Brady/Manning XVII

Captaincoop

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Honest question - what are the Pats defenders supposed to do this weekend when Peyton gets pressured and does his standard turtle on the ground routine? Hit him and risk a penalty? Let him get up and throw it again?

I hate the NFL.
 

E5 Yaz

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Honest question - what are the Pats defenders supposed to do this weekend when Peyton gets pressured and does his standard turtle on the ground routine? Hit him and risk a penalty? Let him get up and throw it again?

I hate the NFL.
Put a hand on him while he's down
 

E5 Yaz

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Yeah, I guess that's the answer.

By honest question, I really meant "rhetorical question to highlight why the NFL sucks so horribly."
Oh, no doubt. It wouldn't surprise me that this situation has been discussed. But, like anything, it depends on the guy with the whistle
 

djbayko

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ENGLEWOOD — Do the Broncos think Patriots quarterback Tom Brady is a crybaby?

"That would be an accurate statement. I've never seen any quarterback look to the referee right after he gets sacked more than Brady," defensive lineman Antonio Smith said with a smile at Dove Valley on Monday. "Every time he gets sacked he looks at the ref like, 'You see him sack me? Was that supposed to happen? He did it a little hard. Please throw a 15-yard penalty on him. Get him fined.'"
I may be a homer, but IMO this can be said about every skill position player on the field for every team. In fact, I find it annoying how every time there is a long pass, one or both of the defensive and offensive players are looking for a flag. It's very much like the NBA in that respect, but slightly less annoying because the begging / complaining isn't happening during live ball game play.
 

rodderick

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I may be a homer, but IMO this can be said about every skill position player on the field for every team. In fact, I find it annoying how every time there is a long pass, one or both of the defensive and offensive players are looking for a flag. It's very much like the NBA in that respect, but slightly less annoying because the begging / complaining isn't happening during live ball game play.
What I love is that he describes the way Brady looks at the ref. Meaning he doesn't generally voice a complaint after a sack, but the Broncos can sense he felt entitled to a flag based on his facial expressions.
 
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Or teams not actually prioritizing winning over other goals, like getting/staying healthy. Even after being banged up for weeks, and losing to Denver and Philly, the Patriots' ELO rating was 1717 after the Titans game and 1689 after the second Jets game. But because we lost to a very bad Miami team, ELO dropped to 1644.

Basically, ELO would have thought the Patriots team after the Titans game, even without Edelman and others, was a huge favorite to beat Denver and the clear favorite to win the Super Bowl. Even after the Jets loss, ELO would have thought we were a substantial favorite to beat Denver. But because we lost to Miami in a game where we rested starters and didn't really try to win, ELO thinks we are now - even fully healthy - an underdog to Denver and the least likely team to win the Super Bowl.

Its a stupid system.
It's more of a misapplication than a stupid underlying system, I'd say. Elo ratings work surprisingly well when you have hundreds of homogeneous, binary-outcome, equally-meaningful datapoints, and a bunch of tightly-clustered competitors trying to differentiate themselves. Chess is of course the original example: a top player will play dozens of matches even within a single tournament, and hundreds over the course of a year, and their health isn't an issue. Tennis is similar: matches are 1v1, health is close to binary (not many players would tough out a tournament despite severe illness the way Serena Williams did at last year's French Open - you'd have to be the favorite to win a Major to justify that), lots of players whose outcomes against each other aren't all that certain, and even though you've got multiple sets, the match outcome is still pretty much binary (and it ain't over until the last point, unlike sports with timed contests).

In football, you've got a whole host of issues: tiny 16-19-game sample size, a 46-man roster turning over frequently, a wide spectrum of gray area on health, and a small number of teams varying enormously in quality, to the point where outcomes are extremely certain by the standards of the sporting world (spare me on "any given sunday", just look at standard deviations of winning percentage). Worse, you have outcomes that are very continuous in nature (widely-ranging margins of victory), parts of which are predictive (good teams tend to blow out bad teams) and parts of which are irrelevant to the point of misleading (i.e., NE's Week 17 vs Miami, or any other not-really-trying effort). I mean, it's worse than even international soccer. Other than, I dunno, ice dancing, I'd be hard pressed to name a sport that's LESS of a fit for an Elo model than American Football.

