Pressure from Patriots may be short-lived – Patriots – Boston.com

Closing the book on the Colts game with Greg Bedard’s wrap up. Lots of good stuff about the decision to blitz or not to blitz.

That the Patriots suddenly blitzed their highest percentage of the season (30.9 percent of the dropbacks) and had their most total pressure concepts (43.6 percent) can be attributed to the coordinator the Patriots were playing against (Bruce Arians), and also the opponent themselves. Dating to the start of the 2010 season, of the six games with the highest number of blitzes, Arians was coordinator of three of those teams: 2010 Steelers (23 blitzes), 2012 Colts (17), and 2011 Steelers (14). Why the need to throw so much at an Arians offense? Likely for two reasons: because quarterbacks Ben Roethlisberger (especially) and Luck don’t make a lot of mistakes unless forced into them; and Arians’s offense lives off deep drops from center by the quarterback and a lot of deep routes. If the quarterbacks aren’t rushed, there could be big trouble down the field.