The defense has a speed issue.

[TBR]

Jordan Richards needs to stay glued to the bench. The rest of the secondary is fine, although Butler regaining some confidence would be nice. Gilmore looked solid, although he had that one huge blown coverage on Hill's TD.

As for the front 7, I think a trade will definitely need to be made. Especially with Hightower now banged up to start the season. He'll either have to miss a decent chunk of time to get near 100% again, which may result in trotting out an awful defense - or play the rest of the year on a bad knee, something I'm not sure I want to see either.

 

[IllegalContact]

I think ninkovich comes back and I think they play 3-4 more and more

LB is a concern.....

Beyond that, gimme a break....it's week 1 and they needed to put notions of perfection to rest

They stuck to plays that weren't working and didn't go back to plays that did

Biggest thing? Berry and Achilles ..... that kills their defense

I ate a ****load of meat tonite

 

[Kontradiction]

What LBs? That's the issue. We played most of the game with a FRONT FIVE.
we have no speed issue that we didn't have every other year.

If you weren't seeing Hunt run past Marsh, Hightower, and Van Noy throughout the night, then I don't know what to tell you. You may be in denial. The defense just gave up 42 points and over 500 yards of total offense to Alex Smith and a rookie RB. They were using misdirection and outs on this defense the entire night. It's quite clear they were trying to isolate our guys in space to take advantage of a lack of speed. Do you honestly think it's all good?

 

[Ring 6]

If you weren't seeing Hunt run past Marsh, Hightower, and Van Noy throughout the night, then I don't know what to tell you. You may be in denial. The defense just gave up 42 points and over 500 yards of total offense to Alex Smith and a rookie RB. They were using misdirection and outs on this defense the entire night. It's quite clear they were trying to isolate our guys in space to take advantage of a lack of speed. Do you honestly think it's all good?

We played a 3-2-6.
It was a stupid scheme.
Stating how bad they played does not make your reason for it correct.
We did not have any more speed last year and we were the #1 defense in the NFL. But we didn't play a 3-2-6 base with 4 safeties.
I don't think anyone ever has.

 

[Tony2046]

We played 4 safeties most of the game.
3-2-6
I don't get it. We can't defend the run like that and there was no cohesion in the pass defense.

This loss is on game planning IMO.
Blown coverages, an offense that seemed to have no plan and let KC dupe is into throwing 20 bombs.

I don't think they started at 3-2-6 did they?

 

[SHOWTIME15]

Stop panicking guys. It's a long season.

 

[Ring 6]

I don't think they started at 3-2-6 did they?

Yes they did.
Flowers branch brown
Hightower van noy
Butler Gilmore
McCourty Chung Richards Harmon.

Played that most of the game.

 

[luuked]

Andy their backs were breezing past our backers like they were wearing 50 lb. weights on their ankles. This wasn't just an issue in the passing game, this was also an issue against the run. They targeted it specifically, too, with the routes they were running and the use of the read option. Speed and a lack of cohesion was what killed this defense. One issue will be fixable... probably by next week. That's the latter. The former needs to be addressed, though.

It is funny how the hot take artists just a week ago were all in arms over NFL Network giving the Chiefs a coaching advantage because for them Andy Reid is a meme. He is actually a brilliant coach that just when things become stressful starts to brainfart with timeouts. But the gameplan of the Chiefs was great. Like you said, you can clearly see how their entire offense was drawn up to attack us like that.

It might sound strange but the game was actually pretty close and sloppy from both teams, except they got two explosive plays that got them 14 points while we turned the ball over twice on fourth down and just couldnt connect on deep shots.

 

[luuked]

Yes they did.
Flowers branch brown
Hightower van noy
Butler Gilmore
McCourty Chung Richards Harmon.

Played that most of the game.

Except Richards was often aligned at the LoS.

 

[pazrul72]

If you weren't seeing Hunt run past Marsh, Hightower, and Van Noy throughout the night, then I don't know what to tell you. You may be in denial. The defense just gave up 42 points and over 500 yards of total offense to Alex Smith and a rookie RB. They were using misdirection and outs on this defense the entire night. It's quite clear they were trying to isolate our guys in space to take advantage of a lack of speed. Do you honestly think it's all good?

Our defenses of the past have rarely been "speed" defenses. They are most commonly referred to as big, tough, physical, wear you down, and smart. What I saw more then lack of speed was miscommunication and players blowing assignments. One of the hallmarks of a Bellichick defense is no big plays, they had what? 3? 70+ yard TD's in one game? From the dink and dunk chiefs? The run defense being out of sync is not as concerning to me as the crazy amount of passing yards given up. The secondary is supposed to be the backbone and strength of the team. Tonight every last one of them made at least one critical mistake which just doesn't normally happen. Hats off the Andy Reid for some serious adjustments and not playing conservative Andy ball. The only consolation I take from tonight's game is Bill now has the teams full and undivided attention with all the insane 19-0 BS off the table. It WILL get better of that I have no doubt it's just a question of how long it will be for all the new faces to gel.

