It's frustrating because it is often painful to watch. It is often passive rather than aggressive. It lets mediocre or bad QBs move the ball downfield rather than forcing 3 and outs. Most painfully it keeps Brady and our powerful O on the sidelines and limits the number of scoring chances. It does work however, mostly I think, because Brady is so damn good the Pats get points on most drives. It's also frustrating because this current D is fun to watch when they do play aggressively.
Disclaimer: I am obviously not the best X's and O's guy so this simply my novice opinion.
Pittsburgh only converted 31% of their third down conversions and 25% in the red zone so the Pats D performed well in those categories and have continuously improved throughout the season.
The two Patriots 3rd down drops and the two fumbles hurt the defensive numbers by giving the ball back to the Pittsburgh offense as well as making the defense spend more minutes on the field. Clean that up and the D will look better in a way.
My understanding of the bend but don't break philosophy:
1. Designed to prevent the big play. Big plays are pass plays over 25 yards and Rush plays over 10 yards. Big play differential (Patriots lead the league) is combined with turnover differential to create the Toxic differential (Patriots lead the league). (Toxic differential = Big play differential + turnover differential) So at least statistically they are doing their job.
2. Forcing an offense into 10-15 play type drives which increases the odds of either stopping them on 3rd down or creating a turnover. ( I think we will see more turnovers in the future. They've been just missing in a few games so I think they will start to get them )
3. Force an offense into their weakness. "Take away what they like to do". If a team likes to run force them to throw and vice versa. Landry is a backup so they forced him to throw and, btw, he threw a couple of dimes into good coverage that not many could have defended so credit to him. Landry started a couple of games last year and had a QBR of 77.3. He had a QBR of 76.6 against the Patriots so he didn't really play better but to your point he didn't play worse either.
4. Complement the offense. Make sure the opponent scores less than your offense. What does that mean? It means when your team is up by 2 TD's burn the clock and not worry about stats. That's the frustrating part imo especially during the Miami comeback but that had more to do with having a 3rd string QB in the game than game planning.
My guess is that you will get your wish this weekend. TT is a serious rushing threat and they like to run so I think you will see more guys in the box to create containment which may lead to pressure and/or sacks.
We'll see I guess but this team is solid in all 3 phases. If I were to pick a weakness it would be the Oline but it is still an average to good line. This weekend will be a good test for them.