Patriot Talk: Week 14 Recap and Week 15 Prediction
NE@MIA: 33-34 Loss (9-4 Record)
What just happened? Up 33-28 with just about 5 seconds left, Dolphins in their own end, Tannehill finds Kenny Stills in the middle of the field. That’s good, because he can’t get out of bounds to stop the clock and there are Patriots around to stop him. Stills laterals to Parker, who quickly laterals to Kenyan Drake and runs ahead to block. The Patriots defense forgets how to tackle, as at least 4 Patriots surrounded Drake near the sideline with no time left, yet he emerges. Rob Gronkowski was back as the deep safety and is just too slow and stumbles as Drake runs it in for one of the worst losses in the Brady-Belichick era. Let’s get into it.
The offense was great when the defense wasn’t, but they couldn’t take advantage of the stops that the defense could rarely generate. Tom Brady finished 27 of 43 for 358 yards and 3 TDs, yet the play he is remembered for in this loss was when he took a sack inside field goal range with less than 10 seconds in the first half and no timeouts. A mental mistake that very rarely happens to the Patriots. Of Brady’s 16 incomplete passes, two were dropped (both by Julian Edelman), four were thrown away, one was thrown as he was being hit, and one was broken up at the line of scrimmage, meaning 8 incomplete passes were not good throws. Brady went 1 of 3 on deep passes for 37 yards and a TD to Cordarrelle Patterson. As for the pass protection, it was sloppy. Trent Brown, Joe Thuney and Marcus Cannon each allowed 2 hurries, Tom Brady went down himself and took a sack (the only sack of the game). Shaq Mason gave up one hurry. David Andrews was the only linemen who didn’t allow a pressure, while Rob Gronkowski, James White, James Devlin and Sony Michel also didn’t allow any pressure when they blocked. The running game, however, was atrocious. Each running back combined for just 2.6 yards per carry (30 carries for 77 yards). Rex Burkhead was horrible, carrying the ball 4 times for 2 total yards, as was James White, who had 4 carries for 13 yards. Sony Michel had 20 carries for 57 yards, which isn’t awful, but the Dolphins have one of the worst run defenses in the league and he should’ve been way better. Yet again, James Devlin scored the only rushing TD. Rob Gronkowski had a great game, albeit the poor attempt to tackle Kenyan Drake, as he caught 8 passes for 107 yards and a TD. Josh Gordon followed that up with 5 catches for 96 yards, as he, too, looked good. Edelman had a team leading 9 catches for 86 yards and a TD, while Cordarrelle Patterson had the 3rd and final TD, recording 2 catches for 51 yards. Overall, the offense was great, but they left points on the board with the Brady sack and Stephen Gostkowski missing a field goal AND an extra point. They also didn’t take advantage of the few defensive stops that were made.
Defensively, the story of the game was the poor run stopping exhibited by everyone on the Patriots defense. For the last two weeks I had brought up the fact that the Patriots have struggled against the run, but both times the Patriots opponents didn’t run the ball enough to make a difference. This week, the Dolphins took advantage, and the defense looked like it had no idea what tackling was. They gave up a combined total of 176 rushing yards and 2 TDs (not counting Ryan Tannehill’s scramble) on 20 carries, that’s 8.8 yards per carry. Oh, and those two TDs were scored by former Patriot and career special teamer Brandon Bolden, who also went for 60 yards on just 2 carries. However, it wasn’t all terrible defensively. They had the most effective game when it came to pressuring the QB. Trey Flowers had a sack, a QB hit and 3 hurries, totaling 5 pressures. Dont’a Hightower had a good game as well when rushing the passer, registering a sack, a QB hit and a hurry. Kyle Van Noy, Adam Butler, John Simon, and Jonathan Jones had the other sacks in this game, with one sack each. Yes, the Patriots had 6 sacks, topping their season high of 3 sacks in one game. Jason McCourty struggled mightily in coverage on Kenny Stills, as he let up catches on all 4 targets for 81 yards and a TD. Jonathan Jones gave up just one catch on one target for the game winning Miami TD (69 yards). Stephon Gilmore also struggled, giving up 2 catches on 4 targets for 38 yards and a TD. JC Jackson was good in replacing Jason McCourty as the number two corner on Stills, as he was only targeted twice, allowing one catch for 15 yards.
Next week, the Patriots take on the 7-5-1 Pittsburgh Steelers in Pittsburgh. Initially, I drew this one up as a loss, as the Patriots continuously struggle away from Foxboro, and the defense is too inconsistent to trust. However, the Steelers have struggled mightily in recent weeks, losing to the Broncos, Chargers and Raiders. Yes, they lost to the Raiders. It’s also hard to ignore Brady’s history against Pittsburgh, winning 10 games out of 12 career matchups, and being very effective against them. Not to mention, Roethlisberger is 3-6 versus New England (he won one when Brady was injured in 2008), and, although he hasn’t been bad, always finds a way to come out just short. The Patriots offense should be just fine, considering how good the offense was last week in a losing effort. The defense, however, is an interesting case. They haven’t played back to back bad games, and with the poor outing against Miami, they could bounce back. There’s also the fact that they play up to high end offenses, like holding Aaron Rodgers to just 17 points, and Adam Thielen in Minnesota to just one TD. With Antonio Brown and Juju Smith-Schuster next up on the list, I have high hopes for this defense.
Prediction: 24-14 Patriots win
