Pats Rebuild Intermittent View of Progress

[Pats2000]

I don’t want to live anymore

I mean thats always an option, but I want to remind you it's just football

 

[PowerRunRevival]

I don’t want to live anymore

This is a tough but fair recap. I'd also like to point out that I still have hope one of Jennings or Uche hit.

The good news is, last years draft was a great one and this year's draft seems like it will produce a number of immediate starters (I also think this year's undrafted crop is especially good)

 

[crawhammer]

Seriously?
So your opinion is that for the last 3 years the patriots have been a team with elite talent dragged down by bad coaching?

The reason for the spoof finishes?
2019 Brady played the worst football of his career.
2020 Legarm Newton
2021 The toughest part of the schedule was at the end, they had a lot of injuries.
It’s not that complicated.

Please explain what point you are trying to make.

Is it your argument that Bill Belichick is a bad football coach?
Would you like to name 5 better.


And why would Belichick need an excuse for anything? He could say FU walk away and be the GOAT. He doesn’t live his life in fear of needing to expect failure and line up excuses like you do.

In the NFL the first quarter of the season involves teams developing identity, and with the large amount of turnover that happens each year, figuring out how the pieces fit together. This has always been. Belichick recognizing it doesn’t mean he created it.

After his 1st teamers got embarrassed by 2nd and 3rd teamers the other night, Bill said they "must have left it on the practice field." Firstly, that's an excuse. Secondly, they reportedly sucked on the practice field too.

My overall point is an obvious one. If you're taking extra time at the beginning of the actual season (real games) to find your identity, and for certain you're found it by Thanksgiving (right, this is the theory), then why are you losing at the highest percentage by the end of the season(s)? There's no payout for the presumed process of finding your identity and putting the proper pieces together when you're repeatedly collapsing in December and January.

I'm not saying Belichick is a bad football coach in the collective. The totality of his career is a success. In this discussion, I'm isolating this approach of individual team building with "extended training camps into seasons" and making the pieces fit in time for the final push to the sum. That approach is not translating into quality play or wins.

They're a bad football team come December and January. You can further make excuses for the individual seasons or you could look for why this trend has occurred. I think you're onto something with the toughening of the schedules, which to me indicates the teams weren't as good as their peak records may have indicated. We've seen a deterioration of talent through not retaining good players who command larger contracts, poor to mixed draft results, and questionable FA moves. All of that lends itself to late season inferior play against better competition. It could be that.

 

[RobertWeathers]

After his 1st teamers got embarrassed by 2nd and 3rd teamers the other night, Bill said they "must have left it on the practice field." Firstly, that's an excuse. Secondly, they reportedly sucked on the practice field too.

My overall point is an obvious one. If you're taking extra time at the beginning of the actual season (real games) to find your identity, and for certain you're found it by Thanksgiving (right, this is the theory), then why are you losing at the highest percentage by the end of the season(s)? There's no payout for the presumed process of finding your identity and putting the proper pieces together when you're repeatedly collapsing in December and January.

I'm not saying Belichick is a bad football coach in the collective. The totality of his career is a success. In this discussion, I'm isolating this approach of individual team building with "extended training camps into seasons" and making the pieces fit in time for the final push to the sum. That approach is not translating into quality play or wins.

They're a bad football team come December and January. You can further make excuses for the individual seasons or you could look for why this trend has occurred. I think you're onto something with the toughening of the schedules, which to me indicates the teams weren't as good as their peak records may have indicated. We've seen a deterioration of talent through not retaining good players who command larger contracts, poor to mixed draft results, and questionable FA moves. All of that lends itself to late season inferior play against better competition. It could be that.

The answer is simple.

The reason why they have losing records in 2019, 2020 and 2021 in December is because they a) played better teams/bad matchups and b) they weren't a really good football team.

 

[crawhammer]

The answer is simple.

The reason why they have losing records in 2019, 2020 and 2021 in December is because they a) played better teams/bad matchups and b) they weren't a really good football team.

Right, that's essentially what I said. I followed up with reasons for why this is. What are yours?

 

[RobertWeathers]

Right, that's essentially what I said. I followed up with reasons for why this is. What are yours?

Their players aren't good enough.

What else is there?

