My Own Little Monday Morning QBing

[Ring 6]

First, I think any loss is a bad loss. I do not agree with the idea that a team is bound to lose if they win too many in a row.
BUT, after the last few weeks I noticed some subtle comments coming out of Foxboro that worried me. I think the headline last we was 'Brady says we are doing some good things' or something to that effect.
I've noticed that a big part of finishing the job with this team is to feel they have an uphill battle, and that when they struggle, in retrospect they were overconfident. It reminds me of the Brady reaction to Plaxico Burress.
My belief is that the biggest strength of this team is the way it game plans and prepares. I am sure they worked hard, but there is a difference between working hard and working with urgency and the right amount of fear of failure.
Of course I hoped I was wrong, but I thought I saw this coming. So, while no loss is good, an increase in focus and urgency as a result certainly is. I think this has a lot to do with the sick record under BB of not losing back to back games.

 

[borg]

And I thought the Pats lost because Rodgers was the Pats' daddy in the 1st half. Will a less confident Logan Ryan be able to keep up with the #3 WR next time?

 

[The Brandon Five]

You might be on to something here. Reminds me of this from Simmons post-Tyree:

http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/page2/story?page=simmons/080204

1. Before the pregame introductions, the Patriots were jogging off the field and the Jumbotron caught Brady briefly break stride to shake hands with Pat O'Brien. This bothered me for some reason -- somewhere along the line, the team and the quarterback almost became too famous, as symbolized by that handshake and the fact Brady would have run right by O'Brien six years ago because he would have wanted to flip out in the tunnel and inexplicably head-butt Bledsoe over and over again. Look, I'm not blaming Brady for the handshake. This was the season when his fame transcended sports and morphed into something else, and part of that "something else" involves the occasional random pregame handshake with the likes of Pat O'Brien. You have to do things like this when you're famous, even if you don't really want to do them. At the same time, I thought this was a terrible omen and a defining moment of the season. In the Super Bowl, you'd much rather be the "Nobody believes in us!" team than the "Not only does everybody believe in us, but our QB shakes hands before games with Pat O'Brien" team. You just would.

 

[The Brandon Five]

Will a less confident Logan Ryan be able to keep up with the #3 WR next time?

In a word, no.

 

[Shed83]

In a word, no.

More than likely not but maybe a more focused, driven offense would score more than 21 points against a mediocre defense?

 

[SHOWTIME15]

The team was an underdog to denver a few weeks ago and prepared like it was the super bowl. The final score reflected that.

 

[RayClay]

Maybe so, but I think it's hard for any team to keep up an emotional high and beat an excellent team on the road. Green Bay will likely have a let down too, and win or lose depending on who they play. We would have beaten most teams with our game plan.

Bottom line to me is Green Bay predicted exactly what we'd do on defense and worked the game plan against that perfectly. they also have a QB who can run and is one of the best, for sure. We didn't adjust to them totally not looking for the players we targeted.

On offense, we were disjointed and slow to get going. Some tough calls, but still, Green Bay was crisp and focused and well prepared, we weren't. We still played great red zone D and got on a roll, too late, on offense.

To me, these teams are well matched. Green Bay played better and you can't give them that edge, like you can't for us.

 

[SacPete1]

Interesting that you brought this up. A quote by Brady posted by Reiss caught my eye yesterday and as much as I don't like to read into quotes much, this one did make me think about the level of effort and focus in their preparations:

“It will be an intense week of practice, especially coming off a loss. We have very high expectations for this week, so we have a lot of veteran leadership and the guys really need to start stepping up and playing our best football this time of year. That’s what we will need.”

There seemed to be more mental errors against GB which could be attributed to GB more than anything but they have a tough road game this week in prime time and "stepping up and playing our best" starts with intense and focused practice. I believe the mental make-up of this team is stronger than any other in the league and they demonstrated this after the KC game.
I would bet that Brady will be very vocal in practice this week.

 

[dales804]

They could have played better for sure. NE did have a chance to win against a great team in one of the toughest places to play even still. I give credit to GB for beating NE with weapons other than their top-2 WRs and, save for a few runs, a top RB. There are few teams in the NFL who can do that but Rodgers can.

I was hoping to see more out of the Patriots offense, however. I am expecting NE to come out on fire Sunday night.

 

[Mack Herron]

I don't think they were overconfident. In fact, one could argue the opposite. Josh went heavy with the pass, increasing pressure on the OL to the point where it could not hold up.

McDaniels said the biggest factor for the unbalance was the Patriots falling behind 13-0 after the opening quarter.

http://itiswhatitis.weei.com/sports...n-why-the-patriots-use-so-many-running-backs/

Being down 13-0 in the first quarter is not a reason to deviate from your plan and shift the balance to the pass. If that is what he did, he lacked confidence and ran scared.

 

[Ring 6]

I don't think they were overconfident. In fact, one could argue the opposite. Josh went heavy with the pass, increasing pressure on the OL to the point where it could not hold up.

http://itiswhatitis.weei.com/sports...n-why-the-patriots-use-so-many-running-backs/

Being down 13-0 in the first quarter is not a reason to deviate from your plan and shift the balance to the pass. If that is what he did, he lacked confidence and ran scared.

I don't think its lacking confidence in the run. I think its that running the ball is like an investment. At any given time, the most likely successful play is almost always a pass when you have Tom Brady. However, if you put the defense in a position to play you one-dimensionally, you decrease the success rate of the pass. Its still higher than the run success rate usually, but you make it easier to pass if you run.
In other words, all things equal, over the course of a game points are going to come in the passing game, but the more you run, the easier you make it for the passing game to produce points.
The flip side of this is you are reducing the chance of getting points by committing to the run.
When you fall behind 13-0, it is hard to make that sacrifice.
13-0 isn't time to throw because you don't have enough time to cut into the lead, but its probably throw because you need to run your best plays and get points now or risk falling behind 20-0.

 

[Ring 6]

Interesting that you brought this up. A quote by Brady posted by Reiss caught my eye yesterday and as much as I don't like to read into quotes much, this one did make me think about the level of effort and focus in their preparations:

“It will be an intense week of practice, especially coming off a loss. We have very high expectations for this week, so we have a lot of veteran leadership and the guys really need to start stepping up and playing our best football this time of year. That’s what we will need.”

There seemed to be more mental errors against GB which could be attributed to GB more than anything but they have a tough road game this week in prime time and "stepping up and playing our best" starts with intense and focused practice. I believe the mental make-up of this team is stronger than any other in the league and they demonstrated this after the KC game.
I would bet that Brady will be very vocal in practice this week.

I always scoff at the 'they didn't show up' or 'they weren't into the game' kind of stuff because I do not believe that happens in the NFL. If your mind isn't in the game, it gets there the first time you are embarrassed or flattened.
But, preparation, IMO, is so critical to success, especially on offense. Overconfidence is a weird thing. I think it is often sub-conscious and may not have any impact more times than not, but that feeling of going from they cannot stop us to oh crap we weren't ready for them to be this good can really impact your play.