Pretty obvious where the issue was tonight, run defense. I, and others, called it the key item for the Patriots and that ended up being an understatement. It seemed the Jets' success on the ground was assisting mightily in opening the middle up for pass completions. It bears serious watching to see what can be done to improve the run defense.
Notable items:
- Amendola looked extra aggressive on KRs. If this is what can be expected from him on KRs then he has officially won that job. Kudos for him on several plays including the game winning catch on a less than great throw.
- OL, my second biggest concern behind the rush defense, held up relatively decent in pass blocking. Jets moved away from the rush only 4 (something teams had been having success with) and blitzed more based on, IMHO, the OL successfully containing the rushing only 4. It was far from perfect but it is improving. Liked seeing Devey have some fire in him.
- Brady was overall effective. JE with two drops right in his hands (one happens, two is no damn good!) -- one of those was going to go for a significant gain. Brady had some accuracy issues at times but definitely got it done when it was needed.
- I'm a bit perplexed on why Wright isn't being put in the pass-play mix more. Is he hurt? In the dog house?
- I SUPER appreciate the Refs, considering last year's abomination for calling a newly minted/never before called penalty right on a last second game deciding play, following that up with multiple calls on the Patriots that were not even handed (either call it tight like that on both teams or not at all). Several replays were almost comical for what you see the penalty call is for, only to see other replays where these, and other, "penalties" are happening commonly.
With that said, a win is a friggin win! I'm happy!! As others have correctly pointed out this was a division game against an arch rival (an arch rival that was desperate for a win and would play with extra abandon).