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Lots of thoughts on this game. I can't even decide if its a good idea for them to win. Now I know that sounds crazy, but I have it in the back of my head how often the team that wins the regular season game loses to that team in the playoffs. (most notable examples of this on the positive side were the Rams in 2001, and the on the negative side, the Giants in 2007. but there are many other examples as well with other teams.)
But then when you consider the playoff seed and bye considerations, plus the possible effects of my emotional well being, and the prospect of hearing the unending ball washing of Peyton Manning if the Pats lose, not to mention the hellish schedule we have in the next 5 weeks; it probably would be a good idea if they win on Sunday.......at least for the short term.
There are lots of things to speculate about on the strategic side of this game. Good discussion points that have no correct answers, but lots of different thoughts. It could be just like it is whenever you have to game plan a game after your last one. The only differences between the Pats and every other HS and college football team are the resources and the amount of detailed information the staff have upon which to make their decisions.
I'm pretty sure when the coordinators sit down for their FIRST 6 am meeting on Denver, they will find statistics of every play the Bronco's executed this season. Using whatever system they have, they will have broken down this raw material in any tendencies or patterns. That includes breaking down the multitude of formation into the kinds of plays that are run from this formation or that one, and down and distance tendencies., What the types of routes run, etc, etc. Not only that by the time players start to arrive on Monday, they would have found a disc of all the plays run by the players they are likely to play against that week so they can study at home.
In the meetings they will look for and TRY to find the very subtle indicators that can tell a DLman if the play is a pass or run, or whether a lineman is getting ready to pull, or for a WR, does he tip off when he is ready to make his break on a route. They look for anything that might give them some pre-knowledge.
All that info has been comprised by the dark minions behind the scenes before at FIRST meeting on Monday. Just think about the work necessary to make that happen in such a short time.
You also have to consider that this isn't BB's first go around. They will have gone back and looked at every game he's ever played vs Peyton (probably during the off season) and charted the inevitable tendencies he's shown over the years. They will have gone over how Fox likes to run his defenses against offense like the Pats. So probably on a very basic level they already had a skeleton of a game plan for what they wanted to do against Denver before the season even began. Now its just a matter of seeing what might be new and confirming what past info still applies. What injuries have created new match ups, how they rotate players, and if there are any anomalies that break past tendencies.
As you can see i'ts a MASSIVE amount of potential data, enough to easily create paralysis by analysis if you aren't careful. What makes a great game plan coach is his ability to distill all this data to find the key elements of your opponent and create a game plan that can be implemented in just a few days, yet has the flexibility to adjust if/when you discover that you were wrong about somethings (remember they are paying a lot of guys a lot of money on the other side too. )
I write this just so some of you can understand what a difficult and daunting task it is to prepare for each game given how MUCH information there is and what a short time you have to distill it. Now for the speculations
1. This is how I expect Denver play the Pat's offense:
a. I think they don't want to blitz much since they already have at least 3 top end rushers on their DL. So the Pats will see mostly 4 man rushes.
b. If I were their DC, I'd match Talib up with LaFell and take him out of the game. Its a good match up for Talib which will probably work.
c. I'd take their LB, Marshall (who has a great story, btw) and with Ward try and take Gronk out of the game by being extremely physical and constantly doubled
d. I would trust in my front 7 to stop the run, and force Brady to win a shoot out throwing to Edelman and Amendola
2. How the Pats might respond ( because we ARE speculating)
a. Putting Gronk in motion to free up his release. Or split him outside more to give him more room to release (this also has the side benefit of taking a LB and a S out of run Defense)
b. More routes for Vareen and the other RB's, especially screens.
c. Tim Wright. I'm not sure where he is in his development within this offense, but this would be a great time to see him as a focus, because if he is what we hope he is, he is the one guy who would present a bad match up for Denver when on the field the same time as Gronk
d. We HAVE go be able to run the ball. Right now if I'm the DC, I'm telling my guys to ignore play action (PA) unless or until the Pats have some success in the run game. BTW, it doesn't have be spectacular success, but enough to gain 100 yds on the ground and get those move the chains type plays.
