Superbowl XLIX Chatter

I don't know if there's an all-purpose thread leading up the big game yet. But maybe we can start some conversation here on all things related to Pats vs Seahawks in the Superbowl.

1. I feel these are the two best teams in the postseason right now, they both deserve to be here. There were no flukes. So this is a grid-iron feast! Can the Patriots knock off the defending champs?

I know there's no love lost between Sherman + Revis who are probably the two best cornerbacks in the entire NFL right now. Check out their twitter feud from 2013:
http://deadspin.com/5985754/darrelle-revis-and-richard-sherman-got-in-a-slap-fight-on-twitter

2. Let's not forget the coaches! Pete Carroll is a former boss of the Patriots, you know the guy who came after Parcells but before BB, the awkward in-between guy. Honestly he didn't do that bad of a job. The Patriots under Carroll's leadership did ok in the regular season, but did not perform in the postseason. Pete left the Patriots for USC where he won a couple of National championships before taking over in Seattle.

Now it comes full circle. Who will be the Master Coach? Will BB make Pete Carroll look like he is playing checkers while BB moves his pieces on the chessboard? Or will the gameplans unveiled result in one of the most intense coaching/sporting matches in league history?

3. The Ball-gate scandal. BB's tour de force press conference on Saturday expelled all the negative chi. His team and us Pats fans could move on to the next step. Thank goodness for BB. He stepped up and quite possibly saved the franchise. He wouldn't put up with the crap anymore and in no uncertain terms he laid out the testing that the team conducted and why he believed we were innocent of any wrongdoing. Kraft later followed up by stepping up and not only coming out in complete support of his coach and QB but even demanding an apology from the NFL if they found there was no wrongdoing done by our organization. Awesome. Let's move on to the game. Phew!!

4. Madden did it's annual Superbowl video game simulation. Surprisingly it has been fairly on point ever since it started this tradition, 8/11 winners correctly picked. This year's result. Madden predicts a Patriots victory over the Seahawks 28-24.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs...at-patriots-will-beat-seahawks-in-super-bowl/

5. With all the talk about how good both defenses are, how is anyone going to score? Well the rules of the NFL favor scoring. They are slanted that way. For the Pats to score, they need to have enough balance to keep Seattle honest. They have a dangerous secondary with Sherman, Chancellor, and Thomas. That means that Blount, Gray, and Vereen need to answer the bell big time! Also, Gronk needs to be a huge factor in both aspects of the game blocking and catching the football.

I believe that Pete Carroll has studied the Pats and knows that disrupting Brady early and often is key. I expect him to work a lot of exotic packages and to blitz quite a bit to rattle Brady early and disrupt his timing.

As for the Seahawks, we need to contain Lynch first and foremost, the man of few words, but who can simply embarrass defenders if we don't get hats on him. Sloppy arm tackles will not work!

And we can't forget about contain on Russell Wilson either. A lot of people talk about the Read Option. The key to us winning is to limit the effectiveness of the Read Option, and forcing Wilson to beat us with his arm.

http://nypost.com/2015/01/25/why-patriots-are-so-concerned-about-seahawks-read-option/

BB is generally acknowledged as a genius. Hopefully he finds the scheme that we need to contain this important aspect of the Seahawks offense. Please throw your thoughts in the ring. May the best team Win!
Go Pats!!!

6. PS Does anyone have any favorite superstitions that they will be using to help will the Pats to a 4th Superbowl win? Playoff beard, don't change your underwear, won't get a haircut, wearing a lucky jersey? Please share!

I'm wearing my size xxxlg Ty Law jersey to the game. I didn't wear it in 2007, opting for a newer Mike Vrabel that fit better. Won't make that mistake again!

So the Seattle defense really does nothing exotic, they do blitz but that is not how they normally get to the QB, even Seattle blitzing TB is probably a bad idea to do it too often. When Brady struggles it is normally by getting pressure with the front four. Again it would be completely outside of the Seattle playbook to start using exotic formations on defense they just don't do it, they line up and rarely even move much pre-snap. They are also very good at it.

