New England Patriots thread (MOD WARNING - #4503)

JaMarcusHustle wrote: »

Chandler Jones back at practice :D:D

Just a walk through tho, probably won't be back for a couple of weeks yet, but it's promising considering rumors he wouldn't be back till the playoffs if at all

Hazys wrote: »

Just a walk through tho, probably won't be back for a couple of weeks yet, but it's promising considering rumors he wouldn't be back till the playoffs if at all

He was limited at normal practice today.

Hopefully we don't rush him back too soon tho

A word on Tim Wright, plenty of people were critical of the move when he was brought in as part of the Mankins trade but he is growing into the team really well and proving himself to be a good target for Brady, this gives the offence so much, there are two genuine, mobile TE's for Brady along with LaFell who has improved as the season is going along too, he is proving to be an important player and is Bradys go to guy a lot of the time now

Anyway, Tim Wright, 24 years old, still scope to improve and his first season integrating into the team so far reads 11 games, 23 receptions from 26 targets for 220 yards, has gained 16 first downs for the team and a very healthy 6 touchdowns.

Can't ask for any more right now and I feel he deserves some recognition

munstermagic11 wrote: »

It should be a shootout with possibly the two best offences on display.
Gronk can beat anyone one-on-one, it may need more than Matthews to stop him.
Green Bay are 30th against the run, so we might see a lot of Blount and Gray with Vereen mixed in.
Nelson and Cobb are excellent, and with Rodgers at QB it'll be a really tough examination. I agree with your likely matchups and suspect Browner will need the safety help.
If the Pats 4 man DL can stop the run like they did against the Lions, then they can add further help in the secondary; it'll be needed against the GB passing offence.

I think the Patriots running game has got way, WAY too little credit or attention in terms of the media coverage leading into this match - the Saints game, especially the second half, is a great blueprint for what I expect Belichick to be looking to do in large parts come Sunday. The absolute keys for GB are to limit the run and to limit Gronk. Not stop them, just limit them.

A major worry though is Dom Capers - he is great for bullying average QBs, but against elite types or an in form, unpredictable player (e.g. Kaepernick) he crumbles in tremendous fashion more often than not. Belichick is known for his ability to take away the opposing offences' best weapon... Capers more often than not caters to/ignores it and tries to stop the other stuff instead. It is one of the major reasons why GB fans wind up so p*ssed off with him at the end of each and every season (and often throughout). Expect a rotation of Hawk/Lattimore/Barrington on Gronk, with safety help coming from Morgan Burnett who has the aggression and willingness to get physical, but not necessarily the smarts. Matthews will the odd time but should mostly be covering the run and getting some blitzes in I suspect... and if we do go this way, Lattimore is possibly the best coverage option but will likely see little play to Hawk can cover his 3 yard box behind the LOS. If it works Capers looks great, but more likely than not when it fails Gronk has maybe his biggest day of the season, causing us to drop a bit deeper and deeper in the LBs, and allowing Grey/Blount to smash forward for 4 yards before contact each and every time as a result.

As for GBs offence, the WRs and running game have been mentioned a lot, but don't overlook screens to Lacy also where he really has found a role this season (since running the ball 25-30 times a game with Rodgers there makes no sense). He only had 13 yards last week receiving, but in the three before that he had 236 receiving yards on top of 178 rushing (and got pulled out with 10 odd minutes left in all three games)... if Cobb and Nelson can stretch you deep, he becomes a massive, massive threat underneath and not someone you want DBs making isolated tackles on. A bonus for you guys is that Davante Adasm does seem to have hit the rookie wall, but on the other end our offensive line has been improving week on week and is now arguably the best Rodgers has had in his whole career (just with razor thin depth at tackle). They'll probably fall flat on their faces now that I've said it but Bakhtiari (2nd yeard, 4th round LT) and Corey Linsley (5th round rookie C) have come on absolute leaps and bounds from the first few weeks of the year.

