Idle thoughts - the "3rd and 18" edition

[Nunchucks]

Marrone has to be dinged for the 2nd half playcalling. They ran Fournette up the gut on first down every single first down except for two. Except for one 14yd run they were in 2-and-7 or longer on every second down in the second half. That's not gonna cut it. Another team conspiring in cutting their own throat by turtling on offense too soon.

They were shortening the game, with a 10 point lead, you got to run it. If they pass the ball too much, Bortles might turn into Bortles.

 

[Sicilian]

They were shortening the game, with a 10 point lead, you got to run it. If they pass the ball too much, Bortles might turn into Bortles.

I agree. They didn't want to pull a Falcons and give Brady extra possessions to get it together. So they stuck with a gameplan that had worked for them in the first half, the problem was the Patriots adjusted to it.

 

[Palm Beach Pats Fan]

As others have said, Marrone was conservative in his play-calling all game long, not just late. He kept calling the kind of runs and short passes that had worked for 3 quarters and had controlled the clock very well. The Patriots defense simply adjusted. You could say that he should have had Bortles sling it downfield, but THAT would have been an example of deviating from what had been working and a surefire way to blow it.

Thank you Ken, for your great opening posts, as usual. A great way to start the day!

 

[SacPete1]

Actually, that isn't true once possession is established. He held onto the ball and was down by contact. The ball was clearly pinned between his thigh.

Jack's initial swipe, causes a loss of possession. The ball clearly moves. As Lewis is going down, he does as you point out, appear to pin the ball against his thigh but this is watching it in slow motion and the key here is he is going to the ground as he attempts to regain possession which then brings the whole "surviving the ground" criteria into play. He doesn't maintain possession through the fall and that seems pretty obvious.

Anyways, we can agree to disagree on this one and if anything it highlights the rather complex rule on possession and re-possession.

It didn't really matter in the end anyway.

 

[Palm Beach Pats Fan]

I don't think "surviving the ground" applies to anything but a reception.

The question is whether you call pinning the ball against your leg and making it stop moving for a second or so to be gaining possession being in possession at the point that you are down by contact. I hoped it would be overturned, but didn't think it would be. I think that they got it right.

It's good that it is being discussed. With all of the bellyaching about the referees, we sure ought to note that the most impactful close call went AGAINST the Patriots, not for them.

 

[tasmlab]

Great post, Ken, thanks!

In this game, like many other Pats game, the Patriots seem to learn, refine, figure things out and get less tired as the game progresses, fully mastering it by the end. The other team seems to lose their knowledge, get tired and turn to dust by the end. Almost like a way less dramatic version of last year's super bowl.

 

[holyredeemer]

Rex Burkhead is made of Glass. As great as he's looked everytime he gets tackled he comes up injured. Please Activate Gilly next game BB. I would not extend Burkhead either he spends too much time in the tub.

While we’re at it, could we please get rid of Gronk and Edelman? Can’t make plays from the locker room fellas! How about Amendola? We’ve gotta treat that guy all year like he is made of glass. Enough already.

 

[Pats2000]

Ken - Love your stuff, as always.

Official line was this (according to the NFL.COM BoxScore:
Lewis - 9 carries - 34 yards
Burkhead - 1 Carry- 5 yards.

Burkhead was out taking special teams snaps in the second half. I think after the hit to the kidneys, they wanted to play it safe with him, honestly.

C. I watched the Lewis fumble numerous times. He got control of the ball on his hip before he hit the ground. He still had control after he hit the ground. It was only as he rolled that Jack pulled the ball from him. I still can't fathom how they called that a fumble. That was the only call I felt that Cleteman blew all game, which surprised me. They did call all the other major infractions outside of the slam on White by Myles Jack in the end zone. Jack should have been flagged for unnecessary roughness on that play since White was well into the endzone and the whistles had blown before he even started the slam.

Looking at the play in super slow no, it looked like he trapped it against his hip. My buddy and I who is a Redskins fan decided it was probably akin to the catch rule, once you start to loose possession you have to have a clear recovery and survive the ground. I thought it was a pretty good call even though it didn't go our way.

 

[Pats2000]

Also, I thought Harrison had that strip sack on Bortles? But the Jags recovered.

 

[Kontradiction]

Also, I thought Harrison had that strip sack on Bortles? But the Jags recovered.

