Kickoffs

[maineman209]

As it clearly took him out of play, it should have been an illegal block in the back.

Last night's officiating crew seemed to take a "hands off" approach about a lot of things. A different crew might have routinely flagged that.

 

[archstanton543]

So, why did they pooch kick it in the first quarter? They basically gave up three points there.

 

[BTTA]

Last year, they had success with it. This year, not so much. How much is execution, vs. how much is the new rules? We don't know.

Probably a safe bet the coaches are all over it this week.

 

[scout]

I

So, why did they pooch kick it in the first quarter? They basically gave up three points there.

Last week, the Colts were penalized on a kick return. The Patriots chose to kick it again. Doesn't it make sense to pooch kick it or sky it versus boom it into the stands. Last night, make them start at the 25.

 

[PATSYLICIOUS]

On the bright side, im pretty sure not even bb is too stubborn to just start getting touchbacks. The coverage clearly is not as good this year. Its a real break that it didn’t cost us the game and at the same time is hopefully the wakeup call the coaches needed to stop the idiotic decisions to kick short of the goal line or squib.

 

[MrBigglesWorth]

The short kicks worked in the comeback Atlanta Superbowl. This group is alot of newbies.. I'd play it safe and kick it for a touch back.. same with returning. Seems the NFL wants to minimize the kickoff just like protecting the qbs

 

[Mack Herron]

I have good confidence this problem will be corrected. Less so about our problems on the back end.

 

[captain stone]

I would have liked to hear Belichick address this issue after the game, had any reporter actually brought it up.

Not surprised...These "reporters" from the enemedia are more interested in pink-hat topics like soap operas & personality crises than they are in actual football topics.

 

[The Brandon Five]

Or force a penalty or turnover.

That would work in a game where they actually called penalties.

 

[captain stone]

On the 97-yard KR, Slater was in a good position to shorten the return, but the KC player who was on him grabbed Slater's jersey/shoulder pads for a second and then pushed him down from behind. Might have been a ticky-tack flag, but we've seen those thrown for that type of contact.

As it clearly took him out of play, it should have been an illegal block in the back.

Upon further review (just now)...I agree that a penalty flag was in order. Perhaps the zebra kept his Mr Hankie in his pocket because Zombo was already engaging Slater as opposed to Zombo running at him and then blocking him in the back. Naturally, the anal-yst Collinsworth glosses completely over the incident, even when a camera had a FECKIN CLOSE-UP of the two of them. What an ignorant shill.

No excuse, on the other hand, for the totally useless, waste of space Brandon King (of STs penalties). Gostkowski also needed to do a better job of fighting through his block and push Smith out of bounds. The kickoff itself was a thing of beauty, however; it went exactly where I would want it to go every single time.

 

[Patstopia]

If they want deep kickoffs, they should change the rules to make kicks thru the goal posts start at the 15 while kicks in the end zone start at the 25. As far as short kicks go, this year Special teams is lacking. The Pats have struggled all year stopping returns short. They obviously are trying to fix it but so far not so good. I am sure they will not just give up on it all together.

 

[maineman209]

So, why did they pooch kick it in the first quarter? They basically gave up three points there.

That's an interesting topic by itself.

It felt a bit like an experiment to me - like something that the ST unit has been working on in practice as part of trying to figure out how best to take advantage of the new KO rules. Maybe the concept was to try to shorten the distance that the Pats gunners needed to run to get to the ball. In any case, the fact that they would try that play against KC maybe demonstrates a level of confidence bordering on arrogance.

It also felt like Gost's kick may not have gone as planned, although it's impossible to know exactly what he was trying to do.

On the one hand, if Gost puts more air under it and drops it in at the 15 or 20 (like a punt), maybe it takes a couple funny bounces in front of the up man, giving the Pats gunners more time to get there, and the KC player has no choice but to simply fall on it short of the 25.

OTOH, something more of a low line-drive maybe bounces off one of the blockers, causing confusion and increasing the chances for the Pats to recover the live ball.

The actual kick looked like something in between those, so IDK.