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Film Review

Patriots vs. Vikings All 22 Thoughts: Defense Edition

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Thank Hoodie the NFL puts All-22 film up now, it’s really so much better to help understand what kind of coverages and route combinations are being run. And the end zone cam is perfect for seeing gap alignment.

Early on the Pats rotated through odd and even fronts, running primarily Cover 1 Robber, with Chung in the box. Essentially the Pats traded Steve Gregory for Chung. Chung might get pulled off the field in coverage packages, but he’s definitely a better presence for the “Robber” spot that the Pats play a lot of. So far his weaknesses have been well-hidden.

One Chandler Jones’ 2nd quarter sack it was a great example of team defense. Jones got an initial hand on Cassel, though he probably had enough time to dump it off had the coverage not been perfect. Siliga came through on a stunt and destroyed the pocket. That’s when Jones finished him off.

On Revis’ interception he did the proverbial “ran the route better than the receiver”. His perfect outside leverage prevented the receiver from breaking out of his cut, from there Revis just sprinted right to where the ball was delivered and there was nothing Jennings could do.

Remarkable that even without Browner and Dennard the defense was still able to play a lot of press man. They slipped in some off-man as well, but Press Cover 1 Robber was the coverage of choice.

On third-and-three in the second quarter we saw some zone coverage with two deep, Mayo in the deep middle, four underneath defenders waiting to pounce on the underneath pass. It worked perfectly.

For all the talk of Hightower’s improved pass rush, dropping him into short zones eliminated the underneath passes that gashed the defense on the first drive. Hightower moves better in space than he’s gotten credit for.

Seemed like Ebner was the dime linebacker while Wilson was just the base strong safety to give Chung a breather. Interesting how they’re rotating a deep group of safeties.

Such a smooth Revis-esque play by Logan Ryan to undercut Patterson’s route on his interception. Cassel shouldn’t have tried that throw but there wasn’t anywhere else to go with it. That’s one thing sticking out with the All-22 – just how good the coverage is across the board.

Pats sent 6 rushers on Dont’a Hightower’s third quarter sack from their dime package. Man-to-man coverage was perfect behind it.

Easley was used entirely inside as a pass rusher, just like he should be. He showed good explosion and violence early on but I think he seemed to run out of gas in the fourth quarter. Understandable considering how he saw no game time in the preseason.

Kyle Arrington’s blitz from the slot was well-timed. I thought the Pats did some experimentation being a little more aggresive. PFF had them blitzing on 10 of 44 snaps which is on the high end for BB.

Patriots vs. Dolphins All-22 Thoughts: Offense Edition

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I’m going to break this down by the first and second half because after re-watching the first half I found myself reminded of how good I felt about things.

Were there protection issues? Sure, especially whenever Sebastian Vollmer had to block Cameron Wake without help. I’m not sure what’s up with Vollmer. Is he rusty? Or is he breaking down? He looked a lot stiffer than I remember, but still credit to Wake. He’s a beast and had his way with Vollmer.

Otherwise Brady had time and the offense moved the ball. The protection was sloppy but effective. They found an early rhythm with the three-step passing game.

I can recall three incomplete deep passes from Brady, a statistical point of contention this week, but one was really a throw away and two others were shots to the end zone where the coverage was solid. Can’t blame him for taking those.

In the first half I didn’t notice a discernible difference between the offensive line rotation. Even Devey didn’t look that bad. Was it the smooth operation we’re used to seeing? Not yet, but like I said, it was effective and Brady had time to make throws.

Drives of 13-plays, 80 yards and 11-plays, 94 yards made this certainly look like the Patriots offense we’re used to seeing. But apparently that team never came out of the locker room.

Second Half

 Okay, now there was the ugliness I remember. The turning point was clearly on Brady’s fumble during their first possession of the second half. From there everything just seemed to fall apart.

All the OL had their issues, with Devey and Cannon both getting smoked in one-on-ones that caused Brady to get sacked. Another sack was due to coverage. 

