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Post by sdm3 on Feb 5, 2019 20:11:24 GMT
Which begs the question, what exactly happened last year with Pederson/Foles? How’d they flummox him so badly? And to a lesser extent, Kyle Shanahan/Matt Ryan in SB51 (the first half at least, obviously he figured it out in the second half)? Should we blame Matt Patricia (tempting)? What made McVay and Goff’s vaunted offense so much easier to solve?
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Post by masterofallgoons on Feb 5, 2019 20:16:55 GMT
They were clearly afraid to use Todd Gurley. He must have been hurt to some degree because they were scared to let him run it on obvious running downs. Also Goff just got trigger shy. He generally played a lot better in the second half, but he was scared to throw the ball and took sacks instead.
I saw, mostly, a young team crumble in the big moment. Even though a few big plays could have easily gone differently, when the chances came to make up for them, these young guys failed to make the most of their second chances. Case in point, Goff makes the best throw of the game in the 4th quarter, the ball is dropped, then on the next down and essentially the same play he gets flustered and makes the worst throw of his season.
Brady wasn't particularly great either, but all it took from him was one good drive.
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Post by sdm3 on Feb 5, 2019 20:23:23 GMT
They were clearly afraid to use Todd Gurley. He must have been hurt to some degree because they were scared to let him run it on obvious running downs. Also Goff just got trigger shy. He generally played a lot better in the second half, but he was scared to throw the ball and took sacks instead. I saw, mostly, a young team crumble in the big moment. Even though a few big plays could have easily gone differently, when the chances came to make up for them, these young guys failed to make the most of their second chances. Case in point, Goff makes the best throw of the game in the 4th quarter, the ball is dropped, then on the next down and essentially the same play he gets flustered and makes the worst throw of his season. Brady wasn't particularly great either, but all it took from him was one good drive. Goff really fucked up that earlier Cooks chance too. There was no Patriot defender within ten yards of Cooks at one point but Goff was too slow to notice and his throw didn’t have nearly enough zip on it, allowing McCourty to close in. Goff was certainly a big difference between those Falcons/Eagles teams. Ryan was a veteran playing in an MVP winning season, while Foles was operating on some kind of sorcery. Goff had just seemed like a wide-eyed kid the entire two weeks before the Super Bowl. “Golly Mr Brady, I was too young to remember you beating the Rams that first time, but I think I saw the Carolina game in whatever year that was! That was awesome!” |
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Post by hoskotafe3 on Feb 5, 2019 20:32:19 GMT
I think Goff shitting his pants made it quite a bit easier and was the main reason that, in spite of the closeness on the scoreboard, there was never any real tension in the game. He repeatedly failed to spot open receivers (they WERE there) and when he did spot them it was usually late. For whatever reason his head was never in the game and you knew he wasn't going to get it done in the last quarter.
People who defend the game also overlook how many points the Pats left out there. Could easily have been a 20+ point blowout.
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Post by FrankSobotka1514 on Feb 5, 2019 20:36:40 GMT
It’s also possible that Patricia sucks and his replacement (Flores?) called a better game. Plus whatever was going on with Malcolm Butler last year wasn’t a distraction this year.
In no way am I saying that Doug Pederson is a better coach than Belichick, but for one single game he was (with the help of Frank Reich). He called bold unpredictable plays and the Eagles executed. They may have been underdogs but they had a lot of talent on that team.
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Post by sdm3 on Feb 5, 2019 20:38:23 GMT
It’s also possible that Patricia sucks and his replacement (Flores?) called a better game. Plus whatever was going on with Malcolm Butler last year wasn’t a distraction this year. In no way am I saying that Doug Pederson is a better coach than Belichick, but for one single game he was (with the help of Frank Reich). He called bold unpredictable play and the Eagles executed. They may have been underdogs but they had a lot of talent on that team. It also helped that the Eagles’ o-line was far, far better than that of the Rams. Foles had all the time in the world to throw, while Goff was under immense pressure from the start and didn’t handle it well. Really, Goff was the polar opposite of Foles. |
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Post by Rey Kahuka on Feb 5, 2019 20:40:32 GMT
Goff shit his pants and Gurley is hurt. BB knew this and it wasn't rocket science shutting them down. Even then the Rams were a Cooks drop and an incredible defensive play by Jason McCourty (who really came out of nowhere to break that TD pass up) away from possibly winning this game. I think it was a very basic scheme, the moment was just too big for Goff.
Did you see the look on Goff's face during pre-game? People are talking about him looking wide-eyed during the anthem, but I saw it during warm ups. He just had that look. Cam Newton had that look in warmups at SB 50. I took one look at Newton during warmups and knew he was going to have a shitty game. I did the same with Goff, only I couldn't tell for sure if it was just what I wanted to see. Then the game unfolded and my suspicions were confirmed.
Back to the Pats D, this was the only good defensive performance from start to finish in the playoffs this year. They gave up a ton of points to the Chiefs and the Chargers in the second half of those respective games. Go back and look at the game recaps of any of the Pats SB wins (before this one) and tell me the defense played well for 4 quarters.
BB was great at dialing up defenses in the old days when you could mug receivers (watch the old Pats SB videos and you'll see montages of hits that are all illegal now). Ever since the Colts complained and the NFL changed the rules to give them an advantage, Belichick's defense has been average at best. I think the pass defense that went to the second SB against the Giants was literally historically bad. The season before that, they went 14-2 when Brady had that inhuman year with a million TDs and 2 picks or whatever it was. They had a huge + turnover ratio because shitty QBs were throwing bad picks when their team was down 30 points in the 4th qtr. That team leaned so heavily on Brady all season that I knew all it would take was one bad Brady game and they'd be done. 14-2 that year and they lost in the divisional round to the f-cking Jets because Brady had a bad game.
Belichick keeps the team focused and prepared. He expects you to do your job and put the team first. He never gets too high or too low. I love him. But he isn't the genius people think he is, and he'd still have a sub-.500 record as a head coach if Brady didn't fall into his lap.
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