Hazys wrote: »

I think it will be mostly Revis on Cobb and Browner on Nelson with Safety help just because Cobb is faster and Nelson is a little slower but bigger.

Nelson is the faster of the two, he doesn't always look it because he kind of 'glides' like say Rio Ferdinand or Thierry Henry used to in the Premiership as opposed to running frenetically, but Nelson is really, really fast. You have a decent point about safety help though because of how dangerous he is deep (he leads the league in 50+ yard receptions, I believe) but also how much damage he can do on shorter passes not only for YAC (4th among all WRs) but also just his understanding with Rodgers that tends to keep them well ahead of the DBs.

Tristram wrote: »

I think Hawk would have serious problems covering Gronkowski. Then again, who doesn't?

Here's a piece on the same topic: http://www.acmepackingcompany.com/patriots-packers-week-13-2014/2014/11/25/7281645/packers-patriots-defend-rob-gronkowski-week-13-2014-preview

Oh he would, he would be a terribly suited player for it, which is in large part exactly why I expect to see Capers try it.

Corvus Maximus wrote: »

Double team/triple team you can't cover Gronk without seriously weakening your defense. Or unless god forbid, some scumbag wants to take out his knee. His TD against the Colts last week is the perfect example of the unique beast he is. He brushed off, ran through and jumped over 5 Colts defenders. He just couldn't be stopped. If he is healthy and on the field, he is just the ultimate match up nightmare. And if he stays healthy for the entire season, then all us Pats fans will be very excited, for obvious reasons.

I'm struggling to think of any players who have a chance to take him one-on-one (or at least with only a small bit of help)... maybe Kam Chancellor (with some help deep from Earl Thomas)? If Chancellor played in the AFC East or NFC South (Graham) he would be worth mega, megabucks in his position in my opinion for that very reason. Outside of an up-and-down Vernon Davis though, there's not much of a real TE threat in the NFC West.

That's my major worry with Blount/Grey - we are actually semi decent at limiting (not stopping) the run against shifty backs like we did with the Eagles and also Forte in the second game - it's power running that really kills us due to a lack of size and aggression outside of Matthews, Daniels and Peppers. Burnett can also help out, but only if there is no passing game to threaten him since he is nowhere near good enough to cover both duties, and that is clearly not the case here. Four months later and I am still shocked we didn't sign Pickett back to a cheap, one year deal the day after Raji went down.

Definitely agree on that, though our gameplan at home seems to typically be to hit the ground running with a hard, fast, aggressive passing game and dare other teams to try keep pace (hence our being just one off the 49ers for most INTs this season) which also negates our weak run defense. I reckon Belichick is well, well aware of that too and will use Blount/Grey in a rotation to try and keep our offense off the field to take the life out of the game. It's going to be crucial and pretty interesting to see how we do stopping that in the first 3-4 defensive drives, and how we do against Gronk if we can force some 3rd and longs (Tramon and Shields should be fine on the outside). On top of course of our offense doing it's job.

Don't want to bet against GB myself but the line is really high at 58.5 points - I think the smart money is on the under and Patriots +3.5 at 21/10 for this one. But if we somehow do manage to stop the run early on and run up scores, the under part of that will fly right out the window and quick.

Love this description of Gronk. Rampage was fantastic

paulie21 wrote: »

Danny Aiken inactive. Looks like Ninko will be the long snapper today

Wow, i know Aiken has been poor this season, but its kinda a shock for Ninko to long snap, seems highly risky. We cut a LS from the practice squad during the week, surely he'd be better suited than Ninko...he hasnt snapped since college :eek:

Seems like the Pats thought he would be good to go but the Doctors said no at the last minute. No way this was their contingency plan.

Looks like it's gonna be a tough night on defense.
Slowly getting to grips with the run, but Browner off to a poor start so lots to work on in the secondary.

Did well to limit it to 6pts so far.