Pats Problems Haven’t Been Solved
Sunday, August 28, 2011
If the third game of the preseason is considered to be the big test prior to the regular season, then the Patriots graded out at a big, fat “F”!
Saturday night in Detroit was ugly for the Pats in so many ways. Head coach Bill Belichick acknowledged as much saying, “I didn’t get the team ready to play. We didn’t do anything really well in any phase of the game. Certainly not good enough to win. (The) Lions are a good team, an played a hell of a lot better than our team. We really weren’t competitive. We had problems in every phase of the game.”
While it’s never wise to overreact to what happens in a preseason game, there is reason to be concerned. Detroit seemed to beat the Patriots the same way that the Giants did in Super Bowl 42, the way the Ravens did a couple of years ago in the playoffs and the way the Jets did in the postseason last year. How, you ask? By physically dominating the Patriots at the line of scrimmage.
The Lions’ offensive and defensive lines were much the best Saturday night. They effectively punched the Patriots in the mouth and New England didn’t respond.
Patriots quarterback Tom Brady was trying to take the loss in stride by saying, “you don’t want to ride the wave of emotions like ‘Oh, we’re great, we suck, we’re great, we suck!’” That’s certainly true because as great as they looked against Jacksonville and Tampa Bay in their first two preseason games, they were equally as bad Saturday night.
But Brady, himself, was also part of the problem against the Lions. It has been written here many times before that Brady seems to turn the fire in his belly on and off these days. It wasn’t until their regular season game in Miami last year that Brady seemed to demonstrate that fiery in-game leadership the team so desperately needs. He seemed to stay true to that for most of the season but became stoic in their playoff loss to the Jets.
The pre-fame Tom Brady was always a fired up and emotional leader. But that was early in his career before he enjoyed all of the success that he has and before he married his super-model wife and got caught up in the GQ scene.
We’ll say it again, Brady NEEDS to be that fiery, emotional leader ALL the time. When things are going well, he needs to be yelling and screaming and patting teammates on the back. And when things aren’t going so well, he needs to be yelling and screaming and pumping his teammates up.
For whatever reason, he now seems to turn it on and off when he wants to. The unfortunate part is that he seems to turn off that type of leadership when the team experiences in-game adversity which is when they need it the most. He’s becoming somewhat of a front-runner. When they’re pummeling and opponent, he’s all fired up. When they’re getting hammered, he’s stoic and sulks. Not good.
Defensively, the Pats gave us hope with the way that they man-handled Tampa in week 2 of the preseason. That hope has all but disappeared following the loss to the Lions.
Last year’s rookie-sensation Devin McCourty had a rough night. He gave up big play after big play looking like anything but the shutdown corner he was last season.
Offensively, the performance was pitiful and, even worse, Wes Welker suffered a neck injury while making a tackle of Detroit's Ricardo Silva who intercepted Brady in the second quarter.
My gut tells me that Saturday’s loss to the Lions was not an indication of what to expect during the upcoming regular season. New England will likely have a very solid season resulting in yet another playoff appearance.
However, my gut also tells me that Saturday night’s loss to Detroit was an indication that the Patriots are not a Super Bowl caliber team just yet. The fact that they are 0-3 in their last 3 postseason games and were beaten soundly at the line of scrimmage in all 3 of those losses is a problem that, as of last night, has yet to be solved.
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