"10 Things We Learned" from last night's game

[Christopher_Price]

No player availability today — and none until Thursday, by the sound of things. But we’ve already delivered the transcript of Bill Belichick’s Q&A with the media today. In addition, here’s my weekly “10 Things We Learned…” column from last night’s Patriots-Giants game.

More...

 

[cstjohn17]

I guess I will be a scrooge, but #3 and #6 are questionable.

#3 For the New England offensive line to hold the Giants’ defense to just one sack — without the starting right guard Stephen Neal and starting right tackle Nick Kaczur — was impressive.

They were horrid for most of the night, Light was dominated and Hochstein looked plain lost. Brady may not have been sacked but he was hammered and constantly forced to make quick throws. The running game was effective enough, when Maroney got a hole he looked really good. But several times going against a light box (6 men) the O Line could not move the line of scrimmage. Watson helped with some of his chip blocks but when asked to lineup in-line he was destroyed. Mankins was the only saving grace, guards don't get their due but look at the last Maroney TD, he pushed his man all the way to the other side of the formation.

6. New England’s red-zone defense still isn’t where they want it to be.

Not just red-zone, overall defense has to improve. Eli fricking Manning looked damn good against them. He carved them up in the two minute drill. Some way or how they also must learn to cover a TE and tackle.



A top 10 list is nice, but really it starts and ends with Brady being the best clutch performer in Boston sports history.

 

[DaBruinz]

I guess I will be a scrooge, but #3 and #6 are questionable.

#3 For the New England offensive line to hold the Giants’ defense to just one sack — without the starting right guard Stephen Neal and starting right tackle Nick Kaczur — was impressive.

They were horrid for most of the night, Light was dominated and Hochstein looked plain lost. Brady may not have been sacked but he was hammered and constantly forced to make quick throws. The running game was effective enough, when Maroney got a hole he looked really good. But several times going against a light box (6 men) the O Line could not move the line of scrimmage. Watson helped with some of his chip blocks but when asked to lineup in-line he was destroyed. Mankins was the only saving grace, guards don't get their due but look at the last Maroney TD, he pushed his man all the way to the other side of the formation.

6. New England’s red-zone defense still isn’t where they want it to be.

Not just red-zone, overall defense has to improve. Eli fricking Manning looked damn good against them. He carved them up in the two minute drill. Some way or how they also must learn to cover a TE and tackle.



A top 10 list is nice, but really it starts and ends with Brady being the best clutch performer in Boston sports history.

I think that #3 and #6 were dead on.

#3 - When you consider that they were playing WITHOUT Neal, Kaczur, and Kyle Brady, the O-line did a fantastic job or not letting Brady get sacked. The run blocking stunk to high heaven, but they got it done in the clutch situations.

#6 - I have to agree here also. The Red Zone defense needs to get better and should with the extra week. Seymour will be that much farther along to being back in the groove. And the Pats will be able to work things better.

 

[DefenseRules]

I was concerned about the defense until I read several reports that stated time and again that the Pat's D showed nothing. They stayed in their base Defense the entire game last night and last week.

I think that we will show much more in the playoffs. These guys are more than capable of playing better than they did last night. I am confident that BB will have these guys ready for the playoffs. The best is yet to come, IMO.

 

[rabthepat]

11. The Patriots are now a "STAR" dependent team. - I am not complaining so just hear me out. The Pats are now extremely dependent on Randy Moss. We are like the Chargers with LT, Dallas with TO, Panthers with Smith, Minnesota with Peterson and etc. Other than Tom, we used to be a team driven team. We could plug and play players. With out Moss, I think we would be 12-4 and not favored to win the SB the way we are.

 

[Scooter_McGruder]

11. The Patriots are now a "STAR" dependent team. - I am not complaining so just hear me out. The Pats are now extremely dependent on Randy Moss. We are like the Chargers with LT, Dallas with TO, Panthers with Smith, Minnesota with Peterson and etc. Other than Tom, we used to be a team driven team. We could plug and play players. With out Moss, I think we would be 12-4 and not favored to win the SB the way we are.

As others have said, that's gonna go away now that the record chase is over. Even last night they didn't force anything to Moss. I think the Pats are more than capable of winning with Welker as their primary option if Moss is being blanketed. But we are "star-driven" in the way that Moss makes the offense go by drawing double coverage when not making big plays.

 

[NEPatriot]

I

Not just red-zone, overall defense has to improve. Eli fricking Manning looked damn good against them. He carved them up in the two minute drill. Some way or how they also must learn to cover a TE and tackle.

i have to agree. I could not believe that we allowed ELi and his QB to do whatever they wanted in the first half.

i seriously hope that we are going to fix all the problems in the next 2 weeks before entering playoff games. I hope pats will do that with 1 extra week to rest and train hard.

pats needs to look forward because we are finished if we don't play well offensively and defensively.

 

[FrontSeven]

11. The Patriots are now a "STAR" dependent team. - I am not complaining so just hear me out. The Pats are now extremely dependent on Randy Moss. We are like the Chargers with LT, Dallas with TO, Panthers with Smith, Minnesota with Peterson and etc. Other than Tom, we used to be a team driven team. We could plug and play players. With out Moss, I think we would be 12-4 and not favored to win the SB the way we are.

The Pats have proven that they find other ways to win over the years. Just because you suddenly get rich, but loved having been poor, doesn't mean you have to go back to acting poor. You change with the conditions. If they had to go back to days without Moss, they would do it and be very effective.