Boston Globe/Bedard: Patriots-Lions Breakdown

I really enjoy Greg Bedard’s breakdowns of the games, he always finds some interesting nuggets. Here he timed how long the respective QBs had before pressure got to them. Some telling stuff throughout the article, but here’s one interesting nugget…

Why did the Patriots’ defense have zero pressure against Stafford and the other quarterbacks? For one, they didn’t bring much pressure. The Patriots blitzed the Buccaneers on 48.6 percent of dropbacks. Against the Lions, the Patriots blitzed 27.5 percent of time total (11 times on 40 dropbacks). Against Stafford, the percentage was even less (18.8 percent, 3 of 16).