Getting Defensive - New England Patriots

[teeray]

Pittsburgh is not the #8 defense.  Not even close.  They have one of the worst defenses in the league really. 

 

They were 24th in the league in TDs given up per drive and 27th in points given up per drive, as well as 18th in yards allowed per drive.  All while playing mostly offensively challenged teams.

 

Some of those number will be better after this past Sunday, but Pittsburgh's defense is not very good.

 

I think the two keys will be:

 

Pressure:  Brady will dice you up if you let him scan the field, or allow time for double moves.  The Panthers have done a good job getting to the QB before those things can even happen all year and even Brady can get jittery when there is pressure.  Our DTs will be more important than our DEs in the pass rush.  Brady loves to step up and deliver a strike with pressure, but when he can't step up he has a tendency to surrender the play.  He can't have room to step up.  The DTs have to get push on passing plays.

 

Keep NE out of the endzone:  The Panther's defense are 2nd in the NFL in points allowed in the redzone, 3rd in TDs not allowed up per redzone trip, and 1st in TD/FG ratio.  New England's offense however, even with the Pitt game, are 17th in points per redzone visit, 17th in TDs per redzone visit, and 26th in TD/FG ratio.

 

Point being, they can move the ball, but have had issues in the redzone.  We have proven to be stingy when teams have gotten into our redzone.  That trend needs to continue.  Brady will move the ball.  We have to limit him to FGs and not TDs.

[panthers55]

I'm curious to see if the Pats will defer if they win the coin toss. 90% of the time they do, but this week? BB might decide to try to try to take an early lead to reduce the crowds impact.

 

Also want if they go hurry up, and put Brady in the shotgun. they've done the former a few times this year, but they haven't been in Shotgun nearly as much as in the past.

 

Have the Pathers faced a Pats-type hurryup this season? When executed well, it can put a huge strain on even the best defenses, especially those that sub out a lot.

Read somewhere on one of the Pats boards by one of the guys who cover the Pats that they wouldn't be running the hurry up and hadn't done it much this year.  The receivers have to know the offense inside and outside to run it and with all the rookies and shuffling, it couldn't be done effectively.

[tailgater]

Read somewhere on one of the Pats boards by one of the guys who cover the Pats that they wouldn't be running the hurry up and hadn't done it much this year.  The receivers have to know the offense inside and outside to run it and with all the rookies and shuffling, it couldn't be done effectively.

 

For the most part, thats true. They've used it much less than last year, but the one game they did use it (Saints), it was very effective and put them on their heels the entire game.

 

Doing it on the road, against a stellar defense , with the crowd in the game, will probably reduce any chance of seeing it this week, but with Amendola, Gronk & Vereen back, anything is possible.

[Trenches]

Captain Munneryln and Drayton Florence's fate will lie in the hands of the Panthers front seven.  Aaron Dobson, Kenbrell Thompkins and Danny Amendola should have huge games.

[teeray]

People can keep short selling our secondary all they want.  It is true that a great front 7 makes an average secondary look good.

 

But the Panther's defense is #1 in the NFL in INTs per possession.  So when the QBs are throwing, we are getting our hands on the ball.

[MHS831]

We had Fua, McLain, Kearse, Neblett, etc. for a few years.  QBs could easily step up into the pocket and pick our CBs apart.  Maybe our CBs weren't as bad as we thought. 

 

Munnerlyn, Florence, White, Mitchell, Mykel-that is pretty solid. 

[Peppers90 NC]

I would blitz Brad with the front 4 + Mitchell all day and keep the LBs in air defense.

yeah Brady wouldnt eventually pick that up and destroy it

[panthers55]

Captain Munneryln and Drayton Florence's fate will lie in the hands of the Panthers front seven.  Aaron Dobson, Kenbrell Thompkins and Danny Amendola should have huge games.

If huge means they each have 5 or 6 catches for 40 or 50 yards a piece then that is likely true. But in only 1 game did a receiver and runner get 100 yards and they were both against Buffalo in week 2 on the road. At home it hasn't happened.

 

Tell me why you think that all these receivers will suddenly go off and have huge games. You do know that the Steelers and the Saints defense are much worse than ours when it comes to scoring points.  You know how many touchdowns we have given up all year?  9  How many in the first half? 1

 

How many in the past 3 games? 1 when it mattered and 1 in junk time. Truth is we are getting better and it doesn't matter the opponent.   Our secondary is patched together but they are working together and getting better every day.  Watch and see.  You haven't come close to seeing a defense like ours.

[Trenches]

Danny will be out of the game after the first series vs our defense...

No one runs on the panthers your rt is done for the year so you have a backup going against Charles Johnson..

Gronk is going up against the best two cover linebackers in the nfl.

