The Game Goat Thread: Wk. 1 @ Miami

tims4wins

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They obviously didn't play good or look good--but some in the media are playing the dysfunction up to the point that ithe media' observations will be wrong if the Pats are merely average or below average; if you keep saying they are completely incompetent on offense and they end up 8-9 and 20th in the league in offense you're wrong.
That's fair, and the media seems to be talking out of both sides of their mouth in this regard. I've seen a ton of predictions for their record and they almost universally range from 7-10 to 10-7. So, a slightly below average to a slightly above average team. And yet, as you point out, the articles are making it seem like a complete disaster situation. As usual, the media is setting it up to say they were right almost regardless of what happens. The only exception would be an 11+ win season.
 

tims4wins

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Well I think it's entirely possible that the process of building the next great Patriots team could include a rough season THIS year. What if BB is taking the long view here, thinking that this is a few year process to get the team where it needs to be? Very few coaches have that kind of security. BB does, and thus can afford to think that way. So when WE see a team that appears to take a step backward - which frustrates us to no end - what BB sees is the developmental steps that are taking place throughout the organization that is building them towards achieving the kind of future success he thinks is possible.

I don't know if that's what's happening here, but it's entirely possible.
It was brought up a couple weeks ago, but someone mentioned the 1995 Pats as a possible comp to this year. Unexpected playoff run in 1994, disappointing 1995, then a bounce back run in 1996. We shall see.
 

BigJimEd

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I listened to the Bedard podcast (he is somewhat knowledgeable, does watch the games, does pick up things I might not) and to hear him speak there's chaos on the team, it's the worst Pats offense he's ever seen, it's apparent that some players are quitting on the team, Judge and Patricia can't connect with the players, BB is being a softy because he doesn't want to face the truth about how bad the team is,e tc. He and others are using the kind of language to describe the team that you would use to describe a 2-5 win team. Maybe they're right? I don't see it yet and I could be wrong but I still have faith that they pull it together to a reasonable degree this season.
It is? Who? If it's apparent that multiple players are quitting then there should be evidence of this.

Both Judge and Patricia have reputation of not connecting with players going back to their NY and Detroit days. That's nothing new. I have concerns with those hires and was not very high on this team going in.

However, none of that has to do with my post that you quoted. Does any of that offer any evidence that Bourne was benched due to being late for a pregame meeting in preseason? NO. Simplest answer is to take Belichick at his word here. Bourne was down on the depth chart long before Carolina. He and Agholor have different skillsets. There's going to be game plans where Bourne as the 4th WR isn't used much. Other games, he'll likely see plenty of snaps either due to matchup, Not to mention potential injury, trade or playing himself up in the depth chart etc...

Of course, none of that means that is the correct decision for Bourne to get limited snaps, just that there are football reasons behind it.
 

rodderick

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It is? Who? If it's apparent that multiple players are quitting then there should be evidence of this.

Both Judge and Patricia have reputation of not connecting with players going back to their NY and Detroit days. That's nothing new. I have concerns with those hires and was not very high on this team going in.

However, none of that has to do with my post that you quoted. Does any of that offer any evidence that Bourne was benched due to being late for a pregame meeting in preseason? NO. Simplest answer is to take Belichick at his word here. Bourne was down on the depth chart long before Carolina. He and Agholor have different skillsets. There's going to be game plans where Bourne as the 4th WR isn't used much. Other games, he'll likely see plenty of snaps either due to matchup, Not to mention potential injury, trade or playing himself up in the depth chart etc...

That also doesn't mean that is the correct decision, just that there were football reasons behind it.
There have been a lot of rumblings over Trent Brown being pissed he's being paid RT money to play LT, Isaiah Wynn being pissed that he's now playing RT and not LT in the eve of free agency, and Kendrick Bourne being pissed at being in the coaching staff's doghouse. It's not concrete evidence because it's incredibly rare to actually get confirmation that guys are "quitting" on the team during a season, but I think there's been some indication of dissatisfaction with the coaching staff.

