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Couldn't have asked for a better result. Haven't been relaxed for so long watching a Pats game in a long time. So lets begin.
1. The elephant in the room - There were 2 key questions that I wanted to see play out in the is game. First was the play of the OL. That was answered almost immediately. It was about as good as we could have hoped for. I didn't think Bud Dupree even sniffed Brady tonight. I think Collinsworth mentioned in 36 pass snaps Wynn gave up one pressure. I don't doubt it happened, but I didn't see it.. From Light to Solder, to Brown the LT position has been well served but if there was a weakness there it was always from the "speed rusher". That won't be a problem for THIS LT. Wynn is by far the best athlete we've ever had out there in the Brady era. He was near perfect in pass protection. I'm not as sure if he was as successful in the run game, but that could be said of the rest of the OL/TE/FB's as well.
2. The 2nd question was how Karras would fare. He did what Brady has done when he's been at his best. He and his 2 OG, allowed Brady to securely step up into the pocket and step into his passes (something Brady didn't do in that first series). Karras isn't as good an athlete as Andrews, but he's bigger and stronger, and just as good a technician. Complain about the slow snaps all you want. That is a small thing that should get better. On the important stuff. Karras did fine.
3. The only fly in the OL ointment was the injury to Cannon. At best he probably will miss the Miami game. At worse....I don't even want to think about it. About the only time Brady seemed rushed in the entire game came after he got hurt. This is the only stain on this game.
4. I don't care about Sony's ypc stats. What I do care about is that every time we needed a 3rd and short, he got it. That didn't happen last year. That being said the run game didn't look like it did when it carried us to a championship. It looked like it did at the beginning of last season. So I'm hoping the run game is a work in progress, just like it was last season, and it will develop as the season goes on.
5. That being said, Rex Burkhead, was our best RB tonight and showed a lot of burst and versatility.
6. Your receiver group had a good night when the least efficient guy is Julian Edelman (though Jules got screwed out of a 17 yd catch when the pats took a PI over the reception to get a first down). Josh Gordon was being forced fed tonight. All his catches were clearly within the context of the game. Same for Dorsett and Jules. It seemed years ago that we were all traumatized at the thought of having to start Meyers, Harry, and Gunner at WR this season. Suddenly WR isn't so much of a problem anymore. Now the problem seems to be is how do we fit AB into this group and who goes. But that is for Monday's discussions
7. Brady started slowly on the first drive. He didn't look comfortable at all in the pocket and threw all his initial passes off his back foot. I got worried for a second. Then he seemed to get in a good rhythm and the results were obvious. Scary what this offense can be down the road.....IF we can keep an OL together.
Special teams were good. Baily's holds were smooth, and the Ghost .was 4-4 in FG. Punting was up and down, but it was his first game. Gunner most importantly looked very confident and cool receiving punts and when he did attempt returns he was excellent. almost 20 ypr. He also ALMOST make a great tackle on KO coverage. The kid is making it hard to make him the guy who goes when AB arrives. In fact I'd like to see him back on the KO return instead of Boldin.
8. And the defense. It was typical Bill Bellichick that all through the preseason we were seeing the defensive line doing all sorts of stems and stunts, plenty of blitzing and exotic amoeba style alignments. Then we come out for the first game with few blitzes and mostly 3 and 4 man rushes that rarely strayed from their lanes. It seemed like the Pats were trying to keep Ben inside the pocket while not allowing him to step up into his throws. Obviously it worked. Wasn't as exciting as the preseason stuff, but it worked. Ben rarely looked comfortable all night. BTW- Kudos do Danny Shelton on the 4th and one. He wasn't moved. Vince like. Early favorite for comeback player of the year,
9. 32 yds. That's what the Pittsburgh had tonight running behind a top 5 OL. IIRC, just last December they had close to 200 yds. So it was great work by the entire front 7. I think we have something special
here.
The secondary was AWESOME. First and foremost they tackled like it was a clinic. I can think of only one or two cases where the initial tackler didn't take down his man. They also knocked a NUMBER of balls out of receiver hands. Just great technique all around
10. General observations:
a. The offensive production was far better than we had a right to expect at this point of the year. My first thought was first team to 20 wins a game with 2 great defenses. Clearly, while the Steeler front 7 is strong, their back end is hurting and won't hold up against any team that can keep their QB reasonably clean.
b. Ben looked fat, completely immobile and not very good. I don't expect him to age well. The Steelers didn't look NEARLY as good as I expect them to be. Hard to define a team from the first game of a season.
At the end of the game Ben seemed to be throwing 4 yd completions to make his stat line look better.
c. BTW- the one long pass they completed was Harmon's fault, imho. Ben stared down the receiver, and threw a high arcing throw. Plenty of time for a safety to read it and get over the top of it. Harmon took a bad angle and was late to boot. But that's about all I have to complain about.
d. Any questions about who is in charge of the defense or making the calls? Do you care anymore? I know I don't. Whatever it is, just keep it up.
e. Anyone know the status of KVN's fatherhood?
f Not an auspicious start for Flores, but as they say adversity doesn't create character, it exposes it. Regardless of what they did this week, they have 53 NFL quality players and it will be 100 in the shade, and its MIAMI, and rarely does anything good happen there.
BTW- If I were the Pats I wouldn't play him down there. Give him 2 weeks to get his feet planted deeply into the culture and send him out to face the Jets in his debut.
