OK, enough of all this happiness. We've forgotten some absolute TRUTHS.

[JackBauer]

Well, while the Jets shouldn't be a team exposing the Patriots pass defense, it could expose the run defense if the Patriots don't get an early lead.

Shonn Green doesn't scare me as much as Benson, and Braylon Edwards and Jerricho Cotchery don't scare me nearly as much as Ohco/TO.

I mean, it's the NFL and anything could happen, of course. But I think the run defense will be a bit better than anticipated this season.

 

[Deus Irae]

One question that does seem answered for me is that spending $8 mil a year on Mankins would be a waste. Much better bang for the buck elsewhere IMO.

The devil is usually in the details but, unless Kraft is lying/wrong, the Patriots don't seem to agree with you:

“I’'ll just say this. We did make offers, and we don’t normally do this, but I want our fan base to be focusing on our team, not on misreports, misperceptions that are put out there. We made an offer that would allow him to be paid very well, like a Pro Bowl guard, I'm not sure his people felt it was appropriate. I know it was comparable with Nick Mangold’s salary.

Mangold's deal is reportedly right around $8 million a year, coming in at 7 years, $55 million.

 

[Rob0729]

Somehow, if this ever happens, I doubt it will be against the Jets. Especially the Jets sans Santonio Holmes.

I actually think the defense will look spectacular vs. the Jets. Just a hypothetical. It could be vs. the Dolphins or the Vikes or the Chargers or whoever. My point was just that with a young inexperienced defense, there is bound to be a game where they play down to what a lot of the doom and gloomers expected to be before the season started. I hope I am wrong, but I am expecting a roller coaster this year. Hopefully it is a kiddie rollercoasters (where there isn't much difference between the highest peak and lowest valley because yesterday was a pretty good start).

 

[blackglass3]

What I found shocking, and maybe it was just because of the years of our older D, but the D yesterday just struck me as FAST. For the first half they were flying around the field. It was really great to see.

 

[Kontradiction]

Shonn Green doesn't scare me as much as Benson, and Braylon Edwards and Jerricho Cotchery don't scare me nearly as much as Ohco/TO.

I mean, it's the NFL and anything could happen, of course. But I think the run defense will be a bit better than anticipated this season.

I'll worry about Shonn Greene if he doesn't knock himself out of the game tonight against the Ravennes and is forced to miss a couple of weeks. If he doesn't, he's most definitely a threat.

 

[WelshPat]

Umm... Crumpler is still fat and slow, but he's a pretty good player!

I would take him over Ben Watson, and he looks like superman

 

[Garbanza]

I will not get carried away by one impressive win - (regardless of the score...which was closer than the game really was). However, I have never been so happy to be so wrong in my life. Although it was just one game, the Pats pressured the QB! Happy, happy, happiness! Holy Cow and all that jazz. The corner's weren't bad. Chung, Merriweather, Mayo - good, good, and good. Yes!

 

[51Hits]

Overreacting based upon one win is no better than overreacting based upon one loss.

Ding ding ding. People saying pesimists are annoying crack me up. They crack me up because most of the time they're the kind of crowd that instead of acting irkd after a loss, they act like this team clinches a SB berth every regular season win.

Nice W, glad to have it. But I can't get over how people feel "OK" about the defense.

 

[MassPats38]

I expected the D to make a few stops and the offense to carry the game. The team as a whole looked fired up, gang tackling on special teams and defense. The Pats haven't looked that way in some time. Awesome game to watch.

If the defense looks like that against the Jets in NY, then this was not simply a case of taking the Bengals by surprise through better coaching and a lack of film from prior games (or the other possibility - that the Bengals are the same team that crapped out at the end of last season rather than the team that showed up at the beginning of last season). I still believe there will be plenty of mistakes in growing the defense, but by mid-season the defense should start showing its true identity consistently. With the younger players, I hope everyone can stay on the field with less of the patchwork defenses inevitably resulting from the use of veteran players.

 

[PowerRunRevival]

Overreacting based upon one win is no better than overreacting based upon one loss.

Overreacting based upon one win is an overreaction that brings about happiness, while overreacting to a loss brings about depression.

I would saying being happy is better than being depressed, so I would say overreacting based upon one win is infinitely better.

 

[Patriot Missile]

Ding ding ding. People saying pesimists are annoying crack me up. They crack me up because most of the time they're the kind of crowd that instead of acting irkd after a loss, they act like this team clinches a SB berth every regular season win.

Nice W, glad to have it. But I can't get over how people feel "OK" about the defense.

It was a nice win and I feel a little more than ok with the defense. I'm actually encouraged which is something I Haven't felt with this defense in awhile. We actually have youth and speed with some tenacity. Compile that with experience and superb coaching and this unit will get better and better week to week. Encouraged.