 

[Ring 6]

Except Richards was often aligned at the LoS.

Doesn't matter. He's a safety. A lot of safeties play in the box. They are still safeties.

 

[Ring 6]

Our defenses of the past have rarely been "speed" defenses. They are most commonly referred to as big, tough, physical, wear you down, and smart. What I saw more then lack of speed was miscommunication and players blowing assignments. One of the hallmarks of a Bellichick defense is no big plays, they had what? 3? 70+ yard TD's in one game? From the dink and dunk chiefs? The run defense being out of sync is not as concerning to me as the crazy amount of passing yards given up. The secondary is supposed to be the backbone and strength of the team. Tonight every last one of them made at least one critical mistake which just doesn't normally happen. Hats off the Andy Reid for some serious adjustments and not playing conservative Andy ball. The only consolation I take from tonight's game is Bill now has the teams full and undivided attention with all the insane 19-0 BS off the table. It WILL get better of that I have no doubt it's just a question of how long it will be for all the new faces to gel.

the big plays were a blown coverage, a de 30 yards downfield coveting a speed RB and a running into a defense that had 6 dbs out there.

It was ugly but it will get fixed.

 

[Ring 6]

This game was very much like the 2014 opener.
We used a bizarre defensive game plan in that game too, and quickly dumped it.

 

[drewskie]

OP is right. This was an issue for us for the better part of three quarters in SB51, and Andy Reid took notes from what was working for ATL and rightfully continued to exploit it. All the plays that worked in the playoffs last year (the flea flicker vs PIT, the SB winning pitch to White) were all expertly blown up by the KC defense.

Poor play calls on multiple short yardage situations for the offense can be corrected, accuracy issues (assuming this isnt a rapid TB decline) are also correctable. I thought offensively our main issue was being too predictable.

Well coached game by Reid. Double dipping by kicking off to us, exploiting Hunt against our lack of speed on the defensive front 7 was genius. Their secondary while constantly obstructing us did kind of throw off our rhythm, and no Edelman to move the chains meant DA was constantly subject to good hard shots by KC in the middle of the field.

I think our coaching staff overestimated our ability to coach up new and unproven players along the defensive front 7, and you cant teach speed.

KC turned the script on us. On the verge of being blown out within 5 minutes of kickoff, and coming back from a deficit going into the 4th quarter at Gillette teams were 0-105 before tonight. Kareem Hunt overcoming a fumble after he never fumbled in college, to the tune of almost 250 yards and TDs including multiple home run plays.

Gotta tip your cap to KC, but whats most tactically concerning to me like the OP has stated is speed on the defensive front 7, and being able to move the chains more consistently on 3rd down for the intermediate routes.

Was surprised to see so little of Gronk and especially Dion Lewis in the flat tonight.

 

[SammyBlueCat]

Not to marginalize KC's effort but this looked like a pre-season game.

 

[QuantumMechanic]

Was surprised to see so little of Gronk and especially Dion Lewis in the flat tonight.

Don't know why so little Lewis, but Gronk definitely wasn't close to 100% tonight. And that's even before he was (IMHO) injured on the non-TD play.

 

[ScottishPatriots]

They looked slow, the tackling was brutal and there were blown coverages all over the place.

It looked like New Orleans or Indianapolis playing defense out there.

 

[drewskie]

Our defenses of the past have rarely been "speed" defenses. They are most commonly referred to as big, tough, physical, wear you down, and smart. What I saw more then lack of speed was miscommunication and players blowing assignments. One of the hallmarks of a Bellichick defense is no big plays, they had what? 3? 70+ yard TD's in one game? From the dink and dunk chiefs? The run defense being out of sync is not as concerning to me as the crazy amount of passing yards given up. The secondary is supposed to be the backbone and strength of the team. Tonight every last one of them made at least one critical mistake which just doesn't normally happen. Hats off the Andy Reid for some serious adjustments and not playing conservative Andy ball. The only consolation I take from tonight's game is Bill now has the teams full and undivided attention with all the insane 19-0 BS off the table. It WILL get better of that I have no doubt it's just a question of how long it will be for all the new faces to gel.

Agreed, my question is what do you think from tonight's obversations will be our biggest long term challenge as a team this season?

 

[Ring 6]

Jordan Richards needs to stay glued to the bench. The rest of the secondary is fine, although Butler regaining some confidence would be nice. Gilmore looked solid, although he had that one huge blown coverage on Hill's TD.

As for the front 7, I think a trade will definitely need to be made. Especially with Hightower now banged up to start the season. He'll either have to miss a decent chunk of time to get near 100% again, which may result in trotting out an awful defense - or play the rest of the year on a bad knee, something I'm not sure I want to see either.

Richards wasn't the problem.

The front 7 wasn't a front 7 it was a front 5.

 

[PatriotReign]

Malcolm Brown has been a disappointment to this point in his career. IF Vincent Valentine can stay healthy he's shown the ability to be disruptive.