Patriots Pregame Thread AFC Championship: We are on to Kansas City!

[drewskie]

In 2015, the broncos kept getting in the backfield on like every other play. Chiefs haven’t been known for doing that but I’m worried that they play a lot of man coverage. The saints played man coverage against the eagles and shut down the birds offense in the second half. That is what worries me

I expect KC to play man defense. Brady shreds zone defenses (see Chargers and Squealers). We will score on them.

If KC can be held to about 30 points or less I like our chances.

 

[TBR]

The Bills put CB Tre'Davious White on Gronk last year with solid results. I don't see why Gilmore couldn't handle Kelce. It's worth trying at least.

 

[Redman443]

I expect KC to play man defense. Brady shreds zone defenses (see Chargers and Squealers). We will score on them.

If KC can be held to about 30 points or less I like our chances.

It’s going to be really cold in KC. More cold than this weekend. Hopefully that’ll prevent this from being a track meet/basketball game.

 

[Vindicate]

F**k Kelce and his dipshit dances. Had to throw that in here.

 

[TB_Helmet]

It takes a lot more than a couple of effective outside pass rushers to get that consistent pressure. The Broncos has Miller and Ware, but we’ve seen Brady handle a duo like that many times by using the aggressiveness to his advantage. What made the Broncos (and Ravens years ago) very difficult is they also had Wolfe and Malik Jackson, solid linebackers, and Talib and Harris at CB. You need a **** ton of really great defensive players to really shut down an offense. Teams that invest all their money in a couple of 15 sack guys are exactly what the Patriots love to dismantle. I don’t know enough about KC to give an opinion about them though, other than that they sure aren’t the 2015 Broncos defense.

That 2015 Broncos line had also figured out the head bob tell that Stork was giving away. It was crazy how fast Miller got home. Almost seemed like offsides every play. We won’t have that problem this time because Stork is gone and Scar is back.

 

[TB_Helmet]

It’s going to be really cold in KC. More cold than this weekend. Hopefully that’ll prevent this from being a track meet/basketball game.

Hopefully it’ll quiet the crowd down a bit too? Especially if we can take a lead early.

 

[BobDigital]

Where would you put Gilmore? He is one heck of a chess piece.

No idea. I would just do to Kelce whatever they did last time. I think we put Gilmore on Hill and they should do that again with lots of help. I don't think they can stop Hill but I know they can stop Kelce cause they did it before. Without Hunt this offense has been top tier but not out of this world. We saw what they did against the Colts (Who I said had an average defense just about). 31 points on a defense worse than ours. It isn't outside the realm of possibility we hold them to even less.

As someone else said in this thread, Mahomes' QB rating dropped down something like 17 points since they lost Hunt and their PPG have dropped down about 4.5PPG. They are still a very good offense but not other worldly.

 

[carmelo15]

I’m more confident in this game than I was with the Chargers. Chargers had Allen/ Williams brothers/ and a Akler with a good defense . KC only has Hill/Kelce although mahomes is elite right now.

I’d double Hill with Jackson/McCourty as JC is elite down field. Double Kelce and eliminate Watkins with Gilmore bring pressure on Mahomes and dare them to run.

 

[Redstorm]

It takes a lot more than a couple of effective outside pass rushers to get that consistent pressure. The Broncos has Miller and Ware, but we’ve seen Brady handle a duo like that many times by using the aggressiveness to his advantage. What made the Broncos (and Ravens years ago) very difficult is they also had Wolfe and Malik Jackson, solid linebackers, and Talib and Harris at CB. You need a **** ton of really great defensive players to really shut down an offense. Teams that invest all their money in a couple of 15 sack guys are exactly what the Patriots love to dismantle. I don’t know enough about KC to give an opinion about them though, other than that they sure aren’t the 2015 Broncos defense.

The Chiefs pass rush is pretty legit. KC has good edge rushers but they also have Chris Jones on the inside. He has 14 sacks and is athletic with long arms. He deflected three passes vs the Colts

 

[BobDigital]

I just rewatched the week 6 game with KC Highlights and I'm sure I will do it again. My thoughts on what happened and what can change?

My first thought is the offense KC had on the field that day was better than the one they'll have this Sunday. (They had Watkins that game too). Lets go over the scoring drives KC had.

While it is true on their first drive Mahomes missed Hunt for a TD we also need to factor in Hunt won't be in this game. The Pats gave up 2 more FGs while presenting good red zone D. Another scoring chance was stopped by a end zone pick. A KC fan could rightly look at this first half and say 7 point were left on the board. They could have easily gone into the half with 16 as opposed to 9.