VJCPatriot said:

I don't know if there's an all-purpose thread leading up the big game yet. But maybe we can start some conversation here on all things related to Pats vs Seahawks in the Superbowl.

1. I feel these are the two best teams in the postseason right now, they both deserve to be here. There were no flukes. So this is a grid-iron feast! Can the Patriots knock off the defending champs?

I know there's no love lost between Sherman + Revis who are probably the two best cornerbacks in the entire NFL right now. Check out their twitter feud from 2013:
http://deadspin.com/5985754/darrelle-revis-and-richard-sherman-got-in-a-slap-fight-on-twitter

2. Let's not forget the coaches! Pete Carroll is a former boss of the Patriots, you know the guy who came after Parcells but before BB, the awkward in-between guy. Honestly he didn't do that bad of a job. The Patriots under Carroll's leadership did ok in the postseason, but did not perform in the postseason. Pete left the Patriots for USC where he won a couple of National championships before taking over in Seattle.

Now it comes full circle. Who will be the Master Coach? Will BB make Pete Carroll look like he is playing checkers while BB moves his pieces on the chessboard? Or will the gameplans unveiled result in one of the most intense coaching/sporting matches in league history?

3. The Ball-gate scandal. BB's tour de force press conference on Saturday expelled all the negative chi. His team and us Pats fans could move on to the next step. Thank goodness for BB. He stepped up and quite possibly saved the franchise. He wouldn't put up with the crap anymore and in no uncertain terms he laid out the testing that the team conducted and why he believed we were innocent of any wrongdoing. Kraft later followed up by stepping up and not only coming out in complete support of his coach and QB but even demanding an apology from the NFL if they found there was no wrongdoing done by our organization. Awesome. Let's move on to the game. Phew!!

4. Madden did it's annual Superbowl video game simulation. Surprisingly it has been fairly on point ever since it started this tradition, 8/11 winners correctly picked. This year's result. Madden predicts a Patriots victory over the Seahawks 28-24.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs...at-patriots-will-beat-seahawks-in-super-bowl/

5. With all the talk about how good both defenses are, how is anyone going to score? Well the rules of the NFL favor scoring. They are slanted that way. For the Pats to score, they need to have enough balance to keep Seattle honest. They have a dangerous secondary with Sherman, Chancellor, and Thomas. That means that Blount, Gray, and Vereen need to answer the bell big time! Also, Gronk needs to be a huge factor in both aspects of the game blocking and catching the football.

I believe that Pete Carroll has studied the Pats and knows that disrupting Brady early and often is key. I expect him to work a lot of exotic packages and to blitz quite a bit to rattle Brady early and disrupt his timing.

As for the Seahawks, we need to contain Lynch first and foremost, the man of few words, but who can simply embarrass defenders if we don't get hats on him. Sloppy arm tackles will not work!

And we can't forget about contain on Russell Wilson either. A lot of people talk about the Read Option. The key to us winning is to limit the effectiveness of the Read Option, and forcing Wilson to beat us with his arm.

http://nypost.com/2015/01/25/why-patriots-are-so-concerned-about-seahawks-read-option/

BB is generally acknowledged as a genius. Hopefully he finds the scheme that we need to contain this important aspect of the Seahawks offense. Please throw your thoughts in the ring. May the best team Win!
Go Pats!!!

6. PS Does anyone have any favorite superstitions that they will be using to help will the Pats to a 4th Superbowl win? Playoff beard, don't change your underwear, won't get a haircut, wearing a lucky jersey? Please share!

Click to expand...

About rattling Brady. He was hit repeatedly against the Ravens and stood tall like vintage Brady. I think it's gonna take more to knock him off his spot.

PatsDeb said:

I'm wearing my size xxxlg Ty Law jersey to the game. I didn't wear it in 2007, opting for a newer Mike Vrabel that fit better. Won't make that mistake again!

Click to expand...