1. The elephant in the room - There were 2 key questions that I wanted to see play out in the is game. First was the play of the OL. That was answered almost immediately. It was about as good as we could have hoped for. I didn't think Bud Dupree even sniffed Brady tonight. I think Collinsworth mentioned in 36 pass snaps Wynn gave up one pressure. I don't doubt it happened, but I didn't see it.. From Light to Solder, to Brown the LT position has been well served but if there was a weakness there it was always from the "speed rusher". That won't be a problem for THIS LT. Wynn is by far the best athlete we've ever had out there in the Brady era. He was near perfect in pass protection. I'm not as sure if he was as successful in the run game, but that could be said of the rest of the OL/TE/FB's as well.
2. The 2nd question was how Karras would fare. He did what Brady has done when he's been at his best. He and his 2 OG, allowed Brady to securely step up into the pocket and step into his passes (something Brady didn't do in that first series). Karras isn't as good an athlete as Andrews, but he's bigger and stronger, and just as good a technician. Complain about the slow snaps all you want. That is a small thing that should get better. On the important stuff. Karras did fine.
3. The only fly in the OL ointment was the injury to Cannon. At best he probably will miss the Miami game. At worse....I don't even want to think about it. About the only time Brady seemed rushed in the entire game came after he got hurt. This is the only stain on this game.
4. I don't care about Sony's ypc stats. What I do care about is that every time we needed a 3rd and short, he got it. That didn't happen last year. That being said the run game didn't look like it did when it carried us to a championship. It looked like it did at the beginning of last season. So I'm hoping the run game is a work in progress, just like it was last season, and it will develop as the season goes on.
5. That being said, Rex Burkhead, was our best RB tonight and showed a lot of burst and versatility.
6. Your receiver group had a good night when the least efficient guy is Julian Edelman (though Jules got screwed out of a 17 yd catch when the pats took a PI over the reception to get a first down). Josh Gordon was being forced fed tonight. All his catches were clearly within the context of the game. Same for Dorsett and Jules. It seemed years ago that we were all traumatized at the thought of having to start Meyers, Harry, and Gunner at WR this season. Suddenly WR isn't so much of a problem anymore. Now the problem seems to be is how do we fit AB into this group and who goes. But that is for Monday's discussions
7. Brady started slowly on the first drive. He didn't look comfortable at all in the pocket and threw all his initial passes off his back foot. I got worried for a second. Then he seemed to get in a good rhythm and the results were obvious. Scary what this offense can be down the road.....IF we can keep an OL together.
Special teams were good. Baily's holds were smooth, and the Ghost .was 4-4 in FG. Punting was up and down, but it was his first game. Gunner most importantly looked very confident and cool receiving punts and when he did attempt returns he was excellent. almost 20 ypr. He also ALMOST make a great tackle on KO coverage. The kid is making it hard to make him the guy who goes when AB arrives. In fact I'd like to see him back on the KO return instead of Boldin.
8. And the defense. It was typical Bill Bellichick that all through the preseason we were seeing the defensive line doing all sorts of stems and stunts, plenty of blitzing and exotic amoeba style alignments. Then we come out for the first game with few blitzes and mostly 3 and 4 man rushes that rarely strayed from their lanes. It seemed like the Pats were trying to keep Ben inside the pocket while not allowing him to step up into his throws. Obviously it worked. Wasn't as exciting as the preseason stuff, but it worked. Ben rarely looked comfortable all night. BTW- Kudos do Danny Shelton on the 4th and one. He wasn't moved. Vince like. Early favorite for comeback player of the year,
9. 32 yds. That's what the Pittsburgh had tonight running behind a top 5 OL. IIRC, just last December they had close to 200 yds. So it was great work by the entire front 7. I think we have something special
here.
The secondary was AWESOME. First and foremost they tackled like it was a clinic. I can think of only one or two cases where the initial tackler didn't take down his man. They also knocked a NUMBER of balls out of receiver hands. Just great technique all around
10. General observations:
a. The offensive production was far better than we had a right to expect at this point of the year. My first thought was first team to 20 wins a game with 2 great defenses. Clearly, while the Steeler front 7 is strong, their back end is hurting and won't hold up against any team that can keep their QB reasonably clean.
b. Ben looked fat, completely immobile and not very good. I don't expect him to age well. The Steelers didn't look NEARLY as good as I expect them to be. Hard to define a team from the first game of a season.
At the end of the game Ben seemed to be throwing 4 yd completions to make his stat line look better.
c. BTW- the one long pass they completed was Harmon's fault, imho. Ben stared down the receiver, and threw a high arcing throw. Plenty of time for a safety to read it and get over the top of it. Harmon took a bad angle and was late to boot. But that's about all I have to complain about.
d. Any questions about who is in charge of the defense or making the calls? Do you care anymore? I know I don't. Whatever it is, just keep it up.
e. Anyone know the status of KVN's fatherhood?
f Not an auspicious start for Flores, but as they say adversity doesn't create character, it exposes it. Regardless of what they did this week, they have 53 NFL quality players and it will be 100 in the shade, and its MIAMI, and rarely does anything good happen there.
BTW- If I were the Pats I wouldn't play him down there. Give him 2 weeks to get his feet planted deeply into the culture and send him out to face the Jets in his debut.
