Is Rex in the head of Pat's coaches and/or Brady?

The Brandon Five said:

Apparently, giving up three TDs in a quarter is what they are looking for as they just extended Freeny's contract.

Click to expand...

In his defense, he only played 2 snaps - - Rufus played 15.

Evidently, he's a ST ace.

I barely knew he was on the team. (Dekoda Watson also)

wizwor said:

The two aren't mutually exclusive. I don't think Rex is in the head of the Pats in the sense that they fear him. I do think the Pats were hoping to put an exclamation point on the win and did not execute. The Bills got lucky on the strip sack and again on the incompletion on 4-1, the Pats got lucky on the interception to end the contest.

Click to expand...

Thanks you articulated this much better than I did. Obviously they don't fear him but his blabbing had them making decisions based on emotions rather than logic.

He's not in their heads - they just wanted to stick it to him. Luckily it all worked out and we are on to Jacksonville!

The Brandon Five said:

Isn't it possible to let the play clock run down and still try to get the first down? Can't you pass the ball with the play clock running out?

Click to expand...

Sure, but does that mean you have to let it run down to 1 second every single time? Once the clock runs down to within 5 seconds, the DL can start to pin their ears back and rush the passer, especially if they know you're going to wait until 1 second left. Keep them on their heels by being unpredictable.

There's also a chance that rushing a defense will force them into mistakes in coverage. We've seen that several times each week so far, and if they are off-balance, take advantage of it even if there's 30 seconds on the clock.

Getting up to the line early gives Brady extra time to survey the field and make any changes. Maybe he lines up, absolutely LOVES the play call against the defense. Does he wait 18 seconds and force his guys not to twitch, risk a false start penalty that stops the clock, or does he just go?

I don't know what Brady is thinking at the line and what he sees, but throughout his career, he's been one of the best at managing the clock. If he felt he should snap early, I trust he saw something that made him do it. Maybe there was confusion that he wanted to take advantage of. Maybe he loved the situation and didn't want Buffalo to switch out.

I don't think he forgot about the game situation and rushed to try and pad stats. I trust in his judgment.

Rob0729 said:

466 yards, 3TDs, 0INTs. Statistically the second best game of Brady's career. Rex has Brady seeing ghosts.

Click to expand...

I think Rex Ryan is seeing GOATs.

RelocatedPatFan said:

I saw it more as stick to the plan and give opponents more to think about when facing the Patriots. they'll have to practice stopping those 4th and shorts outside of goal line stands.

Click to expand...

This.

This reminds me of the run the Patriots had in 2007. Beginning of the year they were accused of running up the score. I can't remember which game it was in the second half of the year, but the Patriots were up big like 28 points. With about 3-4 minutes left Belichick called three runs right up the middle. 4th down New England punts. The other team then proceeded to move the ball down the field, using timeouts throwing every down and they finally score.
New England gets the ball back and Belichick airs it out, three deep bombs and they score. I think that was the game where Belichick thought to himself, "I try to play nice and they still want to screw with me? The hell with it!"

If Rex were in the Patriots head they would have run the clock down. The fact that they continued throwing showed that they thought they had that defense where they wanted them. They were throwing because they want to run up the score. If anyone is in anyone's head, Brady is in Rex's.

ausbacker said:

The fourth quarter had little to do with the Bills and all to do with the Patriots. They went conservative on D and probably didn't play as intelligently as they should have on O. That's nothing to do with Rex and all to do with their own approach.

Click to expand...

according to ninkovich, the D got too aggressive in the fourth quarter, not too conservative:

http://www.csnne.com/new-england-patriots/once-new-england-patriots-adjusted-buffal-was-deflated

It wasn’t an off-the-edge takedown but rather a game of cat-and-mouse that Ninkovich won. Moving upfield to meet the pass-blocking right tackle, Ninkovich stopped and kept the tackle at arm’s length, peeking at Taylor while he did. Taylor tried to go inside on a scramble. Ninkovich hedged that way. Taylor sprinted for the sideline, Ninkovich disengaged completely and chased Taylor out along the Bills sideline.

It was the first of eight sacks the Patriots rolled up against Taylor.

“On those plays, I’m making sure the quarterback doesn’t get out of the pocket and I think towards the end of the game we started to get a little more aggressive and that’s when some of those big plays (by the Bills in the fourth quarter when they scored three straight touchdowns) happened,” said Ninkovich. “The best way to prevent those big plays is to keep that guy in the pocket and let him throw from the pocket. The big plays all came out of the pocket. Scramble plays. When you pin your ears back, so to speak, that’s when those big plays can happen. In the first 40 minutes of the game we did a good job of keeping him in the pocket. When he got out, that’s when it was a problem.”

Click to expand...

I don't think the missed bomb to Edelman was the called play on fourth and one. I thought I heard Brady say it was a play to Lewis that got broken up so he heaved it to Edelman.

They never ran up the score in 2007. It was just dumb sh*t reporters.

If it's 4th and 3 on your 15 yard line with 5 minutes to go why would you kick a FG? You don't need the points, its damn near automatic. Where converting is a much lower percentage play, plus it uses clock (which when the clock runs out you can't score more).

They gave the other team a shot to keep them from scoring, they use clock, if they don't convert the team needs to use more field and use more clock.

Kick and you get three points, then the opposition throws 4 quick passes, burn a minute and your back where you started. Unless you want to get 3-4 more field goals (scoring even more) the last 5 minutes you go for it on fourth.