It wasn't your fault in 2007. I had already stopped the Pats run the year before against Indy by forgetting to break out my lucky jersey, a Cleveland Browns sweatshirt that I bought at the Pats game at Cleveland in 2000. What a run that thing had. It went 10-0 before it's first playoff loss. This might be a good time to break that out again. Maybe it has recharged itself and is ready to start another run.

obgod3 said:

So the Seattle defense really does nothing exotic, they do blitz but that is not how they normally get to the QB, even Seattle blitzing TB is probably a bad idea to do it too often. When Brady struggles it is normally by getting pressure with the front four. Again it would be completely outside of the Seattle playbook to start using exotic formations on defense they just don't do it, they line up and rarely even move much pre-snap. They are also very good at it.

Click to expand...

Seattle rarely if ever blitzes. They send four, cover and will either let you throw into coverage or wait for the rush to eventually get there.

PatsDeb said:

I'm wearing my size xxxlg Ty Law jersey to the game. I didn't wear it in 2007, opting for a newer Mike Vrabel that fit better. Won't make that mistake again!

Click to expand...

It wasn't your fault in 2007. I had already stopped the Pats run the year before against Indy by forgetting to break out my lucky jersey, a Cleveland Browns sweatshirt that I bought at the Pats game at Cleveland in 2000. What a run that thing had. It went 10-0 before it's first playoff loss. This might be a good time to break that out again. Maybe it has recharged itself and is ready to start another run.

Btw, one of my best friends is an avid Browns fan/Belichick hater, and this lucky shirt really got to him when the Pats were winning.

Anther thing. I liked hearing about the Browns being one of the teams punished for tampering with the footballs. That led to a call to my Browns fan friend earlier in the week so I could set him up for a response when he cried about Ball-gate, which he did.

Ahhhhhhhhhh, it's great to be a Pats fan these days

VJCPatriot said:

I don't know if there's an all-purpose thread leading up the big game yet. But maybe we can start some conversation here on all things related to Pats vs Seahawks in the Superbowl.

1. I feel these are the two best teams in the postseason right now, they both deserve to be here. There were no flukes. So this is a grid-iron feast! Can the Patriots knock off the defending champs?

I know there's no love lost between Sherman + Revis who are probably the two best cornerbacks in the entire NFL right now. Check out their twitter feud from 2013:
http://deadspin.com/5985754/darrelle-revis-and-richard-sherman-got-in-a-slap-fight-on-twitter

2. Let's not forget the coaches! Pete Carroll is a former boss of the Patriots, you know the guy who came after Parcells but before BB, the awkward in-between guy. Honestly he didn't do that bad of a job. The Patriots under Carroll's leadership did ok in the postseason, but did not perform in the postseason. Pete left the Patriots for USC where he won a couple of National championships before taking over in Seattle.

Now it comes full circle. Who will be the Master Coach? Will BB make Pete Carroll look like he is playing checkers while BB moves his pieces on the chessboard? Or will the gameplans unveiled result in one of the most intense coaching/sporting matches in league history?

3. The Ball-gate scandal. BB's tour de force press conference on Saturday expelled all the negative chi. His team and us Pats fans could move on to the next step. Thank goodness for BB. He stepped up and quite possibly saved the franchise. He wouldn't put up with the crap anymore and in no uncertain terms he laid out the testing that the team conducted and why he believed we were innocent of any wrongdoing. Kraft later followed up by stepping up and not only coming out in complete support of his coach and QB but even demanding an apology from the NFL if they found there was no wrongdoing done by our organization. Awesome. Let's move on to the game. Phew!!

4. Madden did it's annual Superbowl video game simulation. Surprisingly it has been fairly on point ever since it started this tradition, 8/11 winners correctly picked. This year's result. Madden predicts a Patriots victory over the Seahawks 28-24.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs...at-patriots-will-beat-seahawks-in-super-bowl/

5. With all the talk about how good both defenses are, how is anyone going to score? Well the rules of the NFL favor scoring. They are slanted that way. For the Pats to score, they need to have enough balance to keep Seattle honest. They have a dangerous secondary with Sherman, Chancellor, and Thomas. That means that Blount, Gray, and Vereen need to answer the bell big time! Also, Gronk needs to be a huge factor in both aspects of the game blocking and catching the football.

