It's a poorly written sentence with no offering of a comparison.. And it's only Bedard's claim that the pressures were Vollmer's responsibility.
And just remember. This is the same guy who blamed the running game for the loss even though the running game actually did extremely well when called upon.
Only it didn't. Especially considering it was running against the nickle. And he doesn't blame the backs for most of the lack of success, although he cites a couple of instances where they made the wrong read. He blames the run blocking and in particular that of the TE's. His point being absent Gronk this team was not only limited in the passing game they were limited in the running game.
This team has long needed a running component that is more than complimentary. They need one that can run the ball when they have to, even when the opposition knows it's coming. During the regular season the team set out to balance the offense, but their success was built on a foundation of sand. They could and did run against teams they should have been able to. But they continued to rely on TE blocking (scheme) as a means to that end. They still couldn't run at will against stout run defenses let alone absent their top blocking TE. Statistically they created a misleading assumption which the Ravens chose to challenge, and won.
Bedard's analysis isn't perfect. Can't be when you don't know for a fact what assignments were. He bases most of his conclusions on the success or failure of players based on one on one matchups. But someone gave up 19 pressures (he lays the blame on Brady in two instances) and something resulted in a 3.6 ypc average even on a night when they faced nickle defense more than 90% of the time.
But he does spread the blame around and the end results back up his rational analysis of what the all 22 tape showed him. Injuries hurt them, but we're talking a handful of them which is nearly to be expected. And for that the FO bears the lions share of responsibility. On a night when Brady had limited options to begin with, no one stepped up as a playmaker. Too many drops or stupid mistakes, too few alternative options (Branch played 47% of snaps), conservative field position mindset that led to horrendous clock management, defense unable to generate pressure absent Jones, defense unable to generate turnovers, defense unable to get off the field on third and long, defense challenged to cover deep unable to cover middle to intermediate routes or ultimately in the red zone. It was a combination of insufficient functional depth meets sloppy execution compounded by headscratching game planning and play calling.
Off season self scouting resulted in a flurry of activity designed to upgrade talent at both starting and depth positions on the roster that extended right up to the trading deadline. But at the end of the day most of that activity didn't pan out. Draftees flashed potential but either ended up just flashing it or injured. Never found the functional depth they needed at TE despite investing quite a bit of time and money and valuable roster spots into the search. Upgraded the existing WR corps but failed to do so sufficiently and left it too thin to compensate for injury driven TE issues. Alienated a pro bowl RG they could't then buy back and invested sight unseen in a DT who like numerous veteran WR's whose tires they kicked didn't make it through camp.
This teams got some work to do. They seem to be able to self scout in hindsight, what they do with the information that has been somewhat spotty. Here's hoping they can re-sign most of their own FA or locate adequate replacements (because this team needs more talent not less), they can add a couple of more significant pieces on both sides of the ball via the draft and FA who are durable and can contribute right away and the 2012 rookie class all makes that big year 2 step that Bill always talks about as opposed to regressing in their spohomore season as so many here have of late.