Long story short, I put just as little stock in it as MMS does, other than as a general long-term tracker of franchise lifetime performance. Shit, I'd take TMQ's "authentic wins" metric over Elo.
 

amarshal2

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Looking at some numbers, one area that we'll have a huge advantage in this game is in the red zone. This could actually be Manning's biggest weakness at this point. Once the field gets short and very congested, he simply may not have the arm strength and ball placement to rifle the football into tight windows between defenders. He only threw 6 red zone TDs all year and three of those were from the 1-yard-line. He hasn't thrown a red zone TD from beyond the 1-yard-line since September.
Nice insight. Perhaps Bill and MattyP will spend the first three quarters guarding against the deep pass with a plan to hold the Broncos in the Red Zone. Then they'll mix it up when they have to...similar to the Chiefs game. Everyone's expecting the Pats to come out and be aggressive and press - and maybe they will - but I'm not sure. Personally, I'd like to see the Pats be aggressive because I think they can really handle Denver and make it a multi-score game early. But BB knows a lot better than Dabo Swinney how you can lose an otherwise dominant game by getting beat on a few long plays.
 
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mt8thsw9th

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From the same article:

"He's not going to rattle just because you hit him hard. I've tried over the years," Smith said. "That's what D-linemen think: 'The harder you hit the quarterback, the better it will make it on the secondary.'

"With Brady, he's a great competitor. You know it's coming. He's going to cry about getting hit, but he's going to take the hit and keep going."
Does Brady act like an abused child, Antonio?
 

E5 Yaz

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This seems like a really weird thing to focus on and say in the press.
It points to, I think, Brady and the Patriots being in the heads of some of the Broncos. TJ Ward is the same way. Won't bother me a bit if some of these guys are more focused on disliking the Pats than they are on doing their jobs
 

Morgan's Magic Snowplow

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Nice insight. Perhaps Bill and MattyP will spend the first three quarters guarding against the deep pass with a plan to hold the Broncos in the Red Zone. Then they'll mix it up when they have to...similar to the Chiefs game. Everyone's expecting the Pats to come out and be aggressive and press - and maybe they will - but I'm not sure. Personally, I'd like to see the Pats be aggressive because I think they can really handle Denver and make it a multi-score game early. But BB knows a lot better than Dabo Swinney how you can lose an otherwise dominant game by getting beat on a few long plays.
Good post, I've been thinking along similar lines. The conventional wisdom is that Manning can't throw deep so of course you press at the line of scrimmage. But there is a real counter-argument for limiting the possibility of high variance big plays and that, without a few of those, a Manning-led offense just isn't capable of scoring enough points.

I also think the "Manning can't throw deep" line is a bit exaggerated. What he can't do is drive the ball in the way necessary to throw certain patterns like deep outs that are in danger of being undercut or seam routes that have to whistle into tight windows between defenders. He's perfectly capable of lofting a wobbly deep ball along the sideline that Thomas or Sanders could run down after beating man-press coverage. Peyton might not have a lot of accuracy on those balls but any 1-on-1 matchup on the outside without safety help over the top is still probably good one for an offense that has trouble finishing drives and therefore has incentive to make it a high variance game in which 1-2 big plays could make up for their more fundamental difficulties scoring.

I'm sure they'll mix up their coverages constantly since that's a core staple of every BB gameplan. But I wouldn't be surprised to see a heavier dose of zone and relatively conservative shells in that mix then some are predicting.
 

amarshal2

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This seems like a really weird thing to focus on and say in the press.
It points to, I think, Brady and the Patriots being in the heads of some of the Broncos. TJ Ward is the same way. Won't bother me a bit if some of these guys are more focused on disliking the Pats than they are on doing their jobs
Meh -- it's not weird to me at all. I think PFT is right when he questions if they are just trying to sway the officials.

"Gronk pushes off" and "Brady tries to get roughing the passer penalties" is ripe ground for the Broncos. They benefited from all those OPI calls in the last game and then there weren't many called on Gronk the following weeks. Remember, the Broncos are traveling to Foxborough this week if they don't get those Gronk OPI calls. I'd be concerned if I were them.