You guys are so bias and high off of your little winning streak just because you beat a team with a great defense but no offense and a second year qb in Kaepernick that is average without his weapon Vernon Davis and now you are world beaters?  Have not faced a qb all year like Tom Brady except Drew Brees .. but Drew Brees is no Tom Brady.  A swollen hand for weeks, hurt players all around him, chemistry lacking earlier on, new faces and still 7-2.  Now healthy throwing hand, healthy offense around him, chemistry complete and one of his top weapons returning and you guys have no clue.  A great defense is nothing without an offense that cannot put up points when they're in shoot out games..because you ARE NOT going to have a shutdown defense every Sunday or Monday.  And Danny wasn't knocked out of last game, see he survived and burned some *ss while at it.  And you act like our backups years past have not faced an all-pro lineman.  Last year Marcus Cannon went up against J.J Watts twice, and dominated both games.  Is Charles Johnson superior to J.J Watts, I dare you to say he is..  And if Gronk has beaten both Navarro Bowman and Patrick Willis in the past for two touchdowns then why can't he do it against Carolina.  Luke is great, but so is Bowman and Willis.  Great defense vs Great offense in this game, and these days if you don't have a quarterback you don't win it all.  This is an offensive and quarterback driven league now...

[mc52beast]

great back to back games for this team that seems to be jelling at the right time... another interesting game will be San Fran vs N.O.... want to see how well they do against a team we shut down

[Trenches]

And here is a list of defensive backs that have been beaten by Aaron Dobson, Kenbrell Thompkins and Danny Amendola

 

Darelle Revis

Antonio Cromartie

Brent Grimes

Ike Taylor

Jarius Byrd

William Moore

Troy Polamalu

DaShon Goldson

Ryan Clark

 

so who is Drayton Florence and Captain Munneryln other than average?  The front seven is great but don't act like your secondary is too...

[dldove77]

Not too early to start spreading the word.

[Chaos]

I feel as if the tide is turning to smack.  Perhaps we should take this to the other forum (aka, let's take it outside).

[panthers55]

You guys are so bias and high off of your little winning streak just because you beat a team with a great defense but no offense and a second year qb in Kaepernick that is average without his weapon Vernon Davis and now you are world beaters?  Have not faced a qb all year like Tom Brady except Drew Brees .. but Drew Brees is no Tom Brady.  A swollen hand for weeks, hurt players all around him, chemistry lacking earlier on, new faces and still 7-2.  Now healthy throwing hand, healthy offense around him, chemistry complete and one of his top weapons returning and you guys have no clue.  A great defense is nothing without an offense that cannot put up points when they're in shoot out games..because you ARE NOT going to have a shutdown defense every Sunday or Monday.  And Danny wasn't knocked out of last game, see he survived and burned some *ss while at it.  And you act like our backups years past have not faced an all-pro lineman.  Last year Marcus Cannon went up against J.J Watts twice, and dominated both games.  Is Charles Johnson superior to J.J Watts, I dare you to say he is..  And if Gronk has beaten both Navarro Bowman and Patrick Willis in the past for two touchdowns then why can't he do it against Carolina.  Luke is great, but so is Bowman and Willis.  Great defense vs Great offense in this game, and these days if you don't have a quarterback you don't win it all.  This is an offensive and quarterback driven league now...

Your great offense is averaging 26 points a game. Our terrible offense is averaging 24.  Your all world quarterback has a rating of 82 and our third year running quarterback has a horrific 88.

 

And then we have all the last year the Patriots did well so they will do it again Monday night this year. Because Gronkowski beat Willis last year it is a no brainer that his injuries mean nothing and he  will score several TDs against us this year.  Meanwhile our crappy tight end, Greg Olsen  who only has 35 catches for 440 catches this year, will sit on his hands and do nothing all game.  

 

And because Marcus Cannon held JJ Watts down last year, he will stop Charles Johnson this year.  Because we all know that the best way to judge this years' team is to see what they did last year.  What kind of crazy logic is that??

 

Truth is the Panthers have a very good offense and a great defense going up against a very good offense and a suspect defense. The whole point of the game is how many points you score versus how many you give up. Right now we score 24 and give up 13 for an 11 point difference.  You guys score 26 but give up 19 for a 7 point difference.   At home we are giving up 9 points a game and scoring 28 for a 19 point difference.  On the road you are scoring 21 and giving up 21 points.  Instead of talking about how you are going to score a ton of points you should be worried abut how you are going to stop us. You give up 130 rushing yards and 232 passing yards for a total of 362.  Meanwhile we are giving up 82 rushing yards and 201 passing for a total of 283.  You may score 20 but we may very score 30.  Looking at the big picture your team still comes out on the short end.