Andy Benoit's SB Recap with McVay

tasmlab · May 9, 2019

sean10mm said:
When is the last time the Pats had a RB who was both a strong runner AND a strong receiver? OF COURSE if you play the guy who can run but not catch the other team expects run. And that's when you play action pass. Just like with Blount and Ridley and BJGE and Dillion etc.

Or White/Vereen/Faulk "give away" that it's a pass, and sometimes they run the ball anyway.

I think they gave the ball to Burkhead on the final goal line TD run mostly because they would be selling run or throw if they gave it to Michel or White respectively.

tasmlab · May 9, 2019

QuantumMechanic said:
I cannot agree with you. There were Falcon chokes in that game outside of and independent from NE's play. However, it is true that NE had to play flawlessly to take advantage of those chokes.

A few easy examples:

Snapping the ball over and over again with way too much time on the play clock. If they had just done the simple thing of snapping the ball with less time on the clock there would simply not have been enough time for NE to come back and tie.

Not making getting the game-icing FG a priority after the insane Jones catch on the sideline. They could have taken a couple of minutes off the clock and highly likely would have gotten the FG just playing conservative there. That would have been a deathblow to NE's chances. There was no need to play aggressively there.

The RB choking and not noticing Hightower on the strip sack. He wouldn't have even had to make a solid block. As it was, if HT was even a fraction of a second later it would at best have been an incomplete pass (and the subsequent punt and long field for NE would have made it much tougher on NE) or maybe even a TD, as Butler was totally burned on the play and Ryan was looking to throw to Butler's wide open man.

Don't disagree. I was being hyperbolic. @luuked 's take below may be a fairer take that it took both choking and brilliant play to make it happen.

patfanken · May 9, 2019

Well it looks like I pissed off the James White fan club.

The the fact remains if you'd rather have James White carrying the ball over Michel, Burkhead, or Harris then you are simply delusional, or haven't been watching any games the past 4 years.

So I'm waiting for someone to come out and say, in print, that given a choice they'd rather have White running the ball over Michel, Burkhead, or Harris

Ball's in your court

primetime · May 9, 2019

patfanken said:
Well it looks like I pissed off the James White fan club.

The the fact remains if you'd rather have James White carrying the ball over Michel, Burkhead, or Harris then you are simply delusional, or haven't been watching any games the past 4 years.

So I'm waiting for someone to come out and say, in print, that given a choice they'd rather have White running the ball over Michel, Burkhead, or Harris

Ball's in your court

I mean, Harris hasn't played a down in anger in the NFL, Burkhead averaged 3.3 yards per carry last season and has never carried the ball more than 75 times in a year, while White averaged a healthy 4.5 yards per carry last season on a respectable 94 carries. He's obviously a change-of-pace back, but he's far from the deficient runner out of the backfield that he was early in his career.

primetime · May 9, 2019

On that topic, Josh Norris has a good post-draft series at Rotoworld that collects the public thoughts oand justifications for each team's draft picks. McVay said he specifically had James White in mind when he took Darrell Henderson. In fact he specifically went looking for a James White by lining up running back prospects at wide receiver during visits all spring.

SBLIII · May 9, 2019

patfanken said:
Well it looks like I pissed off the James White fan club.

The the fact remains if you'd rather have James White carrying the ball over Michel, Burkhead, or Harris then you are simply delusional, or haven't been watching any games the past 4 years.

So I'm waiting for someone to come out and say, in print, that given a choice they'd rather have White running the ball over Michel, Burkhead, or Harris

Ball's in your court

There is a reason White has carried the ball as many times as he did in his 5 years in the league.

WaterfallJumper · May 9, 2019

patfanken said:
Well it looks like I pissed off the James White fan club.

The the fact remains if you'd rather have James White carrying the ball over Michel, Burkhead, or Harris then you are simply delusional, or haven't been watching any games the past 4 years.