I think that was Harrison, but I'll have to go back and watch. Huge LOL at the Steelers for letting the Pats scoop him up. He's been nothing short of huge for this team since signing.

 

[Lloyd_Christmas]

I find all commentators, much like all news broadcasters, to be biased. It is usually much more apparent when they are biased in a way that I disagree with.

Having said that, Nance is starting to wear thin on me.

I thought the Jags were trying to assert that they were the tougher team. The refs were giving them more leeway than I felt was fair. They ignored an earlier hit on a defenseless receiver and I said then that someone was going to get hurt if they didn't Tighten up their calls. Sure enough, they took out Gronk. Great trade off for them. 15 measely yards for removing our best receiver. Also watch the replay of the white touchdown. A jags player (Jack maybe) got away with a lot of extra curricular activity. Again, they were trying to out physical the pats

On the Lewis fumble, I really wish lead blocking linemen paid more attention to the rear pursuit. There wasn't much in front of Lewis. Needed a lineman to peel back and take out Jack

Dany Amendola. Weren't there posters calling for him to be cut early in the season? This guy is money when you need him.

I am glad we were up by more than 3pts. The jags kicker was excellent. Their team played very well. Tough win.

 

[p8ryts]

6. Defense - General thoughts.

a. Again it was very conservative play calling by Patricia early on. This is when the Jags had early relative success in the run game. He certainly wasn't gashing them by any means, but getting the 3 or 4 ypc necessary to give Bortles easy 3rd down opportunities that he cashed in on.

b. They also did had a few wrinkles of their run/pass option look that caused the Pats some problems in that 2nd quarter. I remarked in the game thread that watching them get 2 first downs in a row on two 3rd down dump-offs was particularly painful. McCourty said the improvement in the 2nd half was more about improving awareness of the play than any major adjustment. Personally, I'm just glad they did something because it was driving me crazy.

c. In the review thread, I'd like to see exactly why those mickey mouse passes were so effective. I can understand the bunch formation crossers, but when some of the dump offs to the RB's were completed, I was surprised to see how much space there was before he was challenged. I'd like to know why. On the other side, our RB's seemed to have no room on swing passes.

d. Matty had some very nice corner blitzes schemed that while they didn't cause a sack, they did force Bortles to get rid of the ball faster. And while Bortles completed a couple of passes against that particular blitz scheme, he never really hurt the Pats on those passes. It was cool that he often used different DB's in this scheme. Chung, Butler, and Rowe all took their shots.

e. and as usual, the defense got better as the game went along. IIRC the Jags were 0 for 6 on their last six third down opportunities. This has been the one universal thing you can expect from a Pat's defense. It WILL get better as the game progresses.

7. Front Seven - They held Fornette to just 3.4 ypc on 24 carries. That good but not great. What was great was WHEN they started to shut down the run late. By the end of the game, Fornette was lucky to get to the LOS most of the time. Guy and Brown were particularly effective, but RJF made a few plays as well.

a. I was surprised to see Alan Branch on the inactive sheet for this game. He seemed a perfect fit for the Jags run game. I'm guessing if he wants to see any action going forward he's going to have blow some people up when the Pats have their final padded practice this week. If we are looking to add a few million to our cap next season, cutting Branch would be one of them. Branch had a few good years with the Pats, but this wasn't one of them.

b. I noticed James Harrison lose leverage on an early run that got a first down. He set the edge strongly but squeezed in to much and lost his outside leverage. Late in the game when he became part of the rush package, he again showed up well. He didn't get any sacks, but he was a constant irritant to the QB late in the game, with at least 3 QB's in the 4th quarter alone.

c. KVN and Roberts did well for the most part with 9 and 7 tackles between them. I was a little disappointed in MFlowers production. He didn't have much of an impact (1 tackle) on either the run or pass game. Last week I had hoped he would develop into a Ninko-type story. This week, not so much.

