The "UnOfficial" Pats @ Vikings Post Game Thread

Good game overall.
Defense showed up. 4 Interceptions. 6 sacks and a forced fumble. Blocked punt.

The O-line seems to be finally gelling, though it still had a few hiccups..

The refs need to stop with all the onesided calling..

The refs got the call right on the pass to Jennings, despite Ian Eagle trying to say "But the ball crossed the plane". He still couldn't grasp it even after Mike Carey explained it to him. Ball has to be in control first. Means 2 points down in bounds.

Edelman showing why he could go down as one of the best punt returners in history..

Congratulations to Belichick on win number 200..

I would have liked to see more from Dobson and Amendola but they really committed to the run today especially with the big lead after the half. Hard to really get a read on the offense today but glad to see Brady stay mostly clean.

Defense looked like what we all were hoping to see after the first drive. Great to see that.

Somewhat boring with all of the penalties, the second half they kept if vanilla no need to risk injuries to the WR's... let the O line get some work, I think Brady only attempted 1 pass in the second half..

This game will not show up as a great offensive showing, but a win is a win is a win, no style points in the W-L column...

Too many penalties.. need to make that different.

DaBruinz said:

Edelman showing why he could go down as one of the best punt returners in history.

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The only question is if he cements a legacy as the best PR of all time.

He's already, at worst, one of the top five of the Super Bowl era.

What was the OL lineup for the most part? I noticed Fleming in there but I think he was lined up as a TE. And I believe Connolly was in there. Was it Stork at C?

Extremely disappointed with the offense and penalties. Lots of playmaking on D and ST. Though the 1st TD allowed was atrocious. Revis is freaking awesome! BB often talked about how he would run the receiver's route before the receiver makes his cut. Look at that! Amazing! He should play wide receiver!

"Now you see, Minnesota, that New England will always triumph, because the Vikings are dumb."

PATSYLICIOUS said:

What was the OL lineup for the most part? I noticed Fleming in there but I think he was lined up as a TE. And I believe Connolly was in there. Was it Stork at C?

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Most of the game it was:

Solder - Cannon - Connolly - Deven - Vollmer

Thoughts

OL obviously looked improved. Still not good enough but a big step forward (also the Vikings had no Cameron Wake). Better than last week overall though just from the eye test.

WR/TEs did not impress. Edelman was good and Gronk looked better but still the other guys are so-so. Lafell not even targeted. I would not sit KT again this season if he is healthy. Clearly a better option than Lafell or Amendola right now IMO.

RB - Good to see Ridley run hard and not fumble. Good confidence builder. I say give Ridley every chance to fumble in the regular season by giving him a lot of carries. You need to know what you have by playoff time with him.

D - I will just speak for the D overall. It was not as good as the stat sheet said. Holding them to 0 points for the last 55 minutes though is good. It is what a SB caliber D should be able to do against one of the worst Offenses in the NFL. LB depth obviously is the concern here. But not much we can do about it now. Just need to hope the top 3 stay healthy for most of the year. Also the safetly play was solid. The guy who was opposite McCourty went mostly unnoticed (whoever it was cause i think a good amount of rotation happened there) so that is a good thing.

What I want to see next week: KT play. I want the WRs/TEs/Vereen to do better. I don't want this to be the Edelman/Gronk show. It shouldn't have to be. Also I want to see the D pick up right where it left off. Hope Collins is back. Also less plays for Jones/Nink. Need to rotate them more early in the season and bad teams will give you a chance to do that.

Stork played C at the end. He needs work.

Everyone on the O-line played much better than last week. That includes Devey. They still have a lot of work to do, but Props to Coach D for turning that around fast.

Pass D has allowed an average of only 166 passing yards in the first two games - albeit against two mediocre QBs. Still very good though.

DarrylS said:

Somewhat boring with all of the penalties, the second half they kept if vanilla no need to risk injuries to the WR's... let the O line get some work, I think Brady only attempted 1 pass in the second half..

This game will not show up as a great offensive showing, but a win is a win is a win, no style points in the W-L column...

Too many penalties.. need to make that different.

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I liked the overall approach on offense even though it wasn't pretty. Nice mix of run/pass, short drop backs/quick throws, lots of play action. Keep it simple for the OL and Brady, I like seeing the efficient less dependent offense over the run n shoot even if we don't get to see 500 yards and 4 TD's from Brady.

Obviously, for that to shine you need the D to step up and they did today. Did more than their share actually, but at least showing the ability to make stops and force TO's was really encouraging.

Allen had a huge punt after our 3 and out down 7 early on. You could say it helped turning the momentum, that was a dangerous spot after what our D started out like. Then of course the DMC pick and the rest is history.

Edelman is incredible, even his biggest homers couldn't have seen him being this good when Welker was let go. If there's one gripe, I wouldn't mind him taking less punts later in the games though when we're up double digits. Need to keep this guy healthy

PATSYLICIOUS said:

What was the OL lineup for the most part? I noticed Fleming in there but I think he was lined up as a TE. And I believe Connolly was in there. Was it Stork at C?

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Stork came in at the end of the game, but for the most part it was

Solder - Cannon - Connolly - Devey - Vollmer

with Fleming, as you mentioned, coming in as a blocking TE.

Neutralizing Linval Joseph was very encouraging. He's exactly the kind of guy who traditionally wreaks havoc on the interior of the line.

What I loved about this game is the Patriots won it going away and their offense had very little to do with the outcome. A very encouraging sign going forward for this team.

DarrylS said:

This game will not show up as a great offensive showing, but a win is a win is a win, no style points in the W-L column...

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2001-2004 type win

FourierSeries said:

Pass D has allowed an average of only 166 passing yards in the first two games - albeit against two mediocre QBs. Still very good though.

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Tannehill is better than mediocre, and he has good WRs. The secondary isn't the defensive issue, the lack of speed in the linebacking corps is more disconcerting. But they seem to have adjusted to that after the first drive in this game where it really got exposed.

Offense isn't in sync. But we just got Dobson back, gronk isn't 100% ready for a full game, oline finally got some good blocks.

Penalties were killer today also.


Everything seemed good but the offensive passing game and penalties. Hopefully another week will get the receivers on the same page with Tom.

FourierSeries said:

Pass D has allowed an average of only 166 passing yards in the first two games - albeit against two mediocre QBs. Still very good though.

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Also it should be noted a lot of those were to TEs/RBs. They have mostly shut down the WRs.

Elite secondary, hit and miss front 7. Defense and special team carried the offense like the way it was in 2001 to 2004.

seems like the OL played a HELL of a lot better...is this Deven kid improving in front of our very eyes?

About amendola...why did he not play? if we use Edelman as an outside WR, it means Danny is the ONLY slot WR we have...so if he's not on the field does it mean that we are not using a slot WR? (or is edelman moved to slot instead?)
i can see us trading amendola away during reg season at this rate, especially after Tyms is back too

shout out to the coaches, they crapped the bed last week and fixed a LOT of things over this week, what did they change? Jones to OLB over DE, hightower played on the line more than LB, no rotation for OLmen, we started the running game early and stuck to it

if patterson is GBs best WR, why was revis on jennings instead? not like patterson had a lot of focus safety focus

I will say this though...our primary weakness on D will be coverage LB...collins seems to be the only one who can do it effectively, and Mayo is 50/50 with it

maybe after browner is back, we can put him on TEs and mitigate this weakness