 

[crawhammer]

Their players aren't good enough.

What else is there?

You could elaborate.

 

[RobertWeathers]

You could elaborate.

There isn't a need but if you want more...

2019- Injuries and erosion of talent from a SB team did them in.
2020- Cam sucks and further erosion of talent from 2019
2021- Played better teams/matchups

Anything else is a witch hunt.

 

[Ring 6]

After his 1st teamers got embarrassed by 2nd and 3rd teamers the other night, Bill said they "must have left it on the practice field." Firstly, that's an excuse. Secondly, they reportedly sucked on the practice field too.

My overall point is an obvious one. If you're taking extra time at the beginning of the actual season (real games) to find your identity, and for certain you're found it by Thanksgiving (right, this is the theory), then why are you losing at the highest percentage by the end of the season(s)? There's no payout for the presumed process of finding your identity and putting the proper pieces together when you're repeatedly collapsing in December and January.

I'm not saying Belichick is a bad football coach in the collective. The totality of his career is a success. In this discussion, I'm isolating this approach of individual team building with "extended training camps into seasons" and making the pieces fit in time for the final push to the sum. That approach is not translating into quality play or wins.

They're a bad football team come December and January. You can further make excuses for the individual seasons or you could look for why this trend has occurred. I think you're onto something with the toughening of the schedules, which to me indicates the teams weren't as good as their peak records may have indicated. We've seen a deterioration of talent through not retaining good players who command larger contracts, poor to mixed draft results, and questionable FA moves. All of that lends itself to late season inferior play against better competition. It could be that.

No one is “taking extra time”. Are you that vacant that you think the patriots just decide to get less prepared for the season than other teams and don’t care about the first 4 games? My God were you born yesterday?

So, you are arguing that an off the cuff statement that you don’t understand has enormous meaning so if it was as you misunderstand it they might be bad? Gotcha. Go take a nap.

So any team that doesn’t win the SB for whatever reason 31 teams out of 32 don’t win it, ar all just making excuses?

They were what they were, a 10-7 team that played like a 10-7 team. They had good stretches and bad stretches. They had good games and bad games, good players and bad players. It’s as if you think Belichick could make some kind of public statement that you like, and it would have turned into 15-2.

It seems you just want to whine.

 

[40yrpatsfan]

The answer is simple.

The reason why they have losing records in 2019, 2020 and 2021 in December is because they a) played better teams/bad matchups and b) they weren't a really good football team.

Brady's last season they had no weapons, and 2020 they had a bad overall team under Cam, so no surprise they couldn't finish strong either year. 2021 was a disappointing end, but 2 of those losses were vs Buffalo, and they just couldn't match up with them last year. Their talent level on both sides of the ball is better this year.

 

[RobertWeathers]

Brady's last season they had no weapons, and 2020 they had a bad overall team under Cam, so no surprise they couldn't finish strong either year. 2021 was a disappointing end, but 2 of those losses were vs Buffalo, and they just couldn't match up with them last year. Their talent level on both sides of the ball is better this year.

Exactly. People are overthinking it.

 

[festy1986]

They were a playoff team last year after ONE non playoff season. They were the 1 seed with a month to go.

What's you're point? That blowout playoff game buys them an entire season of underwhelming play this year?

I already said that they are trending in the right direction and that if they go out there and lay a 5 win season egg that that is unacceptable. You have to build on last year, not regress.

 

[Ghost_Rush02]

How do you figure defense is weaker than last year? The line is better, they have faster corners, LB got a speed upgrade where we were getting killed.

Before i begin, yes it's still early and we have no idea how this team will look by mid to the end of the year but...

1. Being younger, or faster does not mean being better.

2. as someone put it. Our best corner last year in J.C. Jackson and he really isn't like an elite corner is gone and was getting tortured on the regular when facing Stefon Diggs. Crap we even had our issues against Waddle when we played Miami and he was just a rookie at the time, what do you think its going to be like this year now that they added Tyreek Hill into the mix?

3. Our Linebackers besides Judon(who kind of fell off last year late in the season) are now made of up unproven NFL rookies who haven't even done anything noteworthy yet in preseason (yes we know its preseason but no one has shown any flashes of what could be yet...) And a couple outcast from other teams...how is that better than your proven vets last season..( yes although slow, and did need to be replaced they were still proven NFL linebackers)


4. both lines offense and defense have been struggling ontop of the fact we traded away Shaq Mason and we have a couple unhappy Olinemen now.