And yes, I do think there's a chance Bourne has slid down the depth chart due to his performance in training camp, but to believe he's not only the 4th receiver, but below Lil'Jordan Humphrey in snaps is a bit much. That's not just based on what he's done on the field.
 

Cellar-Door

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There have been a lot of rumblings over Trent Brown being pissed he's being paid RT money to play LT, Isaiah Wynn being pissed that he's now playing RT and not LT in the eve of free agency, and Kendrick Bourne being pissed at being in the coaching staff's doghouse. It's not concrete evidence because it's incredibly rare to actually get confirmation that guys are "quitting" on the team during a season, but I think there's been some indication of dissatisfaction with the coaching staff.

And yes, I do think there's a chance Bourne has slid down the depth chart due to his performance in training camp, but to believe he's not only the 4th receiver, but below Lil'Jordan Humphrey in snaps is a bit much. That's not just based on what he's done on the field.
Especially since he finally got on the field, ran a great route, got the biggest play of the game and was told to sit back down for the rest of the game.... that's not performance, and if it's "scheme" then we need a new scheme. You can't be laying an egg on offense, get a spark from a guy who was maybe your best pass-catcher last year and say "nah, don't want any more of that" it's bad coaching whoever's decision it was.
 

Shelterdog

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There have been a lot of rumblings over Trent Brown being pissed he's being paid RT money to play LT, Isaiah Wynn being pissed that he's now playing RT and not LT in the eve of free agency, and Kendrick Bourne being pissed at being in the coaching staff's doghouse. It's not concrete evidence because it's incredibly rare to actually get confirmation that guys are "quitting" on the team during a season, but I think there's been some indication of dissatisfaction with the coaching staff.

And yes, I do think there's a chance Bourne has slid down the depth chart due to his performance in training camp, but to believe he's not only the 4th receiver, but below Lil'Jordan Humphrey in snaps is a bit much. That's not just based on what he's done on the field.
Bedard's pointed to Wynn, Brown and Bourne being pissed and also his suspicion that you know, if other veteran players are seeing what he's seeing about how bad and vanilla the scheme is that they're also going to be upset.
 

BigJimEd

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There have been a lot of rumblings over Trent Brown being pissed he's being paid RT money to play LT, Isaiah Wynn being pissed that he's now playing RT and not LT in the eve of free agency, and Kendrick Bourne being pissed at being in the coaching staff's doghouse. It's not concrete evidence because it's incredibly rare to actually get confirmation that guys are "quitting" on the team during a season, but I think there's been some indication of dissatisfaction with the coaching staff.
I haven't seen any of that so please point me to it. But still being unhappy about a position change is very, very different than quitting on your team.

And yes, I do think there's a chance Bourne has slid down the depth chart due to his performance in training camp, but to believe he's not only the 4th receiver, but below Lil'Jordan Humphrey in snaps is a bit much. That's not just based on what he's done on the field.
What does this mean? DO you have any context? Where did Humphrey line up? What was his role on those snaps? Without that context, it is meaningless and disingenuous. WR can have very different roles. We should know better than throw out these types of meaningless comparisons.

it's bad coaching whoever's decision it was.
I wouldn't necessarily argue with this.

I have not seen the All 22 yet but have seen reports that Agholor was open a lot. I'll wait and see on that but hopefully that is not a trend that continues from last season.
 

Harry Hooper

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Some players getting mysteriously more playing time (Tavai?) can also be a source of disenchantment among other players.

I don't understand on offense the lack of things like pre-snap motion to help Mac discern what type of man or zone coverage the defense is setting up for the play, but I would welcome an explanation here.
 

BaseballJones

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Every player that thinks they should be playing more gets frustrated at the coaches. This has been true of team sports since they were invented. They always feel like they're being mistreated somehow.

The question is, how do they respond? Do they respond by whining and pouting and making trouble, or do they respond by busting their ass to get better?

