Surprise The Patriots Are Going To Be Good Again
After watching the Patriots play the Redskins in tonight’s preseason game, it has become clear that the offensive firepower of Brady and Moss is going to be back in full force this year. Brady isn’t afraid to put it up for grabs when Moss is one on one with a defensive back. Guess who usually wins that battle?
Aside from the Brady Moss connection, it looks like the Patriots still have some work to do on both sides of the ball. I don’t know if they will be quite as effective as they were two years ago during that 50 touchdown season. Nevertheless, Brady will still put up some great numbers.
It appears that the key to beating Tom Brady still lies in the defense’s ability to get pressure on him very quickly. That really scares me about the Bills as they have yet to prove they can get any consistent pass rush at all out of their starters. It is non-existent. That does not bode well for Buffalo. That makes me think that the Pats will be shredding the Bill’s “D” on national television during that season opener. Scary indeed.
Based on this game though, it looks like the Bills should be able to move the chains against New England. That is assuming that Terrell Owens is on the field and everyone else on the offense is healthy. We saw what the Bills starting offense looks like without TO in the lineup. It isn’t pretty.
The way I see it is the keys to the game against the Patriots will be:
1) Neutralize Moss – Good luck with that.
2) Pressure Brady often during the first few series in which the Pats have the ball.
3) Move the sticks with “TO”
It makes more sense to me to develop a game plan against the Patriots that neutralizes Randy Moss even if it means giving up more yards on the ground. If you could somehow force the Patriots to focus on running the ball, you have got a chance to outscore them. They won’t be able to run the score up so quickly because running the ball uses more clock. They would have to take your yards a few at a time instead of 15 at a time throwing to Moss. It also makes it harder to have a successful 80 yard drive for a touchdown when you are running the ball a lot. This is part of the reason I would always rather see the Bills building a more prolific throwing offense as opposed to a running game based one.
How about those Redskins? They look pretty darn good this year. Man do I miss London Fletcher as a Bill. He had a way of getting that Bills defense jacked up to play above themselves. We could use that kind of motivation again.