Not to go rehash details that we all know to this point. But reports and notes read the defense has only looked good so far against our own offense that's it.



Oh and our ultimately best corner we had was Gilmore who never got back into a patriots uniform.

 

[Pats1971]

Ok without him
2008 went 11-5 with a qb who hadn’t started since HS
2016 went 2-0 with a qb who had never started a game in the nfl
Went 1-1 with a rookie who had a damaged throwing hand in the loss and couldn’t throw the ball
2020 went 7-9 with Legarm Newton after Brady bailed
2021 went 10-7 with a rookie Qb one of the few teams to ever make the playoffs with a rookie starting qb

So if you think that you need to not count the tremendous success he had with a stable QB (which I guess means there has never been a coach who gets credit for his success) then take a look at what he has done with unstable QB situations. Who has ever done better with QBs who never started a game before?

Here let me fill in the actual gaps.
2000 went 5-11 with Brady not starting
2008 Lost 5 more games then the year before when brady went down
2016 went 3-1, 1 game was with the Qb passing for 100 yards because the texans turned it over 4 times in their own side of the field.
2020 with a team that went 12-4 went 7-9 with the loss of Brady
2021 went 10-7 and made the playoffs because of an extra game added onto the season got blown out the worst in Bills coaching history on the pats in the first playoff game.

In total without Brady record is 36-32 zero playoff wins
With Brady 219-64 34 playoff wins 6 superbowls 10 conference title games

I guess if we lower the bar enough that is pretty good.

 

[Ghost_Rush02]

I don’t want to live anymore

and to cap off going to the other way about the rebuild so far..this is worrisome. How can you improve or build if you can't get some of your decision correct. Just possibly 2 players will never be enough to build a proper 53 man roster. Add in the free agency too....we finally spent money and it seems like we only did just "OK" there too.

 

[crawhammer]

No one is “taking extra time”. Are you that vacant that you think the patriots just decide to get less prepared for the season than other teams and don’t care about the first 4 games? My God were you born yesterday?

So, you are arguing that an off the cuff statement that you don’t understand has enormous meaning so if it was as you misunderstand it they might be bad? Gotcha. Go take a nap.

Hahaha you think I actually believe they don't care about the first 4 games? On the contrary, unless Bill is really a total moron, then he's actually trying to win every single game starting week 1 of every season. It's the IBWTers who make up the "extended preseason" garbage so they have an excuse for a slow start.

You said "In the NFL the first quarter of the season involves teams developing identity and figuring out how the pieces fit together." Your pieces need to fit together by today at 4:00 PM. Season starts in less than 2 weeks. The team should have an intention for the season on both sides of the ball by now. You have to construct your roster to fit your identity, not the other way around. Were the dynasty teams scrambling around for an identify well into seasons? For the most part, no. From 2003 to 2017 they had 12 teams that finished with 12 or more wins... I don't recall any talk of extended preseasons and still searching for identities in October.

They have gotten worse now from a deterioration of talent through not retaining good players who command larger contracts, poor to mixed draft results, and questionable FA moves. That's why they haven't been able to sustain anything in the latter part of seasons.

2021 was a disappointing end, but 2 of those losses were vs Buffalo, and they just couldn't match up with them last year. Their talent level on both sides of the ball is better this year.

I disagree. The o-line looks worse, which could have a ripple effect through the entire offense. The skill position groups are basically the same with the notable addition of Parker and a rookie receiver who's going to miss half the season anyway. Major drop-off in coaching talent too... from McDaniels to Patricia, who's clumsily trying to implement a new offense (which is a whole other debate). Their defense lost their best player and some veteran leadership has left the room.

Buffalo on the other hand has gotten better (on paper) and they already were a much better team. The division is out the window and the wild card spots will be harder to secure with the overall improvement of AFC teams. Could be a long season(s).

 

[Ring 6]

Hahaha you think I actually believe they don't care about the first 4 games? On the contrary, unless Bill is really a total moron, then he's actually trying to win every single game starting week 1 of every season. It's the IBWTers who make up the "extended preseason" garbage so they have an excuse for a slow start.