If Bourne thinks he should be playing more, then he needs to do what it takes to play more, not pout. (I don't know if he's pouting; just making a larger point)
 

Cellar-Door

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Every player that thinks they should be playing more gets frustrated at the coaches. This has been true of team sports since they were invented. They always feel like they're being mistreated somehow.

The question is, how do they respond? Do they respond by whining and pouting and making trouble, or do they respond by busting their ass to get better?

If Bourne thinks he should be playing more, then he needs to do what it takes to play more, not pout. (I don't know if he's pouting; just making a larger point)
You mean like produce almost 20% of our passing production in 2 snaps?
 

Petagine in a Bottle

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The Bourne stuff feels like the Malcolm Butler situation, except maybe it will be every game and not just the super bowl. Either use him or trade him .
 

rodderick

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I haven't seen any of that so please point me to it. But still being unhappy about a position change is very, very different than quitting on your team.

What does this mean? DO you have any context? Where did Humphrey line up? What was his role on those snaps? Without that context, it is meaningless and disingenuous. WR can have very different roles. We should know better than throw out these types of meaningless comparisons.

I wouldn't necessarily argue with this.

I have not seen the All 22 yet but have seen reports that Agholor was open a lot. I'll wait and see on that but hopefully that is not a trend that continues from last season.
We can play this game all day long but I don't think I'm the one being disingenuous here. Bourne was arguably their best offensive weapon last year and he got two snaps. The coaching staff thought it fit to have on the field for a lesser amount of plays than a guy that was in their practice squad and has never done anything of note in the league. Davante Parker was eaten up by Howard all game, had ONE catch, and was on the field for 100% of their offensive plays. Bourne couldn't spell him out for an extra 5-10 snaps? He lined up outside plenty last year. If you truly believe they didn't think Bourne deserved more than two snaps in the last game due solely to scheme, then their offensive coaching issues have been underestimated by even Felger and Mazz.
 

SMU_Sox

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Butler was struggling on the field though and had missed practice - this is not like that situation imo.
 

Shelterdog

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Reports all camp was Bourne was struggling. There was even a direct quote from Fears
A IMO good point that was brought up on the Bedard podcast by his colleague was that if you were disciplining Bourne for effort/mistakes/being late to meetings or practice in the pre-season there's some logic to imposing that discipline during the regular season; vets don't really care about missing pre-season time. But who knows what the thinking is or even if it's just one of those weird things the Pats do from time to time like (there are other examples but this one always sticks out) starting ST linebacker Eric Alexander at against the Colts in the 06 playoff game when he'd almost never played D during the regular season
 

ShaneTrot

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I don't have access to the all 22, and I subscribe to too many services so I am not getting it. I listened to Robert May's Athletic podcast today and his guest was saying that Miami had open guys all over the field and Tua did not see them or hit them. Does anyone have any corroborating data or film that proves this?
 

BigJimEd

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The coaching staff thought it fit to have on the field for a lesser amount of plays than a guy that was in their practice squad and has never done anything of note in the league.
Again. With what context? Without context you might as well compare the snap count to Ferentz. You either do not understand WRs play different roles or are being disingenuous. Look at Harry last year.

I'm out because it's just repeating myself at this point and you seem to insist on making points about things that are irrelevant to what I said.
 

rodderick

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Again. With what context? Without context you might as well compare the snap count to Ferentz. You either do not understand WRs play different roles or are being disingenuous. Look at Harry last year.

I'm out because it's just repeating myself at this point and you seem to insist on making points about things that are irrelevant to what I said.
Bourne can play either outside or in the slot, he can play X, Y, Z, that's probably his main calling card as a receiver and part of what made him a natural fit with the Pats. There is arguably no role in the offense he can't fill adequately at his position. He can spell Meyers, he can spell Agholor and he can spell Parker. In terms of ability and scheme there's no reason he should be getting two snaps in a game.
 

BigJimEd

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Well that changes things then. I didn’t realize it was at all serious.
Comments from Brown leading up the opener. There were some reports throughout camp as well.

Troy Brown, who serves as the Patriots receivers coach, provided a status report on the wideout.