There were also some misreads it seems by Brady where he and the intended receiver didn’t seem on the same page. Agree with Greg Bedard’s observation that the deep ball to Edelman that went incomplete was on Edelman. He should’ve gone upfield.

Credit to the Miami linebacker who stuck with Shane Vereen on his patented wheel route and forced an incompletion.

I used to like Brandon Bolden but I think he’s uber average now. He gets what’s there for him and not a yard more.

It looked to me like LaFell tried to dip his shoulder to avoid contact on his penalty but that ended up with his shoulder in the defender’s head. Right call, but not intentional.

Losing their rhythm at the start of the 3rd quarter set the tone and they could never get it back for more than a play or two. They couldn’t string anything together.

I finished the game feeling like it was there for the taking but the Pats were just too on their heels to take it. It was as if each guy took turns making a costly mistake and the sum of those small parts added up.

Patriots vs. Dolphins All-22 Thoughts – Defense Edition

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Finally got to take a look at the All-22 after it posted a day late on Game Rewind and I started with the defense. Not a whole lot was revealed but some things were certainly reinforced.

First, a lot of the focus on the “new” 34 defense has focused on Chandler Jones but other than keeping him from pass drops I didn’t see a ton different than what he was doing last year schematically. He certainly did not have a great game, but I disagree with those who think he was being asked to play the Richard Seymour two-gap role.

34 or 43 or 25 doesn’t really tell you much anyway, it’s more important to see which guys are covering which gaps and I didn’t see Chandler two-gapping much at all, now he’s just being asked to face the tackle consistently like he would be in a run of the mill 43. I went back and looked at last year’s game in Miami to compare and the schematic changes as far as he was concerned were not monumental. It seems they wanted to avoid dropping him into coverage, at least in this one.

I think there hasn’t been enough commentary on WHY the Pats went with the front that they did, and where the real changes happened were with Ninkovich, Hightower, Mayo and Collins.

Collins playing strongside inside linebacker is a tough fit. He’s great in space, but coming downhill to make tackles does not seem to be his specialty and it’s one of the big risks of letting Spikes go. Essentially Collins is the anti-Spikes on the field in both the positive and negative ways. He needs to be better getting off blocks as well. Mayo isn’t much better coming downhill through traffic.

What we’re not seeing from this odd front is “building the wall” as they used to put it, to let the LBs run free. The nose is two-gapping, but the linebackers and defensive ends are keeping single gap responsibility with the help of the strong safety. 

Might be too early to say this for sure, but it would seem there’s an effort to get Hightower out there more than Ninkovich. And I really thought Hightower had a good game outside of a few bad plays. As much as we’ve all come to love Ninkovich it’s not that hard to believe that Hightower has the higher ceiling. But who knows, things could change up and have Ninkovich not coming off the field. Certainly could happen with Adrian Peterson on tap.

Vellano is overmatched and the sooner he’s replaced by any of the other DL the better. I think a four-man rotation of Wilfork-Siliga-Jones-Easley is fine for inside. 

Again I liked what I saw out of Easley. Good explosion and had some drive even when double teamed. There weren’t many third-and-longs in this one, but once the defense starts tackling on first and second down, then I think we’ll really see some special stuff from Easley.

Wilfork had some really solid plays and I continue to be amazed by how quickly he’s still getting off the ball. With some experience and a better rotation this season, he should be effective for a full 60 minutes.

As I’ve said a few times in the last few days, the mistakes of missed tackles just added up. Multiple times they had plays sniffed out in the backfield only to let the running back slip away and gain at least four yards. Wrap up, make those tackles, and it’s a totally different game. This kind of performance is not entirely shocking given all the elements in this one – weather, conditioning, lack of tackling/full pads in practice now, first game of the year against a divisional opponent.

My biggest concerns are Collins and Mayo on the inside and getting Vellano out of there. Otherwise it’s just about making the plays that they’re already in position to make.