8. Secondary - played a little loose early on, but tightened up considerally as the game wore on. Also, the tackling on those little dump offs wasn't as good as usual until later in the game.

a. NOW we know why they paid Gilmore all that money. He shut Westbrook out for all but one catch, and made the big play to end the last Jags threat with an outstanding play. I expect him to be on Jeffery next week, with Butler on Tory Smith. Meanwhile, Ertz with 8 catches will be quite a challenge for Chung. It will be interesting to see how Patricia will make the matchups

b. Chung might have given up the TD, but the Jags TE's only accounted for 2 catches for a combined 8 yds in the game (one each for Lewis and O'Shaughnessy).

c. Hard to see just what the ratio of man to zone was in this game. Early on there seemed to be a lot of yac room on the outside. Could be a bust or missed tackle, or could have been that they caught them in man.

d. Tougher challenge next week than this one for the secondary. Like I said Ertz is a key target for Foles, and Smith and Jeffery present a difficult size and speed problem to shut down and there RB's .

9. ST's - Great as usual on KO coverage, even better on punts. Having Allen pin them down around their 10 on 3 different occasions late made a big difference.

10 General thoughts

a. I thought the Jags did everything they could tonight. They played good enough to win most games. They won the TO battle. They knocked out our best offensive weapon. They had a GREAT game plan that was good enough to make Blake freakin' Bortles look like competent QB. No doubt they are a talented group that SHOULD be heard from in future years

b. I call this the 3rd and 18 edition because it was just one of those improbable plays that this team makes in critical situations so often. It remined me of the 3rd and long against Seattle that ignited the Pats late run on offense in the Superbowl. Or the 3rd and long from the GL early in the game tying drive against Atlanta, and you can name a dozen more. WOW, just WOW.

c. Now a few rants. I've had enough of Jim Nance. He made every call the Pats call seem suspicious regardless of how obvious they were. He took every chance he could to question those calls and to point out the effect of them on the game. Now the haters narrative has focused on the refs and their rallying cry. The fact that only ONE of the calls was even possibly marginal and several legitimate calls were ignored, never was presented. Nance has entered into the Fox News version of "fair and balanced" reporting. It wasn't fair, NOR was it balanced. Sometimes Romo went along for the ride, but it was Nance who initiated the narrative and kept it alive. It was screaming at the TV worthy and I bet I wasn't alone.

d. I was really worried about Beakman's crew and their propensity to throw flags. I was dead wrong. They only threw 7 combined accepted penalties all night. And for all their *****ing, the Jags only got called for 6 with only one being even marginally questionable. With few calls and only one review, the game had a good pace.

e. When the NFC game started I was rooting for the Eagles. Selfishly I didn't want there to be a home-field advantage in a Superbowl the Pats were in. I was right in thinking that. I also thought the Eagles were the weaker potential opponent. I might have been just a little off on that one.

f. There was one play made by Nick Foles that proved to me that he is more than just a weak backup. In it, while he was being pressured in the pocket, he was forced to pull back a throw because there was a rusher in his face and reload, and then, still under great pressure, he changed his arm angle to avoid another rusher and threw a 20 yd completion outside the hash off his back foot. THAT was the Nick Foles who threw for 27 TD's and 2 picks 3 seasons ago.
He also threw for 354 yds tonight on just 33 attempts against the best defense in the league.

Now it seems Foles is a feast or famine kind of QB. Tonight was a feast of epic proportion. I don't know who will show up in 2 weeks. I just know that our defense helped make Blake Bortles look good, so I hope no one looks past the Eagles or get insulted if anyone likes them to win.

g. I think the worst part of sitting there in the 4th quarter staring the REAL possibility of the Pats losing this game, was the shot they took of Coughlin sitting in his box and then telling us how he has been the Patriot'a Kryptonite over the years. I HATE that narrative. Again, Coughlin didn't plan the Helmet catch, or the Manningham/Eli prayer. Besides, the Giants were supposedly the better team in 2011. The fact is that in 2 games the Giants won 2 extremely close games. It is also true that OTHER than those 2 years the Giants were barely relevant over the last several years. They have NEVER been in the Pats head, nor should they be.

h. RPO will become part of the lexicon of all Pats fans before the next 2 weeks are up. Deal with it.

i. Can we put the whole Jimmy G thing to rest. As good as he is right now and how good he MIGHT become there is one unbreakable truth that should be clear to EVERYONE. Jimmy was the 2nd best QB on the Pats this year, and he would have been the 2nd best QB on the Pats next year as well. There was never a reasonable scenario where Jimmy could have remained with the Pats when the EARLIEST he might be likely to play was 2019 and THAT was just a possibility, and NOT a guarantee

OK let's stop here. It's almost 3 am, though I did nod off for a couple of hours so it isn't as bad as it looks Enjoy the win, and the 2 week run up to the Superbowl. At least I hope they let us enjoy it.