“Obviously, he hasn’t had the type of offseason that he had last year, but he’s been working at it just like everybody else,” Brown said Monday in a video conference. “He’s coming along, and he’s getting more and more reps as the camp goes on here. As we go into the first game here, he’s getting more and more reps. We’re going to play the guys who deserve to play.”

...
“He hasn’t done anything wrong, or bad, or anything like that,” Brown said.

...

“I think he’s been making some plays here and there,” Brown said. “But for the most part, he’s just been working as hard as the other guys have been working. We’ve had some other guys that have made some plays throughout the course of camp here, and they’re all out there competing and fighting.

“There’s no named person that’s going to be out there playing more than another person. It’s just going to be whoever earns the right to go out there and play. They’re going to be the guys who play for us on Sundays.”
 

Shelterdog

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I don't have access to the all 22, and I subscribe to too many services so I am not getting it. I listened to Robert May's Athletic podcast today and his guest was saying that Miami had open guys all over the field and Tua did not see them or hit them. Does anyone have any corroborating data or film that proves this?
Nope. I will make the observation that "their guys were wide open all day" is IMO a frequent dubious assertion by someone trying to say either the defense is bad or the QB is bad--like were the guys open when the ball was thrown, in a place where the ball could be thrown to them (not across the field as the QB is rolling out) and not someplace where a safety or other zone defender could get to them?

All that said i'll be you a million bucks waddle and hill got open some.
 

BigJimEd

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Bourne can play either outside or in the slot, he can play X, Y, Z, that's probably his main calling card as a receiver and part of what made him a natural fit with the Pats. There is arguably no role in the offense he can't fill adequately at his position. He can spell Meyers, he can spell Agholor and he can spell Parker. In terms of ability and scheme there's no reason he should be getting two snaps in a game.
Never argued about how many snaps Bourne should get. You are misrepresenting me again. Not talking about X,Y,Z or inside/ outside. You are missing context on role and responsibility during play; comparing Humphrey's snaps without that context, imo, is disingenuous. Once more look at how they often used Harry (similar size to Humphrey) last year. Certainly responsible some might prefer Humphrey with those responsibilities in those limited situations.
 

Gash Prex

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I quickly watched the All 22 last night focusing on the Pat's passing game and it was pretty clear that Pats have a lot of work to do in the design and play calling category. 95% of Miami's defense was dropping into zone coverage with 4 rushing and flooding the zones (with the occasional linebacker blitz) - I assume it was Cover 3 but I didn't chart the defenses. This was different than you might have expected as Miami is from what I gather is a man coverage unit. Seems like the gameplan was man beaters...but ended up with zone coverage. There were multiple plays where 2 pats receivers end up in the exact same location with 3 defenders covering them - it can't seriously be the play design.

The INT was a pre-read call based on the single high safety look. It wasn't a terrible idea but there would have been better options if the play had been allowed to develop. Jonnu and Henry would have been open for a good gain (rare that happened).

Just some screenshots from the terrible NFL + plus view. Seriously, it sucks. The stupid overlay won't go away. Its a jittery, stuttery mess. Please note I am not an All-22 football expert and I'm sure there will be disagreement with my opinions.

Here is an example of the zone Miami was running . This was a completion to the running back but the play design lead to 2 WR in the same place. This was the sort of looks the Pats were facing all day. Somehow the routes ended up with 2 pats players together. This happened again later.

55452

55453

This was from the roughing the passer that was negated. Jones better option would have been to Parker where the blitzer is coming from but ....

55454

the route actually carried Parker into the LB path so ... not a great option either. Parker had a ton of space on out route, curl or comeback, but instead his route carried him in to the defense.

55456

This play sucked IMO - its 4th and 3 and got to have it. The only viable option off the line is a streaking Parker - and instead of a out route ...his route carries him into the safety. Could make Mac have thrown a back shoulder throw? Maybe? But this looks like a deep route design.

55457

Not only does Trent Brown hold by this point but there are no options.

