp. I thought while watching the game the 2nd time that he was very hesitant to get away from the pressure by moving around. It was the least I saw him move all year, and can only assume he was uncomfortable throwing the ball on the move.

One thing that STOOD OUT LIKE A SORE THUMB was the Giant passing game strategy. It was blatantly obvious to me that 90% of the time, and whenever he needed a play, he would simply drop back and watch whoever either Gay or Harrison was covering and throw to them. Not that he surveyed the field and found them open, but that before or at the snap, he picked one reciever, the guy either one of them were covering, followed him alone, and threw to him. Watch again, and Manning almost never takes his eyes off the guy he throws to and almost every completion was to a guy covered by Gay or Harrison.

MY LAME "THEY SCREWED US" COMPLAINT.
I watched this at least 20 times, forward, reverse, slo mo, etc. On the 4th and 1, Brandon Jacobs DID NOT GET THE FIRST DOWN.
now I will qualify it with the play is almost always called this way, even though it is incorrect, and that it was very, very close, and I probably could not have decided it in the time allotted for a review.
The giants needed to get slightly beyond the yard marker (38, IIRC). Jacobs runs into the pile. If you slow down and freeze, his knee has hit the ground by the point his left (non-ball carrying hand) hits the ground. It hits the ground right on the 38. When it hits the ground he is twisted with his left side forward, and his right--with the ball---behind. When his knee hit the ground his left hand was right on the 38, the ball in his right, which was behind his left side. I went back to see the previous measurement and he had to get at least an inch or 2 beyond the 38. When he was down the ball was not yet to the 38. They spotted the ball where it was when the ball hit the ground, well after when his knee did. Again, this will get called that way 95 times out of 100, but it was the wrong call.

Watching the game the second time, I have 2 opinions of Eli.
First, no way he played well enough to be the MVP. We could have (probably should have) intercepted him 4 times. Hobbs had one. Gay dropped one right in his hands. Samuel dropped one right in his hands. Meriwhether dropped one right in his hands. Those are only the ones I would expect to be held onto 90% of the time, nothing spectacular.
Second, I DONT KNOW WHEN I WILL EVER GET OVER ALLOWING 150 PASSING YARDS IN THE 4TH QUARTER TO THAT GUY, AFTER ALLOWING 100 IN THE FIRST 3.

To anyone who is blaming the offense more than the defense, consider this.
At 14:52 left in the game, the Giants started on their own 20.
At this point our defense had not allowed a TD in 10 quarters. Had held the Giants to 3 points in 45:08. All they had to do was finish for us to be perfect.
They went on to allow 152 passing yards, and 14 points. Perpsective? Our D played for 1 quarter the equivalent of allowing 56 points and 600 passing yards. (Oh and dropped 2 easy ints too).
The entire season came down to 14:52 and our defense played, in its most important quarter as bad as any defense in the NFL did all year.
Those things happen, they happen to good teams, they do not happen to Champions 14:52 away from being crowned the best team ever. Everything else that happened in that game combined doesnt come close to causing the defeat of a Champion than that.

Mankins has gotten ripped, and he was not real good, but Kaczur was worse. Awful day by him.

Could it be that the spaztic KO by Gostkowski after the first TD was the reason BB didn't have him kick the FG?
I disagreed with the decision at the time, and still do, but I am sitting here and BB has 3 rings as a HC, and gets paid 5mill+ to make those decisions so who am I to criticize.
I didnt buy the field position reasoning (otherwise just punt) because it was 7 yards of field position. I think the real reason was BB wanted to go for the throat. I think he felt we had a good drive going there, f-ed up 3rd down, and he wanted to take a chance to go up 14-3.

Other observations:
How does Pierre Woods not recover that fumble?
The holding call at about 1 minute of the half probably cost us 3 or 7 points. We were in good shape with the clock and field position, but it set us back about 14 yards, that took us 40 seconds to regain, and then we were short on time, leading to the strip sack when Brady needed to go deep.
Speaking of the clock, maybe I misunderstand, but what happened at the measurement, at 1:28????? Offical timeout for measurement at 1:28, they do NOT measure, theoretically start the clock, AFTER adding 6 seconds back on from 1:22 to 1:28, and call time out AFTER the next play with 1:22 left. Isnt the measurement stop temporary, then when they don't measure, you start it up? It should have run down to about 1:00 or 1:05 by my count. I didnt know yuo get an extra time out when the refs say maybe I should measure, nah, I dont need to.
What is the ref looking at when you throw a deep pass to a 1-on-1 reciever and the receiver shoves his hand into the defenders facemask and pushes off? Toomer made the worst, most out in the open off pi penalty Ive ever seen, and it was missed. (Probably didnt affect outcome but it was 3rd down and probably cost us 20 yards in the end--punt vs Hobbs Int) Even if tis not pi, its hands to face AND face masking. 3 penalties on one play in the wide open where the ball is and none got called.

