Official Post Game Thread -Pats @ Dolphins

archstanton543 said:

I thought Hogan hurt his arm and not his legs.

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Have you ever tried to run with a separated shoulder?

Keyser Söze said:

Nice to see Harmon go off on his teammates on the side line trying to get them going.

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Harmon is one of the leaders on the team. Reported to have had a steadying influence during the SB.

varjao said:

The big problem yesterday was the 3rd down.

Miami converted all of them that I can remember with exception to that when Cutler could've run for the 1st down. And as far as I watched the Patrios were 0/9 in 3rd downs.

-The O-line is shaky.
-Brady is not comfortable with something, either the OL, or his ankle, or both.
-No Edelman and no Gronk AKA the chain movers, absent at the same time, that's a big problem. We need someone to take over the middle, we only have Gronk. I had big hopes for Mitchell but I think he is headed to become Dobson part 2.

And of course, Miami had a great game, kudos to them. Cutler played a good game, their RB's, insane D#, Gaze with great play calling, they have a good team on paper but yesterday they finally put it all together. It's a rare event but it happens.

Not sure what to think about next week, maybe we got caught on a look ahead spot? Hard to believe this would happen in a BB coached team, but it happens, I had a bad feeling about this game and after our first drive it seems like the whole team knew that would be a long night.

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Agree with A lot of this with the exception of Mitchell being Dobson 2.0. And it’s not just you a few posters have made this comparison. Is this just because of injury? To me just watching some of the plays malcolm made last year he’s a much more complete wr than Dobson and it’s not close.

robertweathers said:

Boy was I off on Hogan/Dorsett. I figured they would ease Hogan in and w/ Gronk out play Dorsett more.

He didn't even see the field.

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I thought Dorsett would see the field for at least a dozen plays. Receivers rarely got separation, except for DA once or twice, and even then TB had a hard time getting them the ball. McClain is right; he looked rattled because of the rush. Miami seemed to take away everything - deep ball, intermediate passes, even checkdowns.

Brady just taking one for the team, throwing up a **** game to get the team fired up for the final few games of the season. going into the playoffs with a long winning streak is always a bad thing.

TomPatriot said:

I thought Dorsett would see the field for at least a dozen plays. Receivers rarely got separation, except for DA once or twice, and even then TB had a hard time getting them the ball. McClain is right; he looked rattled because of the rush. Miami seemed to take away everything - deep ball, intermediate passes, even checkdowns.

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You can’t take away everything consistently. He was simply not finding what they were giving. Miami did play well on defense - Brady looked confused and rushed.

Would like to see Dorsett more involved. Felt like Brady was forcing it to all these people who aren't getting open anyway...

That game felt a lot like a "end of 2015 regular season" game.

maineman209 said:

It might not have mattered as much that one guy was able to shutdown Cooks (it happens), if Brady had had someone (?) besides Amendola and a recovering Hogan to target at greater depth than the RBs.

I'm not sure that Dorsett even got any snaps last night. Even if Brady wasn't going to target him, he's certainly capable of pulling some coverage away.

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I am getting the feeling that apart from the obvious routes (deep go, comebacks, deep slants ect.) Josh & co just cant make Cooks fit into the offense in an organic way. In games where he can be used as the (soon to be) expensive chess piece that he is Cooks can get his targets and yards. However in games where -- for whatever reason (e.g. Gronk is not available) -- we need him to step up and do more than that we just cant make it work.

And I dont mean it as an insult to Cooks at all. I think he is having a fine season and maybe it is entirely on me but I thought that at this point we would be able to use him in way more versatile ways than go-routes and comebacks. I honestly believed that he could become a weapon that can be used similarly as the Steelers do with AB if we can just get him into space but it just doesnt work.

And then Brady still somehow decides to focus on him. I have noticed 1-2 plays where Dola was open in the middle but Brady had already decided that he wanted to go to the sideline where Cooks was.

Jesus the entire game felt so weirdly off on offense..

TB5XSBW said:

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Is that your wife?

He’s 40. Tick tick tick

robertweathers said:

Seeing how they gave up 183 yards on the ground vs BUF and Drake pounded the rock last night, I'm wondering if Valentine still makes more sense.

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Depends on Branch and his injury for me. If it is something minor or at least manageable then MM might actually be another type of WR for Josh to play around with in games where things seem to fall apart. If Branch is done for the year or out for a longer time then we definitely need another body in the interior.

Obviously all based on the assumption that both of them are similarly likely to come back. Otherwise bring back whoever is more healthy to avoid another McClellan situation.

robertweathers said:

Lots of runs to the outside. Expecting Wise and Lee to be KVN and Flowers is not realistic.