55458


My general take away was that lots more playaction and creativity was needed. Simply running routes into the zone was not a good plan.

I figured out way to provide GIFs of these and others - not sure if thats helpful.
 

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Kenny F'ing Powers

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It was Ferentz. Phil Perry covered this and while PFF is far from perfect they also credited that sack to Brown. In the post-game interviews it was noted that it should have been blocked. Yes, covering a late blitzer is tough but Brown has made this kind of error before (think last year against the Colts IIRC).

View: https://twitter.com/PhilAPerry/status/1569113106009268227?s=20&t=F8j7nYu0kYWCIZUvmj60zA


And a more thorough review of Brown in the video/audio:
View: https://twitter.com/NBCSPatriots/status/1569087874527629319?s=20&t=F8j7nYu0kYWCIZUvmj60zA
Yeah, this really isn't up for debate.

I think the confusion is around "Henry should have stayed in to block", but that's not how offenses work.

Henry only stays in to block for one of four reasons:

- If the play design keeps him in to block.

- If the play design has him initially block, and then release (usually to take advantage of zone defenses or fidgety man defenders).

- If he's informed in practice or on the sideline that he needs to chip block.

- If Mac audibles for him to stay in and block.

That's it. It's never up to the skill player to change a play design on his own. Plays are designed with each skill player putting stress on certain aspects of the defense. Even if a person is the 4th option on a play, one person changing their route/assignment can absolutely destroy how a play works.

So...the sack is either on Brown or Mac for not keeping Henry in. But, as I said earlier, this feels like it falls pretty squarely on Brown. Delayed pressure and stunts happen. He can't just blindly magnetize to his first read, or else shit like this happens.
 

slamminsammya

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I quickly watched the All 22 last night focusing on the Pat's passing game and it was pretty clear that Pats have a lot of work to do in the design and play calling category. 95% of Miami's defense was dropping into zone coverage with 4 rushing and flooding the zones (with the occasional linebacker blitz) - I assume it was Cover 3 but I didn't chart the defenses. This was different than you might have expected as Miami is from what I gather is a man coverage unit. Seems like the gameplan was man beaters...but ended up with zone coverage. There were multiple plays where 2 pats receivers end up in the exact same location with 3 defenders covering them - it can't seriously be the play design.

The INT was a pre-read call based on the single high safety look. It wasn't a terrible idea but there would have been better options if the play had been allowed to develop. Jonnu and Henry would have been open for a good gain (rare that happened).

Just some screenshots from the terrible NFL + plus view. Seriously, it sucks. The stupid overlay won't go away. Its a jittery, stuttery mess. Please note I am not an All-22 football expert and I'm sure there will be disagreement with my opinions.

Here is an example of the zone Miami was running . This was a completion to the running back but the play design lead to 2 WR in the same place. This was the sort of looks the Pats were facing all day. Somehow the routes ended up with 2 pats players together. This happened again later.

View attachment 55452

View attachment 55453

This was from the roughing the passer that was negated. Jones better option would have been to Parker where the blitzer is coming from but ....

View attachment 55454

the route actually carried Parker into the LB path so ... not a great option either. Parker had a ton of space on out route, curl or comeback, but instead his route carried him in to the defense.

View attachment 55456

This play sucked IMO - its 4th and 3 and got to have it. The only viable option off the line is a streaking Parker - and instead of a out route ...his route carries him into the safety. Could make Mac have thrown a back shoulder throw? Maybe? But this looks like a deep route design.

View attachment 55457

Not only does Trent Brown hold by this point but there are no options.

View attachment 55458


My general take away was that lots more playaction and creativity was needed. Simply running routes into the zone was not a good plan.

I figured out way to provide GIFs of these and others - not sure if thats helpful.
Incredible that in 2022 we have so many ways to play GIFs that work out of the box and the NFL comes up with this mess. Similar to NBA's League Pass shitshow.

