The New England Patriots proved that you have to play all four quarters in any game during its 24-23 loss to the Seattle Seahawks and can never take a play off no matter what the time and the score is.
Tom Brady was called for intentional grounding inside the Seahawks 10-yard line with two seconds left in the first half, and because the Patriots didn’t have any more timeouts, there was a 10 second runoff meaning end of the first half. New England would have most likely gotten at least three points (although Stephen Gostowski has been shaky at times) had there not been the intentional grounding. That one penalty costing the Pats three points was the difference between winning and losing.
After being up 17-10 in the first half, the Patriots only tallied six points in the second half. They could not get their run game started, as they were only able to muster up 87 yards on the ground against the best run defense in the league.
The front four of the Patriots defense even shut down Seahawk running-back Marshawn Lynch for only 41 yards, which no other team has been able to do that often this year. However, the Patriots secondary looked like it was 2011 all over again and made Russell Wilson look like a superstar.
Wilson finished with 293 yards on only 16 completions and three touchdowns averaging 10.9 yards a completion meaning the secondary was getting owned on the deep ball.
The Patriots are relying too much on their offense to put up 30+ points a game again, which elite teams can’t do, because there will be bad games for the offense where that won’t happen so they need to rely on their defense. After all they can’t rely on playing Billy Cundiff (http://www.nfl.com/news/story/09000d5d82637b0c/article/cundiffs-missed-fieldgoal-attempt-ends-ravens-run) every game.
But more on that later.
The Seahawks definitely deserved to win yesterday’s game, but I think some of their players are starting to get too big of an ego.
Richard Sherman being one of them. In an article by ESPN (http://espn.go.com/boston/nfl/story/_/id/8508095/richard-sherman-gloats-seattle-seahawks-top-gimmick-new-england-patriots) Sherman acted like they won the Super Bowl yesterday tweeting how the Patriots are 3-3. The Seahawks are only 4-2 (would actually be 3-3 had the replacement refs not blown that call against Green Bay a couple of weeks ago). I think it’s just a classless act for someone who should be a role model to kids, not acting like a kid on the play ground.
But I will say the Patriots defense didn’t step up when they needed to. Like I said they made the rookie Wilson look like a star out there, especially when he bombed a 46 yard touchdown pass to Sidney Rice with just over a minute in the game to give the Seahawks the 24-23 lead.
The Patriots are the fifth worst team in the league in pass defense, giving opposing quarterbacks a 288 yard a game average. To put this in perspective the only teams worse than that are the Tennessee Titans (2-4 record, 292 passing yards a game), Cleveland Browns (1-5, 294 yards), Tampa Bay Buccaneers (2-3, 312 yards) and the Washington Redskins (3-3, 328 yards).
Now the Patriots are hurting a little on defense with free-agent pickup safety Steve Gregory out with a hip injury and first-round pick Dont’a Hightower out with a hamstring injury, which certainly don’t help things.
The Patriots defense certainly needs to start picking up their game and it has to start this week against the Jets (3-3). The winner of this game will take sole possession of first place in the AFC East, so it will be a big game like always with Rex Ryan and the Jets. Hopefully facing off against the struggling Sanchez/Tebow combo will give the Pats secondary the confidence it so desperately needs.
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Tom Brady was called for intentional grounding inside the Seahawks 10-yard line with two seconds left in the first half, and because the Patriots didn’t have any more timeouts, there was a 10 second runoff meaning end of the first half. New England would have most likely gotten at least three points (although Stephen Gostowski has been shaky at times) had there not been the intentional grounding. That one penalty costing the Pats three points was the difference between winning and losing.
After being up 17-10 in the first half, the Patriots only tallied six points in the second half. They could not get their run game started, as they were only able to muster up 87 yards on the ground against the best run defense in the league.
The front four of the Patriots defense even shut down Seahawk running-back Marshawn Lynch for only 41 yards, which no other team has been able to do that often this year. However, the Patriots secondary looked like it was 2011 all over again and made Russell Wilson look like a superstar.
Wilson finished with 293 yards on only 16 completions and three touchdowns averaging 10.9 yards a completion meaning the secondary was getting owned on the deep ball.
The Patriots are relying too much on their offense to put up 30+ points a game again, which elite teams can’t do, because there will be bad games for the offense where that won’t happen so they need to rely on their defense. After all they can’t rely on playing Billy Cundiff (http://www.nfl.com/news/story/09000d5d82637b0c/article/cundiffs-missed-fieldgoal-attempt-ends-ravens-run) every game.
But more on that later.
The Seahawks definitely deserved to win yesterday’s game, but I think some of their players are starting to get too big of an ego.
Richard Sherman being one of them. In an article by ESPN (http://espn.go.com/boston/nfl/story/_/id/8508095/richard-sherman-gloats-seattle-seahawks-top-gimmick-new-england-patriots) Sherman acted like they won the Super Bowl yesterday tweeting how the Patriots are 3-3. The Seahawks are only 4-2 (would actually be 3-3 had the replacement refs not blown that call against Green Bay a couple of weeks ago). I think it’s just a classless act for someone who should be a role model to kids, not acting like a kid on the play ground.
But I will say the Patriots defense didn’t step up when they needed to. Like I said they made the rookie Wilson look like a star out there, especially when he bombed a 46 yard touchdown pass to Sidney Rice with just over a minute in the game to give the Seahawks the 24-23 lead.
The Patriots are the fifth worst team in the league in pass defense, giving opposing quarterbacks a 288 yard a game average. To put this in perspective the only teams worse than that are the Tennessee Titans (2-4 record, 292 passing yards a game), Cleveland Browns (1-5, 294 yards), Tampa Bay Buccaneers (2-3, 312 yards) and the Washington Redskins (3-3, 328 yards).
Now the Patriots are hurting a little on defense with free-agent pickup safety Steve Gregory out with a hip injury and first-round pick Dont’a Hightower out with a hamstring injury, which certainly don’t help things.
The Patriots defense certainly needs to start picking up their game and it has to start this week against the Jets (3-3). The winner of this game will take sole possession of first place in the AFC East, so it will be a big game like always with Rex Ryan and the Jets. Hopefully facing off against the struggling Sanchez/Tebow combo will give the Pats secondary the confidence it so desperately needs.
Follow me on Twitter: ALabor_ET