What a bad performance by Brady

[Patters]

I don't know if Brady had an off day or if Dungy out-Belichicked Belichick. During the whole game, the Pats offense looked confused and surprised by what they were up against. Throughout the game, Brady looked more confused than determined. It was a frustrating game to watch because the Pats played so inconsistently.

Brady never found his rhythm, and the play calling seemed to play into the hands of the Colts. The Colts pass D was far better than Brady's passing, yet we refused to more fully commit to our run game, which was doing so well.

I had the impression had times that Brady was competing with Manning. Normally Brady is the better QB because he doesn't make the game about himself, and runs the team like a fine machine. But, last night, he made the game about himself, trying to show the world that he was as strong a passer as Manning. Well, he's not.

On the bright side, after a poor first half, our D really slowed down the Colts. Our O line protected Brady and opened up holes for the running game, and our ST, though they gave the Colts good field position, did a good job in terms of the field position they gave us. Plus Gostkowski did as good a job as Adam.

 

[Remix 6]

3 picks were drop tipped balls by us

 

[patsfaninpa]

Did you see some of the overhead shots from behind the Colts defense? B.Sanders was taking 2-3 steps towards the line of scrimmage before Brady handed the ball off. I'm stunned we couldn't beat that with play-action. Roll left have the te chip Freeney and hit somebody on a deep post.

I thought J.Seau was a monster out there. Big problemswas the penalties on 3rd down. I feel that 1st 3rd and 15 set the tone for the game. Manning eluded Seymour and Warren. Launched that bomb to M.Harrison. Big gain for them and R.Harrison hurt on play. Manning's tough. He's going to get his.
You're not going to shut them out. Just wish we could keep our db's healthy for the rest of the season.

 

[JoeSixPat]

My feeling was that the receiving game was off again... though the box score doesn't fully support me on that

Brady was 20/35 on pass attempts and Manning was 20/36

But of those 15 misses - beyond the obvious tipped balls for INTs - it seems to me that quite a few were to Caldwell and Gabriel - who had 1 and 2 passes caught respectively

Were the new guys not running routes well or was Brady just off when throwing for them (unlike Brown)?

Probably a bit of both but we're halfway through the season and we're still talking about giving our receivers "time" to adjust to Brady. I was hoping to see a continuation of last week and am very disappointed.

 

[marty]

I have to agree that I thought Brady was very "off" on his game last night. Never seemed in sync with his offense. Penalties and turnovers just killed it as we blew several opportunities in the 2nd half. Even tho' the defense played well, I kept waiting for that pressure D that we usually run so well against Manning to show up, and it really didn't until later in the 2nd half. I think we really missed Rodney back there.
Biggest whoop of the night was watching Adam's 2 whiffs!!

 

[BigEZPatsFan76]

I have to put this loss squarely on Coach Belichick's shoulders. For the life of me, I can not understand why we did not just stick with the running game more. We were gashing them with the running game. But Brady has to shoulder some of this as well. I am sorry but 4 picks is NOT going to beat anybody. And, it will make a defense that is average at best (like theirs) look like world beaters. I understand two of them were tips. But, that pick on the first drive set the tempo for this game. The defense played great, but repeated stupid mistakes after we stopped them on 3rd and longs were killing us last night. At that beginning of the game, it sure looked like officiating would do all they could to give Indianapolis whatever they could. When Troy was flagged with that phantom unsportsmanlike conduct penalty, I thought here we go again, the fix is in. But, officiating did NOT lose this game for us. Our own mistakes did us in.


EZ76

 

[PatsFan-NH]

I thought the misses by Brady were awful. What really seemed to kill us though (other than the turnovers) was that almost all the guys who did catch passes, promptly fell down. Even if there was no Colt causing it, they fell down and gave the nearest Colt time to come and touch them and make them down by contact. It seemed that we got almost no Yards after Catch for most of the game.

I thought the play calling was bad because they seemed to waste time trying to be tricky and probably could have just spread the field and given the Colts more than they could cover.

The D also seemed to be sleepwalking until the 2nd half.

Very poor showing, more like early in the season than the proficiency of the Vikings game.