On the Brady roughing calls, they probably watched the tape and saw Brady get the roughing call against the Chiefs and then the game before against the Dolphins where Vernon was also fined. It plays right into a popular narrative about Brady getting special attention from the refs (IIRC we've looked at data and decided it's probably not true) so they are probably thinking they should push that narrative publicly and see if they can get the ref to bite his whistle one time he might have used it on Sunday. That can swing a game.
 
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singaporesoxfan

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It's more of a misapplication than a stupid underlying system, I'd say. Elo ratings work surprisingly well when you have hundreds of homogeneous, binary-outcome, equally-meaningful datapoints, and a bunch of tightly-clustered competitors trying to differentiate themselves. Chess is of course the original example: a top player will play dozens of matches even within a single tournament, and hundreds over the course of a year, and their health isn't an issue. Tennis is similar: matches are 1v1, health is close to binary (not many players would tough out a tournament despite severe illness the way Serena Williams did at last year's French Open - you'd have to be the favorite to win a Major to justify that), lots of players whose outcomes against each other aren't all that certain, and even though you've got multiple sets, the match outcome is still pretty much binary (and it ain't over until the last point, unlike sports with timed contests).

In football, you've got a whole host of issues: tiny 16-19-game sample size, a 46-man roster turning over frequently, a wide spectrum of gray area on health, and a small number of teams varying enormously in quality, to the point where outcomes are extremely certain by the standards of the sporting world (spare me on "any given sunday", just look at standard deviations of winning percentage). Worse, you have outcomes that are very continuous in nature (widely-ranging margins of victory), parts of which are predictive (good teams tend to blow out bad teams) and parts of which are irrelevant to the point of misleading (i.e., NE's Week 17 vs Miami, or any other not-really-trying effort). I mean, it's worse than even international soccer. Other than, I dunno, ice dancing, I'd be hard pressed to name a sport that's LESS of a fit for an Elo model than American Football.

Long story short, I put just as little stock in it as MMS does, other than as a general long-term tracker of franchise lifetime performance. Shit, I'd take TMQ's "authentic wins" metric over Elo.
I think Elo ratings are fine as a retrospective look at seasons - the 538 results look pretty decent if your goal is answering a bar argument about whether the the '85 Bears or the '07 Patriots team was more dominant. It's the application of Elo to prediction that is the bad use of the model.
 

m0ckduck

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Good post, I've been thinking along similar lines. The conventional wisdom is that Manning can't throw deep so of course you press at the line of scrimmage. But there is a real counter-argument for limiting the possibility of high variance big plays and that, without a few of those, a Manning-led offense just isn't capable of scoring enough points.
I guess the counter-counter-argument is that the offense isn't capable of scoring enough points until they get to the 4th quarter, when the going suddenly gets easier against a defense worn down from defending all these mostly-fruitless, occasionally-field-goal-yielding, often-extended dink-and-dunk drives. I feel like the Pats can be largely successful in either gameplan (press or prevent), and so I wonder how much they might adjust the plan based on how the offense is looking and how much rest they're affording the defense.

I also think the "Manning can't throw deep" line is a bit exaggerated. What he can't do is drive the ball in the way necessary to throw certain patterns like deep outs that are in danger of being undercut or seam routes that have to whistle into tight windows between defenders. He's perfectly capable of lofting a wobbly deep ball along the sideline that Thomas or Sanders could run down after beating man-press coverage. Peyton might not have a lot of accuracy on those balls but any 1-on-1 matchup on the outside without safety help over the top is still probably good one for an offense that has trouble finishing drives and therefore has incentive to make it a high variance game in which 1-2 big plays could make up for their more fundamental difficulties scoring.

I'm sure they'll mix up their coverages constantly since that's a core staple of every BB gameplan. But I wouldn't be surprised to see a heavier dose of zone and relatively conservative shells in that mix then some are predicting.
Great post, thanks. The bolded part perfectly gets to my thoughts— that I'm not capable of articulating as well— as to why it wouldn't surprise me to see them duplicate the Steelers' defensive approach.
 
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Auger34

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I guess the counter-counter-argument is that the offense isn't capable of scoring enough points until they get to the 4th quarter, when the going suddenly gets easier against a defense wears down from defending all these mostly-fruitless, occasionally-field-goal-yielding, often-extended dink-and-dunk drives. I feel like the Pats can be largely successful in either gameplan (press or prevent), and so I wonder how much they might adjust the plan based on how the offense is looking and how much rest they're affording the defense.