I believe that Pete Carroll has studied the Pats and knows that disrupting Brady early and often is key. I expect him to work a lot of exotic packages and to blitz quite a bit to rattle Brady early and disrupt his timing.

As for the Seahawks, we need to contain Lynch first and foremost, the man of few words, but who can simply embarrass defenders if we don't get hats on him. Sloppy arm tackles will not work!

And we can't forget about contain on Russell Wilson either. A lot of people talk about the Read Option. The key to us winning is to limit the effectiveness of the Read Option, and forcing Wilson to beat us with his arm.

http://nypost.com/2015/01/25/why-patriots-are-so-concerned-about-seahawks-read-option/

BB is generally acknowledged as a genius. Hopefully he finds the scheme that we need to contain this important aspect of the Seahawks offense. Please throw your thoughts in the ring. May the best team Win!
Go Pats!!!

6. PS Does anyone have any favorite superstitions that they will be using to help will the Pats to a 4th Superbowl win? Playoff beard, don't change your underwear, won't get a haircut, wearing a lucky jersey? Please share!

Click to expand...

1 - I'd call Seattle's win over the Packers flukey in a way. They also had a lot of things go very well for them down the stretch. It could be that the Pats will overpower the Hawks.

2 - Parcells, Carrol and then Belichick. No wonder they call him Krafty.

3 - I think all Pats fans need to give up on the "moving on" thing. Enjoy it. Embrace it. Do like Willie did at the draft. Like Jermaine Wiggins said, 'they hate us cause the ain't us."

4 - Is John Madden a good guy or a bad guy?

5 - I like the idea of running the ball a lot at first, even if it isn't working. They need to get to the potentially injured players with some hits and force them to make tackles. I would attack them like that and then balance it off with more passing.

6 - All the superstitions have left me, but your post has me thinking about breaking out an old lucky jersey from the great run of 01-04.

In other news, did anyone realize that the Seahawks Defense has a Kryptonite??

They SUCK at defending the TIGHT END!
The Seahawks allowed 11 touchdown passes to tight ends in the regular season, tied for third-most in the NFL, with six coming in their four losses.
http://espn.go.com/blog/statsinfo/post/_/id/101869/seahawks-trends-equal-patriots-openings

In other words -- Gronk is their Kryptonite! Unleash the Gronk, BB!!

Might see a few Tim Wright sightings as well ;-)

Archeryaddict12 said:

About rattling Brady. He was hit repeatedly against the Ravens and stood tall like vintage Brady. I think it's gonna take more to knock him off his spot.

Click to expand...

Brady has been really good in the pocket this postseason. The return of Stork to the lineup for the Superbowl hopefully means that he gets that extra half second to one second to throw and that could make him lethal!

1960Pats said:

It wasn't your fault in 2007. I had already stopped the Pats run the year before against Indy by forgetting to break out my lucky jersey, a Cleveland Browns sweatshirt that I bought at the Pats game at Cleveland in 2000. What a run that thing had. It went 10-0 before it's first playoff loss. This might be a good time to break that out again. Maybe it has recharged itself and is ready to start another run.

Click to expand...

Well, don't hold out. Break out the big guns! We need all the lucky jerseys that we can in action this Sunday!!

mosi said:

Seattle rarely if ever blitzes. They send four, cover and will either let you throw into coverage or wait for the rush to eventually get there.

Click to expand...

Thanks for pointing that out. In that case, I hope that Josh McDaniel can scheme a way to create space against a defense that plays closer to the vest. Honestly I feel that teams who can pressure us up the middle, get to him early and knock down his passes, give Brady the most trouble.

1960Pats said:

5 - I like the idea of running the ball a lot at first, even if it isn't working. They need to get to the potentially injured players with some hits and force them to make tackles. I would attack them like that and then balance it off with more passing.

