The Patriots won the coin toss and that was the highlight of the day, they were not in this right from the start. For the first time in 4 years they let a team score a TD on their opening drive. They were totally confused by the SF motion offense. They couldn’t set the edge, and when they did there wasn’t enough pursuit, so the ball carriers just cut it up. Couldn’t stop George Kittle even with Gilmore on him one on one.
Linebacker Ja’Whaun Bentley looked totally lost out there. He didn’t drop deep enough in pass coverage, he couldn’t cover anyone out of the backfield. Chase Winovich got himself benched after a roughing call on McCourty’s interception, hitting Jimmy Garoppolo unnecessarily 30 yards away from the play. That cost the pats 30 yards in field position. He got a tongue-lashing from Bill Belichick and didn’t play much after that. John Simon was no peach either. In pass coverage, Simon can stay with the back coming out of the backfield, but he struggled dealing with Deebo Samuel, who the 49ers put in motion and targeted him in the flat. The flat is Simon’s responsibility. What does Simon do? He turns and runs with the running back instead of passing him off to the defensive back. As a result, Samuel is by himself and turns a little 2 yard pass behind the LOS into a 15 yard gain. It was like this all night long.
The defense wasn’t the only ones who stunk it up Sunday afternoon. The Offense was truly offensive! No blaming the O-Line or the WR’s for not getting separation. Again, this was Cam Newton not passing the ball when he should have and holding onto it. He was delivering late, throwing into double coverage and underthrowing the ball. He was making the mistakes of a rookie QB. His fundamentals are way off, too. His footwork is all wrong and he is throwing with a long windup type of motion.
I think Newton is hurt and he is not telling anyone. Last week vs Denver he only threw to the right side three times in the game. This week he threw once to the right side and it was picked off. He has thrown 5 INTs in 2 games. For the year it has been 1 TD to WR and 8 INTs. On the only throw he made to Julian Edelman, Edelman sat down in the zone, and when he didn’t get the ball right way, he slid to his right to avoid the DB. Newton threw it to where he was. Newton says their “Wifi is off”. They haven’t been on the same page since the SEA game. How does a QB regress so badly in such a short amount of time?
Kyle Juszczyk was immense for San Francisco. He is the engine that makes this offense go. His versatility allows Kyle Shanahan to draw up so many plays for his motion offense. Blocking, running, catching, he did it all. Combine him and Kittle and you have an unstoppable force. They also had Samuel and Brandon Aiyuk running the jet Sweep. We had Jakobi Myers falling down on his attempt.
A bright spot was Damien Harris running the ball for an average of 5.8 per carry. However the Patriots were behind so early they had to abandon the running game. Harris ran hard and had 58 yards on 10 carries. After N’Keal Harry went down with a concussion, Myers got out of the doghouse and led the team with 4 catches.
James White only played 10 plays (19%). Was he being punished for missing two days of practice? His 10 plays were 2nd lowest to Gunner Olszewski’s 8 plays.
Why was there no helmet to helmet call on the play that Harry was taken out of the game? That was a targeted hit right to the chin with the crown of the defenders helmet.
The Patriots pre-game show with marc Bertrand and Chris Gasper openly speculated if the Patriots would become sellers at the trade deadline if they lost the game to the 49’ers. They stated the two top names that would fetch the most would be Stephon Gilmore and Joe Thuney. I would look at a team like Dallas making a play for Ryan Fitzpatrick now that Dalton is out with a concussion. Would Cleveland be interested in Julian Edelman now that OBJ is out for the year?
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Merrimack Valley native and lifelong fan of the New England Patriots. My earliest memories of the Patriots were attending as a child with my dad, the off-season practice at Phillips Academy. I was at the Patriots game at Harvard Stadium in 1970 where Bob “Harpo” Gladieux was called out of the stands by the stadium announcer over the PA to play in the game. Analyzing the draft since ESPN first started to televise it in 1980 and former writer for the Lowell Sun Newspaper.