On the topic, there were a lot of dropbacks when the Dolphins were in man where Mac had pretty NFL open guys and either went for checkdowns or held the ball. Coaching and receiving skill can't shine if the QB is not taking what the rest of the offense is providing.
 

NickEsasky

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Bedard's pointed to Wynn, Brown and Bourne being pissed and also his suspicion that you know, if other veteran players are seeing what he's seeing about how bad and vanilla the scheme is that they're also going to be upset.
Bedard also has hinted at Barmore being Hernandez 2.0 as well so I wouldn't put much stock in him knowing who may or may not be pissed. He may watch film, but I don't buy that he has any connections in Gillette.
 

lexrageorge

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Regarding Bourne: Belichick has made it known, either directly or via others, that he does not believe in the "game day" player. And he's not alone among NFL coaches either, so this is not strictly a Belichick thing; the NFL is not a place where "game day" players have long careers. If Bourne was looking like the 4th best WR in the preseason practices, then the game plan going into the Miami game was going to reflect that. What he did last season is only partially relevant.

He got a small window of opportunity in Week 1, and he shined. OTOH, it was only 2 snaps and one play; doesn't mean he would have been the answer had he played 50% or 90% of the offensive snaps. IMO, the coaches did make a mistake in not getting Bourne involved in some more plays in the 4th quarter, but it was one of several mistakes, and I can understand why it happened if Bourne wasn't producing in practice.

The real test if what happens in Week 2; good coaching staffs always adjust.
 

Super Nomario

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No chance Patricia buries Bourne all by himself. BB signs off on that 100% of the time it happens.

As far as game planning goes, well, we know they ran as vanilla a game plan as they basically possibly could (WHY, I have no idea, but they did) and maybe that Uber vanilla game plan just didn’t include Bourne.

If they had run all their complex stuff and Bourne wasn’t present then I’d call total BS on that explanation, but since they ran a bizarrely vanilla game plan, I can actually buy that it just didn’t include Bourne.
If I had to guess on the vanilla stuff, it's that they've had so much trouble running anything so far, the coaching staff is going to make sure they have the fundamentals down before they start working in wrinkles. And of course, they still had some major screwups Sunday.

I'm having flashbacks to the 2017 D that struggled early in the year, and people complained they should simplify the D, and some of the defenders were saying that it literally could not be any simpler.
 

SMU_Sox

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I rewatched the all-22 with friend, Matt St. Jean who is now part of Pats Pulpit. It’s cool to watch SOSHers and slack friends blossom into media people. It wasn’t as bad as I thought it would be. Run blocking had some bad stretches. They lost too many 1:1s with multiple plays and it wasn’t just one guy. Andrews had a bad day run blocking but Onwenu, Brown, Cajuste, and both tight ends also screwed up. Miami’s DL also especially 92 just made a lot of very good run defending plays. It happens. I still loathe the TE run blocking. On the 3rd and 3 duo with Montgomery I get why they called it. It was a light box. The problem is Cajuste and Onwenu completely screwed the pooch on the double team and 92 single-handedly blew it up. I believe Brown also whiffed there and Andrews gets knocked back.
Mac missed some open plays down the field and my biggest question with him is if he has the arm to get after intermediate out routes where he isn’t dropping it into a bucket but more of a harder velocity line-Drive type throw. He had 3-4 plays where the outside guy was open if he can hit him.
Pass pro aside from 3 plays was actually good. Really the run blocking was way more of an issue than pass pro.
Overall they got unlucky. And while Mac avoided some throws where guys were open on the outside they don’t have a dynamic receiver to give them a must get open play. This team is going to probably hover around .500. If they execute well, like last year, they will win more than they lose. The lack of Star skilled position players is pretty glaring.
Other random notes:
Dugger is a pro bowl player anywhere but single deep safety. His angle on Waddle was so fucking bad.
Henry and Jonnu as run blockers are borderline almost unplayable especially with Henry and that’s going to put a damper on 12 personnel.
Some of the spacing was… awful.
Mac got rid of the ball quickly by design on multiple plays but struggled with more intermediate timing routes. He doesn’t have the gun to snap it in there late.