So I'm waiting for someone to come out and say, in print, that given a choice they'd rather have White running the ball over Michel, Burkhead, or Harris

Ball's in your court

And what about a hurry-up offense? It's not really relevant who is the best ball carrier, only that White has improved to the point where he's a legitimate threat when he does carry the ball. He gives the offense an incredible amount of flexibility. Brady clearly loves him. He's a very, very good all around player; it's baffling that you still don't like him.

patfanken · May 9, 2019

primetime said:
I mean, Harris hasn't played a down in anger in the NFL, Burkhead averaged 3.3 yards per carry last season and has never carried the ball more than 75 times in a year, while White averaged a healthy 4.5 yards per carry last season on a respectable 94 carries. He's obviously a change-of-pace back, but he's far from the deficient runner out of the backfield that he was early in his career.

I know Harris hasn't got an NFL carry, but he was drafted as high as he was because he's the "big back" we didn't have last season.

And don't give me that ypc crap. A large percentage of White's carries come on draws when the defense is spread out and expecting something else. There was a reason when the Pats were backed up and needed to run the ball in the superbowl it was Michel and Burkhead who got the call. Why was that?

I appreciate your comments but you didn't really state that given the choice you rather have White carry the ball over Burkhead, Michel, or even Harris (which I admit might be a stretch)

patfanken · May 9, 2019

reamer said:
And what about a hurry-up offense? It's not really relevant who is the best ball carrier, only that White has improved to the point where he's a legitimate threat when he does carry the ball. He gives the offense an incredible amount of flexibility. Brady clearly loves him. He's a very, very good all around player; it's baffling that you still don't like him.

Still waiting for you to categorically state that you'd rather have White run the ball than Burkhead, Michel, and what we expect Harris to be. (the big back we didn't have last year)

BTW- I'm not saying that White has NEVER had a good run, or isn't sometimes effective running the ball out of spread formations. Or that he hasn't improved from his horrific first 2 years. I just state that he, relatively speaking, the last back I want to be running the football, when we choose to run the football. He's #4. Who would you put behind him?

Wheelman · May 9, 2019

DropKickFlutie said:
This isn't good:
---

“They had a big tell on two-back alignments,” Brockers says, explaining that if Develin aligned on the strong side, he would trap-block the nose tackle. If Develin aligned on the weak side, he would wind back across the formation as a lead-blocker.

A broader, more obvious tell came from who the Patriots had at running back. When Sony Michel was in, it was often with the fullback Develin, and the likelihood of a run was very high. So, the Rams played their stouter base 4-3 defense. But if Burkhead or especially James White was in, the Patriots were likely to throw. So here the Rams played nickel, even if one of those back was in with the smashmouthing Develin.

Don't worry. BB has talked about tendencies before. He said if you're good at something you do it anyways. And it showed in the playoffs, didn't it?

Nunchucks · May 9, 2019

patfanken said:
Well it looks like I pissed off the James White fan club.

The the fact remains if you'd rather have James White carrying the ball over Michel, Burkhead, or Harris then you are simply delusional, or haven't been watching any games the past 4 years.

So I'm waiting for someone to come out and say, in print, that given a choice they'd rather have White running the ball over Michel, Burkhead, or Harris

Ball's in your court

I'd agree but you added Harris. Not sure if he better than White running the ball in that situation, since has not played in the NFL

bbobbo · May 9, 2019

robertweathers said:
Shes a freaking goddess. My god.

Russian model I believe. She met him when he was OC with the Skins. She was a student and George Mason. The web site said she was 29.

PATSNUTme said:
would it be wrong to collude with her?

she can manipulate my election....
.

patfanken · May 10, 2019

Nunchucks said:
I'd agree but you added Harris. Not sure if he better than White running the ball in that situation, since has not played in the NFL

Well that's a legitimate reply, but if Harris isn't a better runner than James White then that would make him one of the worst draft picks in the BB era.

luuked · May 10, 2019

patfanken said:
BTW- I'm not saying that White has NEVER had a good run, or isn't sometimes effective running the ball out of spread formations. Or that he hasn't improved from his horrific first 2 years. I just state that he, relatively speaking, the last back I want to be running the football, when we choose to run the football. He's #4. Who would you put behind him?

