Analysis

The Return of the Underdog Patriots?

December 19, 2018 by Mike Dussault

Usually, I’d be jumping into a film review in today’s piece, but given the fervor and excitement about the Patriots’ potential demise I just needed to vent a bit.

Yes, the sky is falling and the hot takers are more than happy to line up and start celebrating but after taking a day of reflection, I’ve returned to my state of enjoying the ride with Brady and Belichick.

Yesterday, the Boston Globe jumped on the old Trent Dilfer quote, sticking the “they’re not good anymore” on a headline that caught my eye. Isn’t a 9-5 team good even if they did just lose two close road games? Especially in today’s topsy-turvy NFL?

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A Final Trip to Pittsburgh?

December 13, 2018 by Mike Dussault

One Last Trip to Pittsburgh?

At this point, there are few teams that Tom Brady and Bill Belichick don’t have history with. Even occasional opponents like the 49ers, Saints and Packers have all provided at least one memorable games.

But few places stack up with the Steelers, especially in Pittsburgh. Yes, we saw the nightmares in Miami that can happen and three seasons in Denver have come to a crashing halt. But Pittsburgh was the rare mostly-friendly away stadium of a really good team.

If the Tuck Rule was the unofficial start of the dynasty run, the next game was a 2001 AFC Championship that is often overlooked. They were underdogs in 2004 and again hoisted the Lamar Hunt Trophy on their way to their third Super Bowl.

In 2005, critical injuries took down Matt Light and Rodney Harrison, blows that the team never recovered from.

In 2010, the dejected Pats, coming off a loss to Eric Mangini and the Browns, went into Pittsburgh and showed that the end was a distant place. The following year, the Steelers exposed how bad the Patriots defense was. A flaw they’d hide almost all the way through another Super Bowl run.

Last year’s game came down to the final plays, with one of the more notable finishes to any of the battles of the last 18 years in Pittsburgh.

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Bend Don’t Break Update: ’18 Pats D Hits Top 5

December 6, 2018 by Mike Dussault

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JTKKjGeraFE

The cat is out of the bag on the 2018 Patriots defense, they’re actually pretty good. Their defining trait not a dominating front seven like the 2001-2007 defenses, but a shutdown secondary and a coordinated front that all work together.

At his core, Bill Belichick is a conservative defensive coach. He wants a defense that tackles well and doesn’t get beat deep. He’ll be aggressive in key spots and disguise plenty but generally, it’s a four-man rush with seven in coverage. When that four-man rush contains and constricts the quarterback they’re extremely effective. When they’re six-man rush stunts do the same they’re dominant.

On the road, they’ve been guilty of being out of sync. In each of the first three months, they had a defensive stinker on the road. Even the win over Kansas City wasn’t great. They were probably a little lucky to escape Chicago with a win.

Patriots Third Down Deep Dive

November 21, 2018 by Mike Dussault

The Patriots offensive third-down conversion rate has slipped below 40 percent for the just the third time (2005, 2013) since 2001, while the third-down defense ranks 25th in the league with their worst rate since 2011. If you’re looking for a reason why the Patriots have sputtered at times in 2018, third down, aka the money down, is a great place to start.

Without Julian Edelman for the first four games, the offense also had to replace super-clutch Danny Amendola, as well as Dion Lewis who sparked them quite a few times last year. When Gronk was slowed with injuries, it just made it that much 2018’s offensive transition harder. The results are obvious, as this new iteration of the Brady offense hasn’t quite totally clicked yet.

The defense doesn’t quite have those excuses. Aside from losing Ja’Whaun Bentley this is pretty much the defense the Patriots brought into training camp. They’ve shown plenty of signs of being a total defense, but their inconsistencies, especially on the road have been maddening. Some speed bumps should be expected with Matt Patricia gone and Brian Flores in, but now is the time for them to lock in.

Overall, the 2018 Patriots are 14th on offense and 24th on defense on third down. The 2015 and 2016 teams combined were 4th on offense and 7th on defense. The offense’s last dip was 2013, when they fell to 16th. The defense hasn’t fallen to 2010 depths yet, when they ranked 32nd in the league, allowing a whopping 47.1 percent conversion rate. They’re just at 43.1 now, the same rate they had in 2011, but still hovering over the bottom third of the league.

2015 and 2016 were the height of the second generation Belichick Patriots and where the bar was set before injuries and departures started to add up in 2017. Those two years were the best run by the third down units on both sides of the ball since ’05-’06. Let’s take a look at how and where they’ve declined.

Trey Flowers or Bust in Free Agency 2019

November 16, 2018 by Mike Dussault

Maybe this is the wrong time to take a look at the expiring contracts on the Patriots considering we’re coming off such a poor performance, but it’s the bye week and in just a few short months the free agents will be at the forefront of everyone’s mind no matter how the season ends.

The list of pending free agents has one big name at the top — Trey Flowers — and after him, and maybe Josh Gordon, is there anyone we’d be all that upset to see leave? Anyone who would truly hurt the Patriots a couple years down the road if they went elsewhere?

Let’s rundown the pending free agents, roughly ranked in order of importance current impact.

Looking for a Friend at the End of Tom Brady

November 15, 2018 by Mike Dussault

It’s no surprise that the punditry and non-Patriot fans gleefully awaiting the inevitable decline of Tom Brady were out in force this week. While most professional sports legends are attributed a kind of reverence as their careers wrap up, Brady has just been too good for too long and transcended from the days of old media (newspapers!) to today’s overabundance of constant breaking news and hot takes.

Not only does it seem like the great majority want to see Brady finally stink, they’re actively rooting it on, eager to take the heroic stand that at some point he will break down and they were the first-ish to call it. Do you ever remember people on ESPN or wherever else getting excited about Wayne Gretzky, Michael Jordan, or even old pal Peyton Manning finally hanging them up? Imagine how Manning was treated after Super Bowl 50, despite being a passenger on their championship ride. Would Brady ever get that kind of glowing adoration if he willed this 2018 Patriots team a Super Bowl title?

I’m still reading hot takes that coming back from 28-3 wasn’t all that impressive.

For whatever the reasons, and there are plenty of them, the Brady hate at the end is very real, leaving us all wondering why they can’t just leave him alone to get old and stinky in peace and not cue the victory parade after any sub-300 yard game.

Patriots Film Review: Defense Strangles out Pack

November 8, 2018 by Mike Dussault

Upon further review, the defense’s performance against Aaron Rodgers and the Packers’ offense was a classic kind of win. Did they give up a few long scoring drives? Yup, three to be exact. But they kept the ground game under control, didn’t allow any big scoring plays and withstood the storm until the second half when they grabbed a turnover, forced a timely three-and-out and set the stage for the Patriots’ offense to pull away.

This is always how it seems to go when the Pats face classic QBs like Rodgers, Matt Ryan, Joe Flacco and Ben Roethlisberger to name a few.

Despite the Jaguars and Lions hiccups, this has been a defense reborn and they getting better every week. It’s impressive and exciting to watch. Especially the Trey Flowers part of it.

No doubt there are still improvements to be made but this is a solid defense no matter how you slice it. Here’s how the Pats D strangled out the Pack.