McCourty Sophomore Struggles

[crowell33]

New England Patriots Blog - ESPN Boston

Reiss listed McCourty as one of the three negative players from the Dolphin game as well, after week one.

 

[patsfaninpa]

New England Patriots Blog - ESPN Boston

Reiss listed McCourty as one of the three negative players from the Dolphin game as well, after week one.

He did not have a bad game. Wouldn't call it a good one. Jackson looked like Jerry Rice tonight. He had him covered pretty good on some of those plays. He isn't struggling. Nobody could have prevented Vincent Jackson from making those catches.

 

[Kid~Brady]

I think McCourty jinxed himself being so good his rookie year. Now everyone thinks the guy can't make mistakes and this is ONLY his second year lol.

Aside from that, week 1 he defended Brandon Marshall and week 2 he had to deal with V. Jax. These are really tough match ups for any corner and he has a lot on his shoulders.

 

[condon84]

He did not have a bad game. Wouldn't call it a good one. Jackson looked like Jerry Rice tonight. He had him covered pretty good on some of those plays. He isn't struggling. Nobody could have prevented Vincent Jackson from making those catches.

 

[Timbo717]

He did not have a bad game. Wouldn't call it a good one. Jackson looked like Jerry Rice tonight. He had him covered pretty good on some of those plays. He isn't struggling. Nobody could have prevented Vincent Jackson from making those catches.

I'm going to cut him a little bit of slack too, at least at this point. Obviously there were plays where you can say that he could have done "X" better and there are some plays where Jackson made legit, superstar plays. Same thing with B-Marshall in week one. But it also isn't like he is the only one getting burned by the other team's QBs.

There will be more criticism of him from the media I'm sure, so it'll be interesting to see how the young Captain responds to it, both vocally and on the field.

 

[borg]

He's getting beat by superior athletes. What are you going to do. In practice, he matches up vs our quick little guys. In 2010, he had a preseason of covering Moss plus a few games before the trade. Not now....smurf city.

 

[jbb9s]

he has had some tough matchups thru 2 weeks. that being said, if he is a top 3 or 4 DB in the AFC like his pro bowl would suggest, then covering a few top 10 receivers effectively isn't outrageous to ask.

 

[Sciz]

Covering guys that are 5 inches taller than you is one thing. Trying to jam those same guys who are also 30 pounds heavier is another. Trying to do that without decent safety help is hopeless, and we've seen that.

 

[boston22407]

Lets give it a few weeks boys,He only went vs two of the best Wide-outs in the NFL

 

[Brady_to_Moss]

He was so-so today..nothing terrible..did have that nice PD

 

[Rob0729]

McCourty wasn't nearly as bad as people are making it. He had great coverage on some of catches he gave up, but rivers made good throws and the receivers made great plays.

I still blame the pressure for a lot of the problems with the secondary. On that TD pass that McCourty gave up in the back of the endzone was clearly the lack of a pass rush fault because there is only so long you can cover guy in the endzone.

 

[PATSYLICIOUS]

He's had 2 pretty bad games and struggled in the preseason as well but it's still early. The guy is too good to continue getting beat like that. Hopefully he'll draw some easier assignments next few weeks and slowly regain that confidence.

 

[Brady_to_Moss]

He's had 2 pretty bad games and struggled in the preseason as well but it's still early. The guy is too good to continue getting beat like that. Hopefully he'll draw some easier assignments next few weeks and slowly regain that confidence.

He's got johnson next week...deff not an easy task..guy is very fast

 

[ay-yo]

1. V Jax had some catches against our other corners.
2. McCourty is getting no safety help.
3. While the pass rush is improved it's only average (+ / -) IMO.
4. Game plans. Last week was to stop Bush. This week to stop run/Gates.

McCourty's struggles are vastly over stated.

 

[Patspsycho]

Without having watched tonight's game again, I really don't think that it's so much him having a sophomore slump as it is having no competent safety help over the top. Even Revis gets help over the top. Nobody, and I mean nobody is going to win 100% of any man to man battle.

For instance, the 26 yard one hand catch by Jackson- McCourty is in trail tech and Barrett is the single high safety and Arrington is the NB, and you can watch this highlight on NFL.com (if you can tolerate the 30 seconds ad every other freaking highlight) or on TV. What you'll see is Arrington cradling his arm for a hopeful INT., instead of delivering a massive hit on Jackson, and Barrett is very late to the play. That's been symptomatic of the safeties situation- and McCourty being "abused" is, I think, more of a byproduct of the opposing OC recognizing that he is not getting competent help over the top. Also two straight games against pro-bowl caliber WRs are not helping him.

 

[WhiZa]

So he's not a shutdown corner. I suppose it could be worse. One thing is for sure that he is one of the hardest working players on that defense. Now many #1 CBs lead the team in tackles on a regular basis?

 

[PATSYLICIOUS]

He's got johnson next week...deff not an easy task..guy is very fast

Most #1 WR's are a tough task, but next week maybe a better matchup for Devin. Johnson's not as big as Marshall/Jackson.

 

[LuthierJr]

The first TD to VJack was partly a pass rush and party D-Mac's doing. Rivers had a long time to find someone, and D-Mac, after good initial coverage, lost track of him.

The long TD was just all VJack. McCourty was right there but the ball was extended far out and the guy makes an amazing one handed catch. Not many, if any, DB's are covering that pass. That was as much Arringtons fault there because he shouldn't have just sat there waiting to catch it but went for the ball. Had he done that it would have been a int. or a breakup.

That being said McCourty still got threw on more than you would like to see, but his coverage was much tighter this week than it was last week. He's better in press zone style of coverage and is getting better at the man. Plus give VJack his dues. The guy is a huge talented receiver. He is going to make his catches on almost any corner except for guys like Revis.

 

[patsfan-1982]

theres really no way of sugar coating it McCourty has sucked the first two games of the season but so has the rest of the pats pass defense, the LB's cant cover and they have the worst Safety's in the NFL and all of the corners can't hang with the NFL's top WR's but Bottom line is they are 2-0 not 0-2 and as long as Tom Brady gets time to throw the ball no one is going to stop him

 

[ausbacker]

theres really no way of sugar coating it McCourty has sucked the first two games of the season but so has the rest of the pats pass defense, the LB's cant cover and they have the worst Safety's in the NFL and all of the corners can't hang with the NFL's top WR's but Bottom line is they are 2-0 not 0-2 and as long as Tom Brady gets time to throw the ball no one is going to stop him

He's losing position on the receiver and losing the ball in flight from what I've observed. He's making some nice plays and making some bone head ones too.

Wouldn't mind getting some Revis attention for Bodden though. Apparently touching a receiver is holding or PI for everyone not on the Jets.