In the end, I take 3 things from the game:
1) We just fell a little short of executing all day long. We had the plays, we had the chances, and we missed by just a bit. That happens a lot in the NFL, but this time it happened to our offense for an entire game.
2) Gay and Harrison were isolated, picked on and taken advantage of.
3) Our defense played the worst it has or could at the most important time of the entire season.

Had we won, I'd be saying a repeat is imminent. Having lost, I feel no differently that we should get that Lombardi back next year, but seein ghow we lost, the same thing can happen again if we do not improve our ability to defend the entire field in the passing game, and if we do not (probably the same exact way) turn the defense back into one that will not be abused when protecting a lead.

 

[PATRIOT64]

Justin Tuck was MVP of that game - No and,ifs or butts

He destroyed Koppen and Hochstien,Mankins and any of those other girlie girl offensive lineman (at least played like girls THAT night) who decided to call themselves an offensive lineman that game

 

[Marko]

The holding call at about 1 minute of the half probably cost us 3 or 7 points. We were in good shape with the clock and field position, but it set us back about 14 yards, that took us 40 seconds to regain, and then we were short on time, leading to the strip sack when Brady needed to go deep.
Speaking of the clock, maybe I misunderstand, but what happened at the measurement, at 1:28????? Offical timeout for measurement at 1:28, they do NOT measure, theoretically start the clock, AFTER adding 6 seconds back on from 1:22 to 1:28, and call time out AFTER the next play with 1:22 left. Isnt the measurement stop temporary, then when they don't measure, you start it up? It should have run down to about 1:00 or 1:05 by my count. I didnt know yuo get an extra time out when the refs say maybe I should measure, nah, I dont need to.
What is the ref looking at when you throw a deep pass to a 1-on-1 reciever and the receiver shoves his hand into the defenders facemask and pushes off? Toomer made the worst, most out in the open off pi penalty Ive ever seen, and it was missed. (Probably didnt affect outcome but it was 3rd down and probably cost us 20 yards in the end--punt vs Hobbs Int) Even if tis not pi, its hands to face AND face masking. 3 penalties on one play in the wide open where the ball is and none got call

Check out the play before the 1;28 that you'are talking about and if I remember correctly that play started @1:28 then the clock does some crazy shiieeet, runs a bunch off and puts some back, so not only do they stop the clock it never ran!

 

[Patriot Missile]

Nice post. It's amazing as bad as they played they still almost won. Hat's off to the Giants and their pass rush+timely offense. The thing that will stick out in my mind about this game is the playcalling and the missed opportunities. All of the above mentioned about the non ints and fumble recovery.

Defensively they held them to 3 points through 3 quarters basically playing in coverage. I will take it to my grave wondering why we blitzed so much in the 4th quarter. I just don't have the anser and probably never will unless I went on a fishing trip will Bill and Jimmy. The loss of Colvin was huge and showed from the day he got on IR. They were completely ineffective trying to do so.

Offensively I would venture to guess during the regular season they ran over 60 percent of our offensive snaps out of Shotgun formation. I've never seen so many 3-5-7 step drops in one game than I did this one. Again, I shake my head. They've used shotgun countless times to slide/move the pocket all year long. Noticeably against Dallas and their pass rush. Either Brady was injured or the fix was in. This was not the same offense I've watched all year long,they were imposters dressed in Pat's uniforms. It makes me wonder on the Pat's final drive if Brady said "screw it" and called his own plays,defying Daniels in the process.

 

[BelichickFan]

Yes, in the end, the problem was the pass defense, and we may very well lose both Samuel and Gay to free agency. Unfortunately, it is much harder to pickup three top corners that it is to pick up three top wide receivers.

Gay is a playable but below average CB. We don't need to pick up 3 top CB. Or two. We have one average to slightly above average CB. If we get two more then we'll have three above average CB instead of one excellent one, one above average one and one below average one. My guess is Belichick would make that trade because teams can throw away from an excellent CB and to the below average one. I don't have names to give you but I bet Belichick would be OK with "trading" Samuel and Gay for two guys about like Hobbs to have more consistency of ability across the field.

 

[BelichickFan]

Offensively I would venture to guess during the regular season they ran over 60 percent of our offensive snaps out of Shotgun formation. I've never seen so many 3-5-7 step drops in one game than I did this one. Again, I shake my head. They've used shotgun countless times to slide/move the pocket all year long. Noticeably against Dallas and their pass rush. Either Brady was injured or the fix was in.

And I have to ask - if Brady were injured why would they go to less shotgun and more deep drops ?

 

[Patriot Missile]

And I have to ask - if Brady were injured why would they go to less shotgun and more deep drops ?

I guess I contradict myself in the last sentence there. All these reports of ankles and hernia's would make you think. "If he was playing in such pain,why not be in the shotgun where you are more comfortable and formidable in the first place?

 

[BelichickFan]

I guess I contradict myself in the last sentence there. All these reports of ankles and hernia's would make you think. "If he was playing in such pain,why not be in the shotgun where you are more comfortable and formidable in the first place?

Right, I wasn't questioning you - more like agreeing with you and wondering if anyone has a good answer. Even if Brady were feeling good, there had to be an increased risk to the ankle.