You said "In the NFL the first quarter of the season involves teams developing identity and figuring out how the pieces fit together." Your pieces need to fit together by today at 4:00 PM. Season starts in less than 2 weeks. The team should have an intention for the season on both sides of the ball by now. You have to construct your roster to fit your identity, not the other way around. Were the dynasty teams scrambling around for an identify well into seasons? For the most part, no. From 2003 to 2017 they had 12 teams that finished with 12 or more wins... I don't recall any talk of extended preseasons and still searching for identities in October.

They have gotten worse now from a deterioration of talent through not retaining good players who command larger contracts, poor to mixed draft results, and questionable FA moves. That's why they haven't been able to sustain anything in the latter part of seasons.


I disagree. The o-line looks worse, which could have a ripple effect through the entire offense. The skill position groups are basically the same with the notable addition of Parker and a rookie receiver who's going to miss half the season anyway. Major drop-off in coaching talent too... from McDaniels to Patricia, who's clumsily trying to implement a new offense (which is a whole other debate). Their defense lost their best player and some veteran leadership has left the room.

Buffalo on the other hand has gotten better (on paper) and they already were a much better team. The division is out the window and the wild card spots will be harder to secure with the overall improvement of AFC teams. Could be a long season(s).

Explain something to me. Why, after being a Patriot fan through the most successful run in the history of the sport do you feel the need to labor so hard to tear done the coach who ran it?

All the rest is just blather. You say it, you don’t listen to what anyone says and then you repeat it.
What is your objective here?

Oh and the “extended preseason” comments were first said in 2014. You remember 2014 right? That was when they won the SB, the start of going to 4 and winning 3 of them in 5 years.

Belichick used the comment to explain the OL gelling with changes made to it and playing together as a unit.
This week HE WAS ASKED IF THATS STILL HOW THE LEAGUE WORKS.
Do you think he planted the question to create an excuse because he’s afraid of your criticism?
Dude, I get you are a loser who sees every one of your failures as a series of excuses. Just don’t bring it here. Go be a Jags fan where you can revel in failure and be happy.

 

[captain stone]

...When November of 2020 came around and the team was 2-5 and it was clear Cam was done he should have been yanked to see if there was any slim chance Stidham could play. Say what you want about Stidham but he can at least physically throw a football which it was apparently Cam could no longer do.

Uche played 50% of the snaps one time all of 2020 and played less than 30% of the snaps 5 out of the 9 games he played and still ended up with 9 tackles, sack, 2 tackles for a loss, and 7 QB hits. When he was healthy he should have seen more playing time.

Asiasi and Keene were literally the only two tight ends on the roster and still ended up as healthy scratches for half the year.

Herron, Dugger, and Onwenu were the only ones to see any real playing time that year as rookies and surprise, surprise, looks like Onwenu and Dugger will be starters this year with Herron in the mix to be the swing tackle. Maybe when you actually get the young guys on the field they can develop into a starter quicker.

Yep; Bill should've done what's best for the T-E-A-M by trading Gilmore & others at the deadline to reap maximum value... He then should've given the kids (including Stiddy) more snaps while giving others (including Cant Newton) fewer of them...

But Bill had, let's just say, other things on his mind...

 

[captain stone]

I don’t want to live anymore

Barnwell can go farther than that if he wants...2017 (0/2)... 2016 (2/4)... 2015 (1/3)...

 

[TheRainMaker]

Yep; Bill should've done what's best for the T-E-A-M by trading Gilmore

Could've fleeced a team coming off of DPOY who Bill knew he wasn't going to pay. This might be Bill's' most negligent use of assets. And he's having a really good camp. However, we need to see how he does when the regular season starts.

Can Stephon Gilmore recapture All-Pro form with Indianapolis Colts?

Gilmore didn't like his departure from the Patriots, and he didn't play a big role in Carolina, so he has a chance to prove himself again in Indy.

www.espn.com

Stephon Gilmore has been giving the Colts offense fits, but they love the challenge

With training camp in full swing, Stephon Gilmore has stood out for this Indianapolis Colts defense that is challenging the offense daily.

horseshoeheroes.com