Click to expand...

If you run it you can also stick someone out there to block them with can also rough them up a bit. I think Sherman is playing possum. Earl Thomas' injury seems more serious and I would go after him.

I would test Sherman's ability to cover against Gronk, they don't move their CB's around so line gronk up on him and see what he can do, see if he can arm tackle early, or us Blount to see if Sherman can tackle ok.

As far as Earl Thomas, anyone that has dislocated their shoulder knows that the brace works pretty dam well, I do, the hard part is getting hit directly on it that would suck and two weeks ain't close enough to help, loss of arm strength is a very normal thing so I would test that also.

We had a fellow rider do 50 miles of hard off road trail after we popped his shoulder back in so depending on the persons pain threshold I can see a guy playing with a brace for sure but there is no doubt he will be limited in some way. Plus let's face it they will both get some injection for pain, not sure if that's legal or not.

This will be a VERY physical game. And I better not hear the Seahawks crying about it after if we impose our will on them. If Blount can get our running game going, that will just be so huge. The play action and everything else opens up when we can run the ball on them.

As far as the supposed injuries to seahawks defenders, well tom brady has been questionable with shoulder for years now. LOL, BB. There might be a little gamesmanship in the injury leaks/reports by the Seahawks.

mosi said:

If you run it you can also stick someone out there to block them with can also rough them up a bit. I think Sherman is playing possum. Earl Thomas' injury seems more serious and I would go after him.

Click to expand...

BB better wear the grey hoodie. Didn't he wear blue in last super bowl?

You know, in watching the 2012 game again, it looked like the Pats played a 4-3 with Wilfork playing all over the line. I think that for the Pats to win either Brady or Wilfork will have to be the MVP.

Hopefully BB avoids wearing anything that he wore for either the 2007 or 2011 superbowls.

Maybe the key to our win will be a Monkey Sock Puppet?
As BB revealed during media day, that is his favorite... his favorite secret weapon!! Muhahaha!


Next up! Media declares Monkey-Gate!! BB unfairly used sock puppet to bewilder and confuse Pete Carroll!

Froob said:

BB better wear the grey hoodie. Didn't he wear blue in last super bowl?

Click to expand...

I'll be wearing my long sleeve shirt i bought at the Pro Shop back in October. It's 2-0 this year (Cinci & Balt)

Hey just want to give a shout out to the lucky Pats fans who will be supporting our team @ the game in Arizona! Are you guys planning an epic tailgate or what? Please share the sights, sounds, and eats at the game!

Tailgating is a must, if for nothing else, sharing great food and company! AmIrite?

Our #1 priority is containing Russell to the pocket and playing his read option. They won't beat us without him playing well and Lynch just needs to be "managed" as best as possible. On Offense ....... I have no idea, let me say we need a big game from Brady (then we win regardless).

Concentrate on the mufti-faceted Russell weapon. Can he beat our secondary from the pocket?

I can't wait for the Super Bowl. But, to be honest, I'm somewhat pissed off with the predictions by analysts across the web. A lot of them picked the Seahawks. I know they have their own opinion, but it's ridiculous. Only Madden NFL 15, Mike Ditka, and a few analysts picked the Patriots. Last year almost everyone picked Denver to win but we all know how that turned out *cough43-8cough*. Hope the Patriots win (whether it's a close game or blowout) just so people can shut up (even though, sadly, that may never happen).

Also, I learned something yesterday. Did you know that all three of Madden NFL's wrong Super Bowl predictions are three years apart? Super Bowl 42: Wrong; Super Bowl 45: Wrong; Super Bowl 48: Wrong. So it shouldn't be wrong again until Super Bowl 51.

With all of the talk about how great Seattles defense is, I gotta imagine the patriots defenders are getting sick of hearing about it like they've done nothing all year. They shut down some of the best offenses and qbs throughout the year and they get no respect. I feel a statement game for them on Sunday.