3. How I see the Pats defending the Bronco's offense.
a. Its a daunting task, and any number under 31 would be HUGE.
b. I'd go into this game differently than the past. Historically the Pats have rarely blitzed Manning, and mostly tried to use trap zones against him
c. Making Manning uncomfortable in the pocket is paramount. It;s not an easy thing to do with a good OL and no great individual rushers....but it can be done.....schematically at least. What you can do to create questions is to zone or overload blitz. In that way you can still rush only 4 or 5 players but still create some match up problems for the Bronco's pass defense. Make them waste blockers on players who will be in coverage. What I don't want to see is a standard 4 man rush with occasional twists between the DE and DT.
d. If you can make Manning release the ball quickly, you can narrow the areas of the field that have, to be covered.
e. Show Manning what he expects to see, then give him something else. Look like man, but be in a match up zone. No ONE scheme will work
f. Like Brady, the defense KNOWS where Manning will be and that's one of the few advantage they have. So pressure up the middle is the key. With Manning sacks aren't the goal. Seattle sacked Manning only ONCE in the super bowl. Make him move his feet. Make him go to his first look and most importantly KNOW what that look is likely to be.
g. In man, I'd have Revis on DThomas, Browner on the TE, and Dennard on Sanders, and Arrington on Welker and McCourty playing single high S. On EVERY play I'd align as if we were in this kind of coverage I was in, including moving with a motion man. However there would be a healthy percentage of time where this alignment would morph into a 4 or 5 under match up zone, so When Manning goes to is short crosses and pick plays, he will end up throwing into the strength of the defense.
h. In a game where you want to keep the Denver offense on the sidelines, the question arises how much up tempo offense do you use? Its one of the things the Pats do very well, yet this week it might be counter productive. It will be interesting to see how the Pats play it.
OK that's my plan on these areas' What's yours.
General notes:
1. This could be the premier game of the NFL's regular season. 2 Great teams, 2 great QB, 2 great histories, both with good records. A meaningful game with tons of playoff implications. Yet in its Omnipotent wisdom the NFL assigns Walt Anderson's team to game. So ultimately this game will NOT be about the Broncos or the Pats, but about the OFFICIALS.
Anderson's team is among the leaders in almost every category of penalties and leads in several. If I were a conspiracy nut, I'd think Peyton personally demanded Anderson work this game. For him, he's ideal.
2. In the same vein, the mediots should start to get that there hasn't been a decline in Revis' game. The difference in EVERY CB's production is they aren't playing the same game they did when Revis Island was created. Last week THREE QB''s threw for over 400 yds. It never happened before.
3. I like that it will be under 40 for the game, but really I doubt it will be much of a factor. HOWEVER, if the WIND winds up being a factor, it will be a big advantage to the Pats, because Manning's passing game is affect by the wind to a much greater degree that Brady.
4. Crowd noise is going to be critical. Its a huge advantage to home team.
5. Lots of words, lots of thoughts. Some provocative, some not so much, but in the end, like most games the game will likely be won or lost by who wins the TO battle, who gets the lucky bounces, and who gets the critical call.
But then when you consider the playoff seed and bye considerations, plus the possible effects of my emotional well being, and the prospect of hearing the unending ball washing of Peyton Manning if the Pats lose, not to mention the hellish schedule we have in the next 5 weeks; it probably would be a good idea if they win on Sunday.......at least for the short term.
There are lots of things to speculate about on the strategic side of this game. Good discussion points that have no correct answers, but lots of different thoughts. It could be just like it is whenever you have to game plan a game after your last one. The only differences between the Pats and every other HS and college football team are the resources and the amount of detailed information the staff have upon which to make their decisions.
I'm pretty sure when the coordinators sit down for their FIRST 6 am meeting on Denver, they will find statistics of every play the Bronco's executed this season. Using whatever system they have, they will have broken down this raw material in any tendencies or patterns. That includes breaking down the multitude of formation into the kinds of plays that are run from this formation or that one, and down and distance tendencies., What the types of routes run, etc, etc. Not only that by the time players start to arrive on Monday, they would have found a disc of all the plays run by the players they are likely to play against that week so they can study at home.
In the meetings they will look for and TRY to find the very subtle indicators that can tell a DLman if the play is a pass or run, or whether a lineman is getting ready to pull, or for a WR, does he tip off when he is ready to make his break on a route. They look for anything that might give them some pre-knowledge.
All that info has been comprised by the dark minions behind the scenes before at FIRST meeting on Monday. Just think about the work necessary to make that happen in such a short time.
You also have to consider that this isn't BB's first go around. They will have gone back and looked at every game he's ever played vs Peyton (probably during the off season) and charted the inevitable tendencies he's shown over the years. They will have gone over how Fox likes to run his defenses against offense like the Pats. So probably on a very basic level they already had a skeleton of a game plan for what they wanted to do against Denver before the season even began. Now its just a matter of seeing what might be new and confirming what past info still applies. What injuries have created new match ups, how they rotate players, and if there are any anomalies that break past tendencies.
As you can see i'ts a MASSIVE amount of potential data, enough to easily create paralysis by analysis if you aren't careful. What makes a great game plan coach is his ability to distill all this data to find the key elements of your opponent and create a game plan that can be implemented in just a few days, yet has the flexibility to adjust if/when you discover that you were wrong about somethings (remember they are paying a lot of guys a lot of money on the other side too.
