SHUT DOWN JULIO? WE HAVE DONE IT BEFORE

[Ring 6]

Julio Jones has faced the Patriots once in his career.

In that game the Patriots built a lead of 30-13 with 6:18 left.

Up to that point Jones had:

9 targets, 3 catches, 22 yards.

After that in garbage time he padded some stats to end with
13 targets 6 catches and 108 yards.

The game plan to stop him held him to 3/9/22 for 54 minutes.

Just to complete the story, Jones was playing as well then as he is now.
It was game 4 of the season, and in week 1-3 he had put up 27/373/2
That is 9/124 per game and this year he is averaging 6/100

The more I think about this game the more I think Atlanta's inexperience in facing a BB defense is going to be a huge factor.


FYI, people will say Ryan threw for 400 and put up 23 points in that game, but the real facts are that with 6:18 left and a 30-13 score, and game over his numbers were 23/35/227/1/1 and only 13 points on the board.

 

[archstanton543]

WHY ARE WE YELLING!?!?

 

[FourierSeries]

I don't think the goal should be to shut him down necessarily, just to limit the number of 20+ yard plays he has. He's had some of his best games in losing efforts this season. Limit his big plays and keep the other receivers in check.

 

[Clonamery]

HE WANTS YOUR ATTENTION AND HE"S EXCITED!!!

 

[archstanton543]

HE WANTS YOUR ATTENTION AND HE"S EXCITED!!!

THAT MAKES SENSE!

 

[skinnydog]

As much as the bend but don't break style of defense frustrates me in general, I think it's perfect for this game. Generally, I think is will sometimes give a mediocre offense more confidence than they deserve, but against Atlanta I think it will greatly frustrate them. Yes Julio and others will make short catches, but will not get much YAC. They will stall in the red zone a few times and get frustrated. Then they will make mistakes.

 

[TheBeers]

Oh I like it..

LET'S GOOOOOOOO!!!

 

[Sicilian]

Interesting numbers. Which year was that? Trying to remember who was on our defense, and I'd be curious what the game plan was that actually held him to that 3/9. Be interesting to see if the current personnel could be leveraged into a similar tactic.

 

[juny]

Interesting numbers. Which year was that? Trying to remember who was on our defense, and I'd be curious what the game plan was that actually held him to that 3/9. Be interesting to see if the current personnel could be leveraged into a similar tactic.

2013, talib was the NE's #1 CB

 

[mosi]

Yes, I think this is the type of team the Pats do well against. The Falcons in many ways are like the old Megatron Lions. If you remember, the 2014 game, they did a good job against both Johnson and Tate. Ryan is a lot better than Strafford but the matchup look similar. Anybody remember who covered who that year? Was Revis on Johnson or did they put Browner on him with safety help?

 

[A Defiant Goose]

We had a good counter for him with a taller and arguably better (no knock against Butler) CB in Talib. Butler is good but I don't think he'll be on Jones much due to height discrepancy. Maybe Rowe/McCourty on Jones. Butler on Sanu. Ryan on Gabriel. Who knows. But we don't exactly have the same "luxury" this time around

 

[Froob]

Uh what? That was NOT garbage time. They were in the redzone late in the game down 7...what the...

 

[fxmallon]

Perhaps it's just the 3-4 Atlanta games I watched this year. But in those games, Julio Jones, looked like superman to me--and the best wr in the NFL.

But, at the same time, I can see the Atlanta-Detroit comparison. I guess I say this: anything can happen in a Detroit game (they have far more squeaker losses than wins, however) and anything can happen in an Atlanta game--but they do better with the squeakers. So, a little more fear of them is recommended (by the likes of me)

 

[libra957]

Ryan and Jones will get their yardages, it is what it is.

 

[Hammer of Thor]

2013, talib was the NE's #1 CB

Uh what? That was NOT garbage time. They were in the redzone late in the game down 7...what the...

That was this game:

 

[Guts]

Wasn't Talib on Tony g that game?

 

[Sicilian]

2013, talib was the NE's #1 CB

Ah, see, that lessens my enthusiasm for the premise. Talib was tailor made for guys like Jones. He struggled against smaller guys like Steve Smith, but against the big, athletic guys he could match their physicality and usually take their heads out of the game.

I still feel like Butler or Ryan can compete (with safety help), and end up doing enough to curtail Jones, but I don't think the game in the OP has much bearing on what will happen Sunday.

 

[Sycola]

First of all , lol@ the irony in explaining Ryan's garbage stats. Not an acceptable excuse when talking about Atlanta's defense

Secondly, that was in 2013 correct? If so, falcons in whole were completely decimated that year, and a completely different team. This season, as many teams have discovered.. containing julio means opening the flood gates.

If I were an opposing fan, I'd be talking about how do we contain matt ryan.

 

[Sicilian]

First of all , lol@ the irony in explaining Ryan's garbage stats. Not an acceptable excuse when talking about Atlanta's defense

Secondly, that was in 2013 correct? If so, falcons in whole were completely decimated that year, and a completely different team. This season, as many teams have discovered.. containing julio means opening the flood gates.

If I were an opposing fan, I'd be talking about how do we contain matt ryan.

You make a good point, but as fans who have watched Belichick and this defense for a decade and a half now, I'll tell you that discussions like this is typically how he approaches shutting down someone like Matt Ryan. It doesn't always work of course, but the generally philosophy is to find the "archstone" of the offense, the thing that holds everything else together, and scheme to take that away while trying to find the best individual matchups on all the secondary options.

The end result (when it works) is an offense that is forced to do things outside of its comfort zone. This doesn't usually lead to complete domination, but combined with the other prevailing tactic employed by ALL Belichick defenses (limit or eliminate big plays), it means that teams have to sustain long drives, convert multiple third downs, and do so keeping pace with the Patriots offense, all without the use of their safety blanket.

This is why you don't often seen gameplans against good QB's to consist of intense and consistent pressure on the QB himself. They don't always view that as the best way to take an offense out of its rhythm.

Now, all that said, what you've indicated may be 100% correct: That scheming to take out Jones is just welcoming the other weapons for Atlanta to kill you. They're certainly the most versatile of the offenses we've faced all year. But right now we don't even know if BB is targeting Jones as that "archstone" piece. For all we know it could be the running backs, in which case Jones may have a field day while the offense is still kept in relative check.

This chess match is definitely the most interesting aspect of the game going in for me though. Great stuff if you're a football fan.

 

[Ring 6]

First of all , lol@ the irony in explaining Ryan's garbage stats. Not an acceptable excuse when talking about Atlanta's defense

Secondly, that was in 2013 correct? If so, falcons in whole were completely decimated that year, and a completely different team. This season, as many teams have discovered.. containing julio means opening the flood gates.

If I were an opposing fan, I'd be talking about how do we contain matt ryan.

Feel free to discount anything that happened in the last 6 minutes of games you were up 17. You still can't show your defense is any good.

Jones was playing as well up to that point as he is this year. The Patriots played a scheme to take him away, and after 54 minutes he had 9 targets, 3 catches and 22 yards.
If you don't think that is meaningful, you are just lying to yourself.