Your comments are not only welcome but demanded.

 

[Lloyd_Christmas]

I think that was Harrison, but I'll have to go back and watch. Huge LOL at the Steelers for letting the Pats scoop him up. He's been nothing short of huge for this team since signing.

It was Harrison

 

[p8ryts]

Great job as usual. Glad to see someone giving props to OL, thought they did very well. Solder great, Fleming did his job. Never did hear Yannick's name called.
Jax whining about penalties but they held the receivers arms down several times with no call, hands to the face by their RT on our LDE. I was surprised by the lack of Devlin and the straight ahead running game. Their speed held the wide stuff in check. It was a real TOUGH game.
Surprised at how much Eric Lee played. Harrison a liability first half, contributed in 4th qtr.
Another great win.

 

[QuantumMechanic]

I don't think "surviving the ground" applies to anything but a reception.

That's not true, as we learned in the brouhaha over the ASJ fumble-touchback.

Once the ball comes loose, all the same rules apply as to when a player gets possession of it as with a reception, except that the ball hitting the ground while not in player possession doesn't make the play dead.

Since Lewis was going to ground while trying to recover the loose ball, he needs to survive the ground to be considered to have possession. And without possession, he can't be down by contact.

 

[QuantumMechanic]

Speaking of the Lewis fumble play, I see the scorers gave Amendola a pass completion and Lewis a pass reception. Sure looked to me on replay that Lewis was even with or behind Amendola, so it should have been scored a lateral and rushing yards for Lewis. Not that the difference matters to the game, of course.

 

[Ring 6]

Jack's initial swipe, causes a loss of possession. The ball clearly moves. As Lewis is going down, he does as you point out, appear to pin the ball against his thigh but this is watching it in slow motion and the key here is he is going to the ground as he attempts to regain possession which then brings the whole "surviving the ground" criteria into play. He doesn't maintain possession through the fall and that seems pretty obvious.

Anyways, we can agree to disagree on this one and if anything it highlights the rather complex rule on possession and re-possession.

It didn't really matter in the end anyway.

No Pete. Surviving the ground is not an issue here. That only applies to making a catch while going to the ground.
When his knee is down the play is dead. At that instant it certainly looked to me like he had possession even if it was lost immediately after.

 

[Ring 6]

That's not true, as we learned in the brouhaha over the ASJ fumble-touchback.

Once the ball comes loose, all the same rules apply as to when a player gets possession of it as with a reception, except that the ball hitting the ground while not in player possession doesn't make the play dead.

Since Lewis was going to ground while trying to recover the loose ball, he needs to survive the ground to be considered to have possession. And without possession, he can't be down by contact.

No. ASJ issue was he didn’t regain possession until after he was out of bounds. Has nothing to do with surviving the ground.

 

[patfanken]

Coughlin may not have called plays, but you could clearly see that Marrone and Wash pulled Twists, Stunts and Late ILB Blitzes from the Giants' playbook. One of the sacks came on a stunt where the RDE was coming around Dareus. Mason saw it, took his eye of Dareus and Dareus used that to push him aside and get to Brady..

The ILB blitz that was late clearly pressured Brady. There were other plays as well that clearly had the hallmark of the Giants gameplan.

That stuff is in EVERYONE's playbook DB. Let's not ascribe things to Coughlin that don't exist.

 

[Palm Beach Pats Fan]

No. ASJ issue was he didn’t regain possession until after he was out of bounds. Has nothing to do with surviving the ground.

I am getting more confused. The ref said that not surviving the ground was critical in the ASJ play. This is what the NFL ref said:

“He lost the ball,” referee Tony Corrente told a pool reporter. “It came out of his control as he was almost to the ground. Now he re-grasps the ball and by rule, now he has to complete the process of a recovery, which means he has to survive the ground again. So in recovering it, he recovered, hit the knee, started to roll and the ball came out a second time. So the ball started to move in his hands this way … he’s now out of bounds in the end zone, which now created a touchback. So he didn’t survive the recovery and didn’t survive the ground during the recovery is what happened here.”

https://nypost.com/2017/10/15/jets-fall-to-patriots-after-controversial-replay-call/