)I write this just so some of you can understand what a difficult and daunting task it is to prepare for each game given how MUCH information there is and what a short time you have to distill it. Now for the speculations
1. This is how I expect Denver play the Pat's offense:
a. I think they don't want to blitz much since they already have at least 3 top end rushers on their DL. So the Pats will see mostly 4 man rushes.
b. If I were their DC, I'd match Talib up with LaFell and take him out of the game. Its a good match up for Talib which will probably work.
c. I'd take their LB, Marshall (who has a great story, btw) and with Ward try and take Gronk out of the game by being extremely physical and constantly doubled
d. I would trust in my front 7 to stop the run, and force Brady to win a shoot out throwing to Edelman and Amendola
2. How the Pats might respond ( because we ARE speculating)
a. Putting Gronk in motion to free up his release. Or split him outside more to give him more room to release (this also has the side benefit of taking a LB and a S out of run Defense)
b. More routes for Vareen and the other RB's, especially screens.
c. Tim Wright. I'm not sure where he is in his development within this offense, but this would be a great time to see him as a focus, because if he is what we hope he is, he is the one guy who would present a bad match up for Denver when on the field the same time as Gronk
d. We HAVE go be able to run the ball. Right now if I'm the DC, I'm telling my guys to ignore play action (PA) unless or until the Pats have some success in the run game. BTW, it doesn't have be spectacular success, but enough to gain 100 yds on the ground and get those move the chains type plays.
3. How I see the Pats defending the Bronco's offense.
a. Its a daunting task, and any number under 31 would be HUGE.
b. I'd go into this game differently than the past. Historically the Pats have rarely blitzed Manning, and mostly tried to use trap zones against him
c. Making Manning uncomfortable in the pocket is paramount. It;s not an easy thing to do with a good OL and no great individual rushers....but it can be done.....schematically at least. What you can do to create questions is to zone or overload blitz. In that way you can still rush only 4 or 5 players but still create some match up problems for the Bronco's pass defense. Make them waste blockers on players who will be in coverage. What I don't want to see is a standard 4 man rush with occasional twists between the DE and DT.
d. If you can make Manning release the ball quickly, you can narrow the areas of the field that have, to be covered.
e. Show Manning what he expects to see, then give him something else. Look like man, but be in a match up zone. No ONE scheme will work
f. Like Brady, the defense KNOWS where Manning will be and that's one of the few advantage they have. So pressure up the middle is the key. With Manning sacks aren't the goal. Seattle sacked Manning only ONCE in the super bowl. Make him move his feet. Make him go to his first look and most importantly KNOW what that look is likely to be.
g. In man, I'd have Revis on DThomas, Browner on the TE, and Dennard on Sanders, and Arrington on Welker and McCourty playing single high S. On EVERY play I'd align as if we were in this kind of coverage I was in, including moving with a motion man. However there would be a healthy percentage of time where this alignment would morph into a 4 or 5 under match up zone, so When Manning goes to is short crosses and pick plays, he will end up throwing into the strength of the defense.
h. In a game where you want to keep the Denver offense on the sidelines, the question arises how much up tempo offense do you use? Its one of the things the Pats do very well, yet this week it might be counter productive. It will be interesting to see how the Pats play it.
OK that's my plan on these areas' What's yours.
General notes:
1. This could be the premier game of the NFL's regular season. 2 Great teams, 2 great QB, 2 great histories, both with good records. A meaningful game with tons of playoff implications. Yet in its Omnipotent wisdom the NFL assigns Walt Anderson's team to game.
So ultimately this game will NOT be about the Broncos or the Pats, but about the OFFICIALS. Anderson's team is among the leaders in almost every category of penalties and leads in several. If I were a conspiracy nut, I'd think Peyton personally demanded Anderson work this game. For him, he's ideal.
2. In the same vein, the mediots should start to get that there hasn't been a decline in Revis' game. The difference in EVERY CB's production is they aren't playing the same game they did when Revis Island was created. Last week THREE QB''s threw for over 400 yds. It never happened before.
3. I like that it will be under 40 for the game, but really I doubt it will be much of a factor. HOWEVER, if the WIND winds up being a factor, it will be a big advantage to the Pats, because Manning's passing game is affect by the wind to a much greater degree that Brady.
4. Crowd noise is going to be critical. Its a huge advantage to home team.
5. Lots of words, lots of thoughts. Some provocative, some not so much, but in the end, like most games the game will likely be won or lost by who wins the TO battle, who gets the lucky bounces, and who gets the critical call.