 

[JackBauer]

Nice W, glad to have it. But I can't get over how people feel "OK" about the defense.

Why wouldn't we? OK is a term I wouldn't feel uncomfortable using with respect to the defense.

 

[atomdomb]

It was a nice win and I feel a little more than ok with the defense. I'm actually encouraged which is something I Haven't felt with this defense in awhile. We actually have youth and speed with some tenacity. Compile that with experience and superb coaching and this unit will get better and better week to week. Encouraged.

I agree. Is it just me or did we play a different style of D in the second half? First half we used alot of different looks and played alot of bump and run. Second half we were 8-10 yards off the line and were trying to keep the receivers in front of us. We played burn the clock defense in the second half. Am I crazy?

 

[Sicilian]

I agree. Is it just me or did we play a different style of D in the second half? First half we used alot of different looks and played alot of bump and run. Second half we were 8-10 yards off the line and were trying to keep the receivers in front of us. We played burn the clock defense in the second half. Am I crazy?

Nope, that's exactly what I saw too. And I'm fine with that given a 4 touchdown lead the first time the D took the field in the 2nd half. You don't want to play that way if you're only up by 10-14 at the half, but with a 28 points lead... you're fine giving up TDs if they take 6 or 7 minutes to get.

 

[Kontradiction]

Umm... Crumpler is still fat and slow, but he's a pretty good player!

I would take him over Ben Watson, and he looks like superman

Welshman, did you see the Crump last year? Fat and slow is the definition of Crump in 2009. Not 2010.

 

[51Hits]

Why wouldn't we? OK is a term I wouldn't feel uncomfortable using with respect to the defense.

Yeah, re-reading that I worded it completely wrong. I meant to say I don't see how anybody can feel this defense is anything more than an OK defense. It was a good performance in the first followed by a nightmare in the second half. Yet people around here are going on how this game shows BB's genius, etc. They were OK enough to win, but the defense needs work.

 

[PatsDeb]

Agreed. If this defense can't play well against that offense the way it's looked, I'm going to be depressed. In fact, given what we were able to do with fewer weapons in the 2nd Jets game last year, if our offense doesn't have a good game I'll be disappointed too.

Basically, we just better beat the Jets

I am optomistic vs. the Jets and will be interested to see if the Krafts wish they had just accepted Logan Mankins' private aplogy (being sarcastic - I know the public thing didn't happen) so that they had him to block for Brady against the Jets. The last few years the one thing the Jets have done very well is get after Brady and totally disrupted him. If he has a lot of time like he did vs. the Bengals, I will feel very confident about a win, even if the D is still learning.

 

[Sicilian]

Yeah, re-reading that I worded it completely wrong. I meant to say I don't see how anybody can feel this defense is anything more than an OK defense. It was a good performance in the first followed by a nightmare in the second half. Yet people around here are going on how this game shows BB's genius, etc. They were OK enough to win, but the defense needs work.

You can't evaluate the defense in the 2nd half using the same criteria you would use for the 1st half. They were calling plays and playstyles with completely different goals in mind.

Not saying there wasn't plenty of room for improvement in that 2nd half, just that I never felt it was a "nightmare" as you call it. They set out to make the Bengals eat up the clock if they were going to score, and that's exactly what happened. You'd love to see them still get stops doing that, but it's not as crucial when you're up 20+ points. That's where the chance to improve comes in.

 

[JackBauer]

Yeah, re-reading that I worded it completely wrong. I meant to say I don't see how anybody can feel this defense is anything more than an OK defense. It was a good performance in the first followed by a nightmare in the second half. Yet people around here are going on how this game shows BB's genius, etc. They were OK enough to win, but the defense needs work.

Of course there's room for improvement. That's generally how it goes with a defense this young. But the talent is clearly there at many of the key positions, and frankly the defense was light years better than I had expected. If someone had predicted we'd be up by 24 at the half and Cedric Benson would have 6 carries for 0 yards, I would have assumed that person was drunk.

 

[Sicilian]

Honestly, the way I view that 2nd half is that the Bengals got 21 points because they are a terribly coached team.

The Pats went into a very soft defense, likely with the mentality that with all the weapons the Bengals have, they're going to try to score quickly to get back into this game down 28. The Bengals instead, decided to "save face" by trying to dink and dunk the Pats all the way to long scoring drives. The Patriots kept playing soft, waiting for the Bengals to take their shots, and they never did. The Bengals stats look great because of it, but they never had a chance to win that game.

If the Bengals had tried to score quickly, they probably lose by more, but with a couple breaks they end up back in the game. They decided it was better to make the game close rather than try to win, and because of that the Pats defensive STATS look worse than they should.