The stats show since the TB game and before the BUF game the run D has been good.

I still think they have a little but of a problem with runs between the tackles but the edge setting will be solved with health.

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I agree. You just cant put out a set of Elandon Roberts (at best a situational player), Eric Lee (coming from the practice squad), Trevor Reilly (career backup) and a ST player in M. Flowers and assume that there will be no falloff / that they wont be attacked by the opponents. It just goes to show that after losing McClellan, Hightower and Langi we are really razor thin over there.

luuked said:

Depends on Branch and his injury for me. If it is something minor or at least manageable then MM might actually be another type of WR for Josh to play around with in games where things seem to fall apart. If Branch is done for the year or for some time then we definitely need another body in the interior.

Obviously all based on the assumption that both of them are similarly likely to come back. Otherwise bring back whoever is more healthy to avoid another McClellan situation.

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Thats how I see it too.

Regardless of who it is, they'll need some time to get their conditioning squared away prior to the playoffs.

I fully expect a decision to be made after the Pitt game.

robertweathers said:

Boy was I off on Hogan/Dorsett. I figured they would ease Hogan in and w/ Gronk out play Dorsett more.

He didn't even see the field.

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And to finish my quote trifecta I totally agree here. It is very confusing how Dorsett is used by Josh. Without the benefit of knowing what goes on in practice it is rather weird that they didnt at least give him a couple of snaps even just as decoy or to give Hogan a bit of rest.

Confusing..

varjao said:

The big problem yesterday was the 3rd down.

Miami converted all of them that I can remember with exception to that when Cutler could've run for the 1st down. And as far as I watched the Patriots were 0/9 in 3rd downs.

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The Pats were 0/11.

The 'Fins were 4/14, plus 1/1 on 4th down.

TomPatriot said:

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My girl.

This may have been the worst game of the season for McDaniels. I'm not one to normally pile on him, but if your quarterback is absorbing one highlight reel hit after another and you're having issues with pass protection up the B-gap, it might not make sense to call long-developing pass plays (particularly on third and short). You might want to go into the no-huddle, use motion, and make use of quicker-developing route concepts like slants and quick outs to alleviate some of the pressure.

KontradictioN said:

This may have been the worst game of the season for McDaniels. I'm not one to normally pile on him, but if your quarterback is absorbing one highlight reel hit after another and you're having issues with pass protection up the B-gap, it might not make sense to call long-developing pass plays (particularly on third and short). You might want to go into the no-huddle, use motion, and make use of quicker-developing route concepts like slants and quick outs to alleviate some of the pressure.

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McDaniels gameplan, Jesus how much time you got to talk about that disaster. Even though we should’ve gotten a holding call on Howard that 3rd and 1 out route was rediculous. Even worse was using white on the 3rd and short lateral before the half. That’s just basically not using someone’s skill set appropriately. That’s a play either designed for cooks or using playaction off of cooks to get the first down. To me that was just a loser mentality to have a promising drive before the half abruptly stalled due to our own decisions, settling for 3

Might be a tad more than that.

IIRC, Hogan didn't even shed the sling until 3 weeks ago. Which means maybe 3 weeks before that with possibly no actual running whatsoever - stair-climber and bike perhaps. After that, maybe two weeks grdually ramping up from light jogging to sprinting and cutting. Then, he's limited in practice for a week leading up to last night's game.

He played 90% of the snaps last night (running, cutting and blocking), which might have been his hardest workout since he was injured.

Speaking from (related) personal experience, after that long a layoff, it might be week-16 or 17 before he's gotten all of his pre-injury speed and cutting quickness back.

And then there's his blocking. He might not have done much significant upper-body work for as long as four weeks.

luuked said:

Depends on Branch and his injury for me. If it is something minor or at least manageable then MM might actually be another type of WR for Josh to play around with in games where things seem to fall apart. If Branch is done for the year or out for a longer time then we definitely need another body in the interior.

Obviously all based on the assumption that both of them are similarly likely to come back. Otherwise bring back whoever is more healthy to avoid another McClellan situation.

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OTOH, VV is coming off an injury and hasn't physically practiced, much less played, at NFL speed and contact level for at least 14 weeks. There are 3 weeks left in the regular season and (hopefully) 3 playoff games. Even if he starts practicing with the team this week, how long until he can be a significant upgrade over a guy like RJF who has at least been participating in NFL-level practices since September?

With Mitchell, as long as he's just healthy enough to play, he's kind of an automatic upgrade over a completely healthy WR off the street who would still need to learn the offense from the ground up.