 

[BigEZPatsFan76]

I thought the misses by Brady were awful. What really seemed to kill us though (other than the turnovers) was that almost all the guys who did catch passes, promptly fell down. Even if there was no Colt causing it, they fell down and gave the nearest Colt time to come and touch them and make them down by contact. It seemed that we got almost no Yards after Catch for most of the game.

I thought the play calling was bad because they seemed to waste time trying to be tricky and probably could have just spread the field and given the Colts more than they could cover.

The D also seemed to be sleepwalking until the 2nd half.

Very poor showing, more like early in the season than the proficiency of the Vikings game.

Yep, those "gimmick" plays were annoying. John Madden said it best last night. The Patriots did NOT need anything like that. Just run it right at them, they can't stop it. Even with all the mistakes, and basically gift wrapping the damn game for them, we had a chance to either tie or win it in the end. Maybe I am crazy, but had we scored a TD on the last drive, I would have gone for "2" to try to win and end it. I would not have chanced OT.



EZ76

 

[PatsFanSince74]

3 picks were drop tipped balls by us

Except for the Faulk "dagger to the heart" at the end, I think we have to acknowledge that the others passes were off target. I'll leave it up to BB and his review of the tapes to determine if Brady had that bad a night or if the Colts forced him to do things he didn't want to do. Either way, it was still four picks.

 

[TomBrady'sGoat]

Eh, Brady threw a couple balls where he didn't catch his guy perfectly in stride. He threw some higher/lower than he normally does. Most were catchable.

As for the picks, the first one (deep into the end zone) seemed like either miscommunication or a bad route. Weren't the others all tipped?

It wasn't vintage Brady but I don't think it was a bad performance. Against a lesser team they win.

 

[PatsFanSince74]

agreed. in fact, against anybody but the colts or denver they win last night...one of the three will be in miami and, unless there's a huge letdown, the AFC Championship will be the SB...

 

[Sporin]

I think Belicheck said it best, they got out played and out coached.

There is plenty of bame to go around, a lot of tipped balls for INT's, the DB's gave up a LOT of long pass plays. WAY too many penalties.....

You can't turn over the ball FIVE TIMES against the Colts and expect to say in it. The fact that they were only down a TD at the end is surprising.

Much as I loathe Madden's blathering I think he was right, the Pats got too cute and blew it. All they had to do was run, run run, pound the ball.

I have some issues with the officiating, but it wasn't the game breaker IMO.

 

[khayos]

This felt almost exactly like the Denver game last year to me from an emotional standpoint.

Weird playcalling I thought. Why even through it to Kevin Faulk for 5-7 yards when you could rumble that with Dillon or Maroney?

I'm also curious if the playing surface isn't a liability -- not letting Brady plant right.

 

[PatsFanSince74]

I'm also curious if the playing surface isn't a liability -- not letting Brady plant right.

Peyton and Marvin didn't seem to have any trouble planting...

 

[rabthepat]

When was the last time Brady brought us back against a good team? I can't remember the last time we beat a really good team. Maybe SB 39?

 

[khayos]

Peyton and Marvin didn't seem to have any trouble planting...

They seemed to be running alot of come back routes. None of the passes seemed very clean. Both Brady and Manning had about 20 completions.

 

[braveht]

In baseball I'd suspect the pitches were being tipped off. It sure looked like Indy was guessing right on D an awful lot, so many running plays stuffed! Yeah, I heard Madden praising the wham blocking. It's not that new to us.

I'm sure BB will take a good look at the film.

 

[belichickaholic]

I thought Tom played horrible. His decisions were really bad all night. On the play that watson tipped into the hand of the Indy safety, he threw it into triple coverage while he had three wide open receivers underneath.

Another play in the red zone he was rushed some what but couldn't make a decent throw to a wide open Thomas on the three yard line.

Just poor decisions and poor execution. We know he can play better than that but I hate to say it, IMO he was trying to stay with Manning instead of just playing his game.

 

[PaulNEPats]

Someone should tell Caldwell that he's a receiver, not a QB. Did anyone see that catch where after he caught the ball, he slid down immediately to avoid taking a hit?

 

[BelichickFan]

As others have said, whether it was Brady or the WR not being in the right place, who knows. But, yeah, "what a bad performace by the passing game".