The problem with all of this is that you are looking at it without any context. White is one of McD's favorite tools to create mismatches via personnel. If you see a chance to exploit something like him in space on the LB or the other team going nickel with him on the field (and you exploiting it via different means) it is obviously more relevant than straight YPC.

Similarly as others have mentioned he is solid enough as a RB that he gives you a way to run no-huddle to keep opponents in whatever personnel they are in to keep pounding that mismatch.

supafly · May 10, 2019

patfanken said:
Well it looks like I pissed off the James White fan club.

The the fact remains if you'd rather have James White carrying the ball over Michel, Burkhead, or Harris then you are simply delusional, or haven't been watching any games the past 4 years.

So I'm waiting for someone to come out and say, in print, that given a choice they'd rather have White running the ball over Michel, Burkhead, or Harris

Ball's in your court

For a small fee of a few hundred bucks, you can pay James White to say that he’s a better running back. Or vice versa. James White doesn’t really care. Fnord (pronounced “eff nord”) will whore him out to anyone with a credit card.

And by the way, long live MF James White. The dude is an absolute beast who comes up huge in crucial moments. Much like you, I prefer to see him dodging tacklers after he’s made a catch, but he’s definitely good enough on the ground to where he poses a matchup nightmare, (Like luuked stated).

supafly · May 10, 2019

primetime said:
To be fair, they almost certainly drafted Sony with the expectation he would be a dual-threat. You don't spend a 1st rounder on a running back who can't play in both phases, and Sony had over 60 catches in his college career so this isn't a Blount or Ridley who never caught the ball even in college.

I’m totally convinced that trying to involve Sony in the passing game was one of our SB wrinkles. They attempted to throw to him twice, early on, but neither pass ended up as a completion.

I fully believe that he’ll be a larger part of our passing game, moving forward.

luuked · May 10, 2019

supafly said:
I’m totally convinced that trying to involve Sony in the passing game was one of our SB wrinkles. They attempted to throw to him twice, early on, but neither pass ended up as a completion.

I fully believe that he’ll be a larger part of our passing game, moving forward.

If anyone wants to look for that "year 2" jump in Sony then him being more involved in the passing game would be the most important development. He doesn't have to be nowhere near elite but just competent enough to make the offense less predictable. Similar to a "deep threat" receiver it is more about making the opponent believe you can threaten them and not so much about actually doing it frequently.

RobertWeathers · May 10, 2019

supafly said:
I’m totally convinced that trying to involve Sony in the passing game was one of our SB wrinkles. They attempted to throw to him twice, early on, but neither pass ended up as a completion.

I fully believe that he’ll be a larger part of our passing game, moving forward.

...and Harris had 52 catches at Bama.

It's crystal clear what they want to do.

slam · May 10, 2019

patfanken said:
Still waiting for you to categorically state that you'd rather have White run the ball than Burkhead, Michel, and what we expect Harris to be. (the big back we didn't have last year)

BTW- I'm not saying that White has NEVER had a good run, or isn't sometimes effective running the ball out of spread formations. Or that he hasn't improved from his horrific first 2 years. I just state that he, relatively speaking, the last back I want to be running the football, when we choose to run the football. He's #4. Who would you put behind him?

I would not hesitate to give the ball to James White in the most critical short yardage situations, including must-have goal line situations.

Sincerely,
Bill Belichick and Josh McDaniel, Super Bowl LI

40yrpatsfan · May 10, 2019

I agree with the others over Ken, which is rare. First of all, he improved tremendously as a scrimmage runner from his rookie season to his 3rd season. He really was dogmeat his first 1 1/2 seasons as a runner, but by year 3 he was delivering SB winning runs, including a critical 2 point conversion if I recall right. So try to erase his first couple of years from your memory.

Yes, he's not as effective as the others in running downs, but he's such a threat as a receiver that he can pick up 4.5 ypc when the Pats mix it up and hand it off to him. That's what you call a weapon.

Andy Benoit's SB Recap with McVay

Starting QB, won 20 SBs, number is retired

Starting QB, won 20 SBs, number is retired

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Pro Bowl Player

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In the Starting Line-Up

Veteran Starter w/Big Long Term Deal

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2nd Team Getting Their First Start

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