I was watching Inside the NFL and they were fairly critical of McDaniels and how the Pats used Moss in general. They felt by keeping him outside the entire time they sorta left him oiut to dry and in the 2nd half when they FINALLY had him playing inside running shorter slants he had 50 yds and a TD. Their point was when teams take away a player like Moss, its upto the OC to find ways for him to still get open, not just upto Randy.
I had to agree with their reasoning, all we've been hearing is "what happened to Moss in the playoffs." IMO, 2 things happened..a)the team got conservative and decided to not take any chances throwing into double coverage and b)they were not creative in their usage of him and essentially had him running the same routes. A weapon like that you have to move around, you have to find ways to keep him involved. I remember they did that against Indy in the regular season and it payed dividends, he had 145 Yds and was the reason they won. But for some reason he was forgotten about in the playoffs, and their was a perception that there was nothing wrong with him staying as a decoy, I read it here everyday. But the reality is that the team was not as effecctive without him being a big part of the action, and only when it was evident that changes needed to be made during the SB did that point hit home.
I had to agree with their reasoning, all we've been hearing is "what happened to Moss in the playoffs." IMO, 2 things happened..a)the team got conservative and decided to not take any chances throwing into double coverage and b)they were not creative in their usage of him and essentially had him running the same routes. A weapon like that you have to move around, you have to find ways to keep him involved. I remember they did that against Indy in the regular season and it payed dividends, he had 145 Yds and was the reason they won. But for some reason he was forgotten about in the playoffs, and their was a perception that there was nothing wrong with him staying as a decoy, I read it here everyday. But the reality is that the team was not as effecctive without him being a big part of the action, and only when it was evident that changes needed to be made during the SB did that point hit home.