Great post, thanks. The bolded part perfectly gets to my thoughts— that I'm not capable of articulating as well— as to why it wouldn't surprise me to see them duplicate the Steelers' defensive approach.
Wouldn't the ideal defense to play on Peyton then be the old school Tampa 2? Cover short and deep sidelines and leave the middle seams vulnerable so Peyton has to throw over the top of the MLB or whistle the ball into tight windows?
I know the Patriots like playing cover 3 but have they run any cover 2 at all this year?
 

koufax32

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Didn't know where to post this. Go to YouTube and find "Growing Pats" right now. On my phone so no link.
 

edmunddantes

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I may be a homer, but IMO this can be said about every skill position player on the field for every team. In fact, I find it annoying how every time there is a long pass, one or both of the defensive and offensive players are looking for a flag. It's very much like the NBA in that respect, but slightly less annoying because the begging / complaining isn't happening during live ball game play.
It's even better when a angle includes a sideline shot and you can see 15-20 guys all clustered near the sideline ref making the flag motion after every incomplete pass play.
 

Slow Rheal

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Chris Harris, how to tackle Gronk: hit him low, hit him in the knees

Edit: I'm kind of shocked at the level of squawking coming from the Denver players already. Wouldn't any head coach, trying to get his team ready for the conference championship game, flip his shit if this was what his guys were focusing on in their media sessions?
 
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pokey_reese

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I think that something being overlooked with ELO and some of the other prediction systems favoring the Broncos even though humans seem to like the Pats is that they all take home field advantage pretty seriously. ESPN's FPI just came out and they say right in the blurb that location of the game swings the prediction substantially enough to overcome the team with the higher rating:
ESPN's Football Power Index has the Cardinals and Patriots as the two best teams remaining, but home-field advantage gives the Panthers and Broncos slight edges this weekend. FPI's odds:
  • Panthers - 51.8 percent to beat Cardinals
  • Broncos - 54.2 percent to beat Patriots
 

E5 Yaz

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Meh -- it's not weird to me at all. I think PFT is right when he questions if they are just trying to sway the officials.
So, the Broncos are trying to sway officials by complaining that Brady tries to sway officials
 
Bedard on F&M: Patriots shouldn't have any problems with the Broncos matchup-wise. Manning is not even as good as Alex Smith and can't take advantage of anything the Patriots might screw up down the field.
Bedard just predicted a Pats victory, 42-17. Felger and Mazz practically fell out of their seats. And I can kind of see why. I feel confident, but that's a little crazy.
 

Ed Hillel

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The Broncos entire secondary is a bunch of knee-hunters. They took a really dangerous shot on Sunday at a receiver's knee who was landing from a jump-I think Bryant-that was fortunate not to break the guy's leg. Talib does the same thing, low-bridging jumping receivers. Bruschi talked about the very thing on WEEI yesterday, too. They took out both Gronk and Hightower with vicious knee shots in November. I'm sure there will be at least a few attempts on Sunday, but if I was Belichick and any of them connected, I'd be playing tit for tat. Go low on Thomas every time if that's how Kubiak and Phillips want to play things. Brady will certainly have his hands full protecting these receivers, especially Gronk.
 

Norm Siebern

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Chris Harris, how to tackle Gronk: hit him low, hit him in the knees

Edit: I'm kind of shocked at the level of squawking coming from the Denver players already. Wouldn't any head coach, trying to get his team ready for the conference championship game, flip his shit if this was what his guys were focusing on in their media sessions?
This, along with home field influenced refs is what I am worried about. Under the guise of "the only way to tackle Gronk is to hit him low," this is in reality carte blanche to take cheap shots at his knees. TJ Ward has already done this to Gronk once in his career. With a Super Bowl bonus on the line I fully expect multiple cheap shots thrown at the Patriots by the Denver defense and by their offensive line. They have a history of dirty play that stretches back to Lyle Alzado, all the way forward to Welker's cheap shot against Aqib Talib two years ago and now these quotes from Harris.

