PatsPropaganda

An Independent Patriots Blog

Patriots defense lives or dies by turnovers

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Though there is always a correlation between forcing turnovers and winning football games, the Patriots defense of the past two-plus seasons is an extreme example.

Since 2010 the Patriots are 32-9, including playoffs. Over that stretch the defense forces an average of 2.69 turnovers in their wins, and just .92 turnovers in their defeats.

Only twice over that time period did the Pats win a game where they didn’t get a turnover, against the Ravens in 2010 and the Jets in 2011. And of the other 30 wins there were just 8 times where they only forced a single turnover.

That means in 69% of the Patriots wins since 2010 they’ve forced multiple turnovers.

Of their 9 losses they failed to force a single turnover in 3 of them, which includes both the AFCDG loss to the Jets in 2010 and the Super Bowl loss to the Giants in 2011. Clearly the defense picked the wrong time to suddenly stop their ball hawking ways.

Just twice have they forced 2 turnovers and still lost, against Buffalo in 2011 and the Cardinals this year. Both of those games came down to a field goal kick as time expired to determine the Pats fate.

The Pats defensive formula for success is pretty simple. They’re going to give up yards, and especially long passes, but if they can just force 2 turnovers they’re probably going to win. They’re 22-2 when they get 2 turnovers or more.

So if opposing offenses can just keep the ball safe they’ll give their team a chance to win, regardless of how unstoppable the Pats offense can be at times.

Somehow the Pats defense needs to find a way to become less dependent on getting turnovers, because most of the time they require mistakes by the offense. Punts are something the defense should be able to do on their own simply by executing. Unfortunately that’s easier said than done.

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So Kevin, again, it’s been an honor to coach you. Congratulations on a wonderful career. I’ll never forget the many, many accomplishments you had on the field to help make our team successful, and more importantly, what I’ll really remember is all the things you did on the practice field, in the meeting room, in the locker room, as really one of the most important members of our team, with the leadership and example that you set – not just for the other players, but for every one of us who was on that team. Congratulations.

Bill Belichick, uncut, on Kevin Faulk – New England Patriots Blog – ESPN Boston

https://www.patspropaganda.com/belichick-kevin-faulk/

Notes on PFF’s Patriots grades: Week 5 Broncos

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The ProFootballFocus.com Patriots grades are in for the Broncos game and here are the numbers that stood out to me.

Best Offensive Grade: Mankins 6.0 – dominant effort in all aspects, this is a very positive development considering he didn’t even play last weekend.

Worst Offensive Grade: Wendell -3.3 – just can’t quite wrap my head around Wendell.  His grades have been generally solid until this week.

Best Defensive Grade: Chandler Jones 2.9, 2 QB hits, 3 QB hurries – Jones didn’t stand out to me as the best player on the defense, that would be Ninkovich who came in 3rd on defense with a 1.4.

Worst Defensive Grade: Jermaine Cunningham -2.1 – I didn’t think Cunningham was the worst defender on the field, but the graders didn’t think highly of his pass rush, scoring him just a -1.8.

We suspected it was the first bad week of the season for Vollmer and these scorers agreed giving him a -1.5.

Might be a tough week to read too much into Spikes’ -1.4 (-1.9 pass coverage). Clearly he can still be exploited in the passing game. He was targeted 6 times and gave up 5 catches for 53 yards, including 39 yards in YAC.

Secondary Coverage Rankings:

  1. Dennard 2.4
  2. McCourty 0.4
  3. Dowling 0.2
  4. Arrington -0.1
  5. Wilson -0.3
  6. Chung -1.2

Tom Brady didn’t attempt a pass in the 10-19 yard range. He was 1-for-5 on 20+ yarders, the other 24 attempts were either behind the LOS or 0-9 yards.

The running game was dominant running behind Mankins (4.8) and Solder (3.2). Off left tackle was good too (2.3).

Von Miller scored the highest rating I can remember ever seeing, a 12.3!?!?!

Great day for Jerod Mayo. 3 stops, a sack and a hurry, plus a 1.5 pass rush rating. BB needs to send him more I think.

I never read too much into these ratings but Vince Wilfork is having a down year by their scorers. His five game scores: 2.3, -1.2, -1.7, -0.2, -1.1. His -2.1 pass rush was the worst on the team against the Broncos.

See all our PFF notes here. And for all our written Pats analysis click here.