That being said the 2nd half went better than KC could have hoped offensively. a 67 yard pass to Hunt for a TD, a VERY uncharacteristic Brady mistake giving them the ball at the 29 for a very short field helped them score a TD easily, a kick off return that was brought to the 3 yard line, and a 75 yard TD pass to Hill on a broken coverage.

That is 4 big mistakes that lead to 28 points. Their only true drive in this quarter was a FG. Now I'm not saying we would have held them to 3 points that half if all those things didn't happen. But I think it is fair to say our defense would have held them to less than 40.

Probably some where in the range of 28-31 points is what they would have scored if so many unusual things didn't break their way. They are clearly a less potent offense now. I think it is reasonable to assume we can keep them under 30 or barely over.

LAC kept them to 28 and SEA kept them to 31 with a gift 3 points at the end in recent weeks while the Colts held them to 31. There is no reason our D shouldn't be able to do just as well. We're just as good as if not better.

 

[LightSkinSmurf]

I won't be picking the pats to win this but after seeing this game I do have alot more hope. That being said, we were at home. We have been good at home all year. Being on the road is the issue. I'm so proud of this team for making it to this point yet again regardless of what happens next.

 

[ViperGTS]

In honor of the squirrels postgame comments to Deion...a blast from the past!

 

[hellolin]

Guys, don't get too ****y, we win like we did today because the stupid Chargers insisted on playing Zone defense, knowing that Brady loves to play against zone. They are like the old Steelers team with that old defensive coordinator who just wants to prove that his zone blitz can get to Brady but never could. If Chiefs are smart, they will practice man coverage all week, and we will go back down to earth next week again.

 

[ViperGTS]

Guys, don't get too ****y, we win like we did today because the stupid Chargers insisted on playing Zone defense, knowing that Brady loves to play against zone. They are like the old Steelers team with that old defensive coordinator who just wants to prove that his zone blitz can get to Brady but never could. If Chiefs are smart, they will practice man coverage all week, and we will go back down to earth next week again.

Let them.

 

[carmelo15]

Guys, don't get too ****y, we win like we did today because the stupid Chargers insisted on playing Zone defense, knowing that Brady loves to play against zone. They are like the old Steelers team with that old defensive coordinator who just wants to prove that his zone blitz can get to Brady but never could. If Chiefs are smart, they will practice man coverage all week, and we will go back down to earth next week again.

Why even play the game that scrub brady ain’t gonna do **** to a man defense. Why don’t teans go man in us more often we wouldn’t have any Super Bowls if they did

 

[Nikolai]

KCs defensive coordinator isn’t stupid. They’re going to play tight man to man coverage. Perhaps we can counteract this by getting gronk involved in the passing game. If they double gronk, we can get it to Edelman or white if they get open. Maybe we can go with a run heavy gameplan by ramming it down their throats. I really don’t want a repeat of the 2014 AFCCG against Denver.

If kC plays Man to Man the whole game they run the risk of wearing themselves out like the Falcons did in SB 51

The Chargers tried man a few times. One of the plays, IIRC, had Edelman initially lined up in the backfield. Brady put him into motion, diagnosed the man coverage and threw an underneath route to Edelman who was more or less pretty open for an easy first down c0nversion.

We've got the horses to beat man coverage; especially after seeing Michel get a bit of love in the passing attack. Gronk looked good today too.

I'm feeling a bit better about this one than I did the Denver games in 2013 and 2015.

Btw, the overblown road playoff losses were against teams with good defenses and QBed by Peyton Manning...

 

[Snooky97]

Need to start quick against them. Get the crowd quiet and that will go a long way to helping. BB is planning as we speak...

 

[SaCaCh]

Anyone know how to look up our record on grass fields?

 

[RobertWeathers]

The Chargers tried man a few times. One of the plays, IIRC, had Edelman initially lined up in the backfield. Brady put him into motion, diagnosed the man coverage and threw an underneath route to Edelman who was more or less pretty open for an easy first down c0nversion.

We've got the horses to beat man coverage; especially after seeing Michel get a bit of love in the passing attack. Gronk looked good today too.

I'm feeling a bit better about this one than I did the Denver games in 2013 and 2015.

Btw, the overblown road playoff losses were against teams with good defenses and QBed by Peyton Manning...

We were undermanned in 2013 and 2015.

Not this year

 

[IllegalContact]

The pats are better in the trenches and have a better running game

It’s supposed to be in the single digits

Do the math