My Thoughts From Today

[Uncle Rico]

... The Hernandez catch where they all followed Moss. What's the twist once teams see that on film? ...

I think the twist will be other teams wondering how the heck they're supposed to cover all those guys AND double on Moss.

 

[patchick]

Special Teams:
Anytime you make your team faster and more athletic, you are going to see a significant return on your special teams. They were covering exceptionally well, they were blocking exceptionally well, and obviously Tate is legit.

Let's also give a nod to Tracy White, who was part of every ST grouping. That's looking like a nifty pickup.

Here are some numbers that really leap out at me from the game:

0 fumbles
0 interceptions
0 sacks allowed
0 serious injuries
1 punt
11 first & second-year players seeing very significant snaps

Great stuff.

 

[Deus Irae]

I don't want to pee in the Cheerios, Jay, especially because I wasn't able to watch the game as closely as I'd have liked (was working at the same time), but I saw a couple of things that I'd like your take on. If you saw it differently than I did, I'd love to know it.


1) They seemed to be giving Connolly a lot of help early on, which will be tougher to do against teams like the Jets and Ravens.

2.) The ends didn't really hold up against the run. There was a lot of blitzing, which helped with the numbers and covered for their struggles. This became more obvious in the second half, when the Patriots pulled back on the blitzing a bit in favor of clock killing, and the Bengals were able to rip off some nice runs.

Jay, as a follow up to this, please don't worry about point 1. Bruschi's post-game observations verified what I thought I'd seen, at least with regards to Koppen helping Connolly.

 

[Kontradiction]

Jay, as a follow up to this, please don't worry about point 1. Bruschi's post-game observations verified what I thought I'd seen, at least with regards to Koppen helping Connolly.

Since Jay isn't always on here, I'll help out with what I saw. I don't think you were seeing things on the second point. I saw it too. Our DE's were getting pushed off the ball on runs up the B-Gap and were getting sealed with relative ease on outside runs. I'm sure Jay can elaborate more on that than I can, but that's just what I saw.

 

[kkpat]

One thing I noticed in the game was even with huge leade 31-3, we could not pound the ball and get a couple of first downs to take time off the clock in 3rd quarter. It is all on Brady to get the first down. This was a big problem for us last couple of years. When we really need to get a first down, we have to rely on Brady that makes the opponent "D" to key on Brady and not respect our run game even with the huge lead. If any one watched Colts-Texans game, you might have seen how Texans pounded, pounded and pounded Colts in 3rd and 4th Quarters until it broke the Colts.

 

[Sicilian]

One thing I noticed in the game was even with huge leade 31-3, we could not pound the ball and get a couple of first downs to take time off the clock in 3rd quarter. It is all on Brady to get the first down. This was a big problem for us last couple of years. When we really need to get a first down, we have to rely on Brady that makes the opponent "D" to key on Brady and not respect our run game even with the huge lead. If any one watched Colts-Texans game, you might have seen how Texans pounded, pounded and pounded Colts in 3rd and 4th Quarters until it broke the Colts.

That was the only drive where that happened though. We're not going to go a whole season, regardless of situation, without having to punt, it's just not going to happen. The offense followed up that drive with a long TD drive, then ended the game (essentially) with another long drive that left the Bengals inside their own 10.

I'll take 2/3 drives long drives in the 2nd half as effective clock killing every week.

 

[kkpat]

That was the only drive where that happened though. We're not going to go a whole season, regardless of situation, without having to punt, it's just not going to happen. The offense followed up that drive with a long TD drive, then ended the game (essentially) with another long drive that left the Bengals inside their own 10.

I'll take 2/3 drives long drives in the 2nd half as effective clock killing every week.

I did not say we should not punt. We just have to get a couple of first downs and not go 3 and out and take some time off the clock. At one point in 3Q, Bengals had 24 plays vs our 3 plays. I thought that was problem why we lost to Colts in the last few years. We also lost games while leading in 4th Q last year.

 

[Patspsycho]

Sure am man. Save for a few minor adjustments, it seemed pretty clear that they knew the lead was enough to conserve tape. There's no doubt in my mind that BB thinks that this is his hand picked group (save for the DL).

This is the same thing I am seeing in the 2nd half. They dialed down the pre-snap/post-snap mixed looks and changing alignments. Not so much rushing or blitzing. Straight up zone or man.

Long-term thinking here. Already planning for next Sunday.

 

[Sicilian]

I did not say we should not punt. We just have to get a couple of first downs and not go 3 and out and take some time off the clock. At one point in 3Q, Bengals had 24 plays vs our 3 plays. I thought that was problem why we lost to Colts in the last few years. We also lost games while leading in 4th Q last year.

But again, that's going to happen, to EVERY offense in the history of the league. It happened to the Saints last year, the Colts last year, the Pats in 2007, it just happens. It's football.

You might as well say, "Tom Brady had a good game, if only he could do away with those pesky incompletions... they don't result in any yards!"

Every other drive in that half was incredibly effective. Where we had problems last year was when poor drives were happening multiple times in the 2nd half.

 

[Patspsycho]

But again, that's going to happen, to EVERY offense in the history of the league. It happened to the Saints last year, the Colts last year, the Pats in 2007, it just happens. It's football.

You might as well say, "Tom Brady had a good game, if only he could do away with those pesky incompletions... they don't result in any yards!"

Every other drive in that half was incredibly effective. Where we had problems last year was when poor drives were happening multiple times in the 2nd half.

I did notice that Brady still tunnel-visions. This is a problem that is a carryover from last year. He tunnel-visioned on Welker and Faulk on 3rd downs.