I wonder if following Bengals/Steelers the refs will look to put a stop to this if (more likely when) it starts to happen.
 

Ed Hillel

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Bedard just predicted a Pats victory, 42-17. Felger and Mazz practically fell out of their seats. And I can kind of see why. I feel confident, but that's a little crazy.
Honestly, it doesn't seem all that far-fetched to me. The Pats jumped out 14-0 missing some huge pieces and likely would have won going away if Chris Harper hadn't muffed a punt. If they get up 10+ early with a healthy offense, which I think is quite possible (especially if Harris is limited), it's easy to see how this could turn into a rout.
 

wiffleballhero

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Wow, so it is only Tuesday and the Broncos have already complained about Gronk pushing off, complained that Brady is a whiner and all but admitted that they are going to try to injure someone on the other team. Nice.

I hope the Pats absolutely demolish these clowns.
 

88 MVP

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Wow, so it is only Tuesday and the Broncos have already complained about Gronk pushing off, complained that Brady is a whiner and all but admitted that they are going to try to injure someone on the other team. Nice.

I hope the Pats absolutely demolish these clowns.
Absolutely.

I would love to know how and when the Pats utilize this stuff internally. Has this ever been covered in any of the inside the locker room documentaries or mic'd up features? Other than the Anthony Smith game where Brady went out of his way to trash talk the guy on the field, and the "parade route," with Philly, I can't recall other instances where the Pats discussed using mid-week trash talk and bulletin board fodder for motivation.
 

theXman

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Interesting 5 minute video breaking down the Broncos' tendencies last week vs. the Steelers.

I'm curious to see how much Denver will be able to change the tendencies pointed out here. Seems like they're heavily limited by the current form of Manning. Interested what some of the smarter folks here think about the tendencies pointed out.


https://realfootballnetwork.com/2016/01/19/breaking-down-peyton/
 

Byrdbrain

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Meh, Harris is basically right. The only way to tackle Gronk is low and if you tackle low you aim for the knee/lower thigh area.
Yep nothing to get upset over here, it is literally the only way a DB has any chance to tackle Gronk. While true that Ward takes it to another level and I'll cringe every time I see it, Harris is 100% correct.
 

jablo1312

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Interesting 5 minute video breaking down the Broncos' tendencies last week vs. the Steelers.

I'm curious to see how much Denver will be able to change the tendencies pointed out here. Seems like they're heavily limited by the current form of Manning. Interested what some of the smarter folks here think about the tendencies pointed out.


https://realfootballnetwork.com/2016/01/19/breaking-down-peyton/
Good watch. I wonder how much they'll change this on the notion that the Patriots run defense is weaker than the Steelers.

The deep pass thing was definitely something I've noticed going back to the end of last year. I feel like that is when the Bronco's will run some version of play action along with a shot to Sanders or Thomas on a fly route. Manning has consistently overthrown these, or thrown them out of bounds, but obviously something you still want to be ready for as a defense. Worst case scenario here is the Pats key on the early-down run and Logan Ryan gets burned by a Thomas stop and go.
 

awallstein

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Does Gronk's tweet constitute conduct detrimental to the integrity of professional football? I suppose we'll find out.
 

brandonchristensen

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Good watch. I wonder how much they'll change this on the notion that the Patriots run defense is weaker than the Steelers.

The deep pass thing was definitely something I've noticed going back to the end of last year. I feel like that is when the Bronco's will run some version of play action along with a shot to Sanders or Thomas on a fly route. Manning has consistently overthrown these, or thrown them out of bounds, but obviously something you still want to be ready for as a defense. Worst case scenario here is the Pats key on the early-down run and Logan Ryan gets burned by a Thomas stop and go.
I would hope mccourty could pick that up.
 

Devizier

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I may be a homer, but IMO this can be said about every skill position player on the field for every team. In fact, I find it annoying how every time there is a long pass, one or both of the defensive and offensive players are looking for a flag. It's very much like the NBA in that respect, but slightly less annoying because the begging / complaining isn't happening during live ball game play.
They do it, because it works.

Baseball has it right, by the way.
 

TheRealness

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One of their players came out and said they were going to hit his knees and possibly end his career, and he basically responded with "Blow me". I love it.

42-17 sounds nice to me.