Mac is always going to have arm limitations. Defenses are going to continue flooding the middle of the field and daring him to throw outside. I think with enough timing and anticipation he can win that way but his margin for error is close to zero. He’s great pre-snap but he’s still very much a work in progress post snap. He misses rotations and doesn’t see where holes open up as you would want him too. That’s a veteran trait but with his physical skills it’s one he needs to develop ASAP.
 

8slim

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I rewatched the all-22 with friend, Matt St. Jean who is now part of Pats Pulpit. It’s cool to watch SOSHers and slack friends blossom into media people. It wasn’t as bad as I thought it would be. Run blocking had some bad stretches. They lost too many 1:1s with multiple plays and it wasn’t just one guy. Andrews had a bad day run blocking but Onwenu, Brown, Cajuste, and both tight ends also screwed up. Miami’s DL also especially 92 just made a lot of very good run defending plays. It happens. I still loathe the TE run blocking. On the 3rd and 3 duo with Montgomery I get why they called it. It was a light box. The problem is Cajuste and Onwenu completely screwed the pooch on the double team and 92 single-handedly blew it up. I believe Brown also whiffed there and Andrews gets knocked back.
Mac missed some open plays down the field and my biggest question with him is if he has the arm to get after intermediate out routes where he isn’t dropping it into a bucket but more of a harder velocity line-Drive type throw. He had 3-4 plays where the outside guy was open if he can hit him.
Pass pro aside from 3 plays was actually good. Really the run blocking was way more of an issue than pass pro.
Overall they got unlucky. And while Mac avoided some throws where guys were open on the outside they don’t have a dynamic receiver to give them a must get open play. This team is going to probably hover around .500. If they execute well, like last year, they will win more than they lose. The lack of Star skilled position players is pretty glaring.
Other random notes:
Dugger is a pro bowl player anywhere but single deep safety. His angle on Waddle was so fucking bad.
Henry and Jonnu as run blockers are borderline almost unplayable especially with Henry and that’s going to put a damper on 12 personnel.
Some of the spacing was… awful.
Mac got rid of the ball quickly by design on multiple plays but struggled with more intermediate timing routes. He doesn’t have the gun to snap it in there late.

Mac is always going to have arm limitations. Defenses are going to continue flooding the middle of the field and daring him to throw outside. I think with enough timing and anticipation he can win that way but his margin for error is close to zero. He’s great pre-snap but he’s still very much a work in progress post snap. He misses rotations and doesn’t see where holes open up as you would want him too. That’s a veteran trait but with his physical skills it’s one he needs to develop ASAP.
This was a great read, thanks for the insight.
 

rodderick

Member
SoSH Member
Apr 24, 2009
12,751
Belo Horizonte - Brazil
I'm pretty sure it bothers Bill that he answered that first question affirmatively. "Oh yeah, I'll be playing more". I don't have an issue with it, but Bourne seems to be more open with the media than they have historically wanted their guys to be.
 

DennyDoyle'sBoil

Found no thrill on Blueberry Hill
SoSH Member
Sep 9, 2008
42,297
AZ
I'm pretty sure it bothers Bill that he answered that first question affirmatively. "Oh yeah, I'll be playing more". I don't have an issue with it, but Bourne seems to be more open with the media than they have historically wanted their guys to be.
I agree for the most part, but in this specific context it's not really an answer that reveals too much information given that it would be hard to play less.

I didn't see anything problematic in the Reiss clip. And who the fuck knows what the question was in the Perry tweet. If it was just referring to the answers in the Reiss tweet, this is nothing. It's not like he was purporting to talk about the game plan.
 

BigSoxFan

Member
SoSH Member
May 31, 2007
47,094
I'm pretty sure it bothers Bill that he answered that first question affirmatively. "Oh yeah, I'll be playing more". I don't have an issue with it, but Bourne seems to be more open with the media than they have historically wanted their guys to be.
He’s also been more open in the secondary…