How many of you blame Cassel?

[PATS22]

The defense broke down completely in every way. Cassel needs a heck of alot more protection than what he was given yesterday. He took some serious shots and shook them off like a man who has been starting for years. I still have a huge amount of faith in our team. GO PATS!!

 

[PatsDeb]

This is not a "yes" or "no" question. While Cassel made a couple of really bad plays (stupid INT, fumble), the most blame has to go on the D and their coaches. How the hell do a bunch of intelligent football players (which we know the Pats are) get totally run over 4 TIMES by the same bush league play?!?! OMG!! They were totally humiliated! By the Dolphins no less!!

I think the blame chart looks something like this:

1.Asleep defense
2. Comatose coaches who forgot to yell, "Look out for the Ronnie Brown fake handoff play!" when they saw Chad Pennington lining up wide AGAIN!!

3. Terrible O-line that doesn't give inexperienced QB 2 seconds to try to get a pass off

4. Inexperienced QB who made a few bad plays and failed to get anything going when 1, 2 and 3 happened repeatedly.

Luckily it's one loss and we have 2 weeks to right the ship. BB better get crackin'!

 

[BradyManny]

He is very low on the blame chart. I'm not even sure if he's on the blame chart. He generally did what was asked of him again.

Defense
O-Line
Coaching

Not to mention, the Phins played a hell of a game on both sides of the ball.

All that said - and this is not a knock on Cassel at all - if Tom Brady is in there, its a completely different game, no doubt. We score on those first two drives, go up 14-0 and completely change the make-up of the game. As I said in another thread, I hope this puts last season into perspective. These types of losses happen...every year except for last year, which should help put the 16-0 achievement in perspective.

 

[D-Money]

The problem with Cassel is that he needs to manage the game.He will most likely average 165 yards to 185 yards passing.If u expect this team to win close games, ur nuts.This team needs to put up points and rest this defense.Cassel is not the guy and i will continue to say it.

 

[Leave No Doubt]

Football is the ultimate team sport- it would be difficult to blame a loss (or win) on any one player. Every team has 60 minutes to correct it's mistakes and make adjustments and it has 2 sides of the ball with which to do that.

Every team has a coach for each unit it fields, it has TO's, it has the right to challenge, and it has many sources of information coming at it throughout the game. Somewhere something broke down. Cassel definitely gets a piece but so does everybody else.

Here's what I know for sure- Joey Porter had his way out there. Chad Pennington looked like Joe Montana and Ronnie Brown will have you tubes from now til eternity.

 

[Rob0729]

Sorry, but it clearly wasn't his fault. He didn't give up 38 points. Every single one of the Dolphins TDs started pretty deep in Dolphins' territory (their shortest TD drive started on their 26) so he didn't conceed field position. At least in the first half, Cassel didn't have short drives that kept the defense on the field other than the opening drive (his other three drives in the first half had 8 plays, 10 plays and 13 plays). This was clearly a loss that lies far more on the shoulders of the defense than anyone on the offense.

Cassel needs to play better going forward, but other than Hobbs' kick returning and Gostkowski who can't we say that about. I think if Cassel did everything that the Pats wanted him to do going into the game, the Pats still would have lost by at least 2 TDs.

 

[javajunky]

It's simple. He folds under pressure. You can't coach him up from that.

 

[spook75]

Nah, they didn't lose because of cassel , they lost on all fronts
That said he does need to improve though, there were some missed chances and some bad mistakes.

 

[PatsWickedPissah]

Matty needs to improve his game. Not comfy in what passes for a pocket with this OL. Sunday he often looked at option 1 and went to a 2nd option which is good. I always felt that he was/is our best REALISTIC option as a backup. But fans should note, a backup is a guy who should finish a game for you when your starter gets injured or maybe start a couple while he heals. A guy who plays the majority of 16 games is called a 'starter'. There are only about 20 halfway decent starters in the entire NFL. Expecting our backup to outperform starters is unrealistic.

 

[patzchick]

Still early I think he will figure it out....

 

[tedylb]

Tom Brady wouldn't have saved the Pats yesterday. We lost the game at the line of scrimmage. While Pennington had all day to pass, Cassel was under pressure all day long. And the Dolphin's run blocking was far superior to ours. Give credit to the Dolphin O-line and their defensive front 7. This game was won-and lost-in the trenches.

This is no time to panic or write off the Patriot's chances. It's time to regroup. And I think the coaches and team will.

 

[DGameguy]

No but he re-assured me that I don't think he can bring the team back from behind.

Exactly. I don't put the blame entirely on Cassel. The line on both sides of the ball played poorly. But when the Fins went up 21-6, I felt no confidence in Cassel's ability to bring the team back (at 14-3 I didn't feel too great about it either, truth be told). And that says everything in the world about his play. He can't string two-frist downs together, so how is he supposed to put together two or three scoring drives?

If this team is going to win games this year it is going to have to be by holding the lead or staying within single digits of the opponent the entire game.

 

[PJM]

He didn't have a very good game but very few players did. We have gone from a situation where the QB was our best player and could put the rest of the team on his back a couple of times a season to one where the QB is in the lower half talent-wise and needs everyone else to carry him sometimes. I've never believed that he was kept on the team because he was the next TB, he was just good value at the price. This kind of game will happen to a QB of his ability if the rest of the team plays badly. Remember how we used to be so proud about the Patriots' team ethic? The flipside of having no superstars is having no scapegoats.