 

[MoLewisrocks]

Offensively I would venture to guess during the regular season they ran over 60 percent of our offensive snaps out of Shotgun formation. I've never seen so many 3-5-7 step drops in one game than I did this one. Again, I shake my head. They've used shotgun countless times to slide/move the pocket all year long. Noticeably against Dallas and their pass rush. Either Brady was injured or the fix was in. This was not the same offense I've watched all year long,they were imposters dressed in Pat's uniforms. It makes me wonder on the Pat's final drive if Brady said "screw it" and called his own plays,defying Daniels in the process.

http://library.kraftsportsgroup.com/20080203_gamebook.pdf

Here's a link to the gamebook. I'm too tired to count the shotgun snaps, but just eyeballing this it's substantially more than half of them. I'd say upwards of 70%. Most of the sacks were in shotgun, including in the hurryup offense people also forgot they ran in two series...one led to a TD and the other a strip sack. Lots of things that worked consistently all year didn't work on Sunday night. When that happens it's called failure to execute.

 

[Miguel]

My thought is that the OP was WAY off his arrogant prediction and needs to come out and just say it, "I was WRONG".

Bingo.
http://www.patsfans.com/new-england-patriots/messageboard/showthread.php?t=76787

Andy predicted a 48-13 blowout. The offense underperformed his prediction by 34 points. The defense underperformed his prediction by 4 points.

 

[makewayhomer]

for the hundredth time, the defense really didn't play bad on the last drive, they just had a whole bunch of weird plays go against them.

if Eli thows that ball 2 inches lower, Asante intercepts and the game is over.

if Jarvis gets another 1/2 step or 1/2 second, he sacks Eli and game is probably over.

and Tyree catches that ball 1/100 times.

it's like the Giants were playing with 5 downs that drive, with the breaks and close plays that went their way.

their drive was basically the same as our last drive vs the Ravens - there was an awful lot of luck involved

 

[Horace's Ivories]

for the hundredth time, the defense really didn't play bad on the last drive, they just had a whole bunch of weird plays go against them.

if Eli thows that ball 2 inches lower, Asante intercepts and the game is over.

if Jarvis gets another 1/2 step or 1/2 second, he sacks Eli and game is probably over.

and Tyree catches that ball 1/100 times.

it's like the Giants were playing with 5 downs that drive, with the breaks and close plays that went their way.

their drive was basically the same as our last drive vs the Ravens - there was an awful lot of luck involved

I agree but it seems this year in quite a few games:
- The pass rush has been just missing or lets someone escape
- The secondary has dropped their share of Picks (including samuel)
- Pats defenders had given up plenty of red zone TDs esp early in the year.

It just seemed that these weaknesses caught up with them.

 

[upstater1]

I disagree about the defense because so late in the Super Bowl, teams are going to open up their offense, and the defnese is tired.

People keep crediting the Patriots for that last drive, as though they should have been doing that all game. But you can't ignore the fact that the Giants defensive line was sucking air on the sidelines.

Yes absolutely the Patriots D blew it on that last drive. Samuel said as much.

But they should never have been in that position in the first place.

Every Super Bowl we've played this decade has seen our D give up a lot of yards in the 4th quarter. Rams, Panthers, Eagles, Giants. It's happened every time. There's a reason.

By the way, in the first quarter on a crucial 3rd down play, Plaxico ran down the field and knocked our D-back on his back, making an easy first down catch. Last year in the AFCCG, Troy Brown was called for a penalty late in the first half that took us out of FG position and ended our drive. The Patriots were getting ready to go up 28-3.

 

[Ring 6]

A comment and a question,

My comment is that with so many multi WR sets now, I'm hoping that if we can get two above average CB to replace Samuel and Gay we will be no worse off than 2007 when those two were very good and below average respectively. I doubt we'll spend the money to get someone as good as Samuel but I think we can upgrade over Gay.

My question - with your comments on Harrison, are you thinking it's time to get more speed in his spot ? If we released him (sorry, just a question) we'd save about $2.3M. I think Meriweather will be good next year. Sanders seems OK. Maybe it's time to get younger and more athletic at Safety.

I think Harrison still has value. I would like to see him back, but would like him limited to playing in the base D, or if he is in on nickel/dime, as a LB, who mostly blitzes. I think he is an asset on first down and in base situations but a liability in coverage on 3rd down or the 2 minute drill.
From watching the SB, I dont think it will be hard to upgrade Gay, in fact, I wouldn't be frightened with Chad Scott or Richardson being that guy, compared to Gay.

 

[Ring 6]

Gay is a playable but below average CB. We don't need to pick up 3 top CB. Or two. We have one average to slightly above average CB. If we get two more then we'll have three above average CB instead of one excellent one, one above average one and one below average one. My guess is Belichick would make that trade because teams can throw away from an excellent CB and to the below average one. I don't have names to give you but I bet Belichick would be OK with "trading" Samuel and Gay for two guys about like Hobbs to have more consistency of ability across the field.

Gay was the worst player on the field in the SB. Manning came in with a plan to find 21 and throw to his guy.