Patriots 6 Redskins 23
Preseason Game 1 Thoughts
First off,
this game was pretty tough to watch. The team looked flat the entire night and
never really found themselves. The legit starters for the Patriots didn’t get
to play either so while the team didn’t look too good the best players didn’t even
touch the field for the Patriots. The list of players who didn’t play Thursday
night includes Brady, Mayo, Revis, Gronk, Edelman, Mankins, McCourty,
Hightower, Collins, and Amendola. Thursday night was a showcase night for many
of the depth players on the roster to earn their place on this team. While it
was tough to watch most of the night, there were certainly some bright spots in
there as well. I’m going to take a look at this through positives and negatives
even though the negatives will outweigh the positives after this dismal
performance by the Patriots.
Negatives:
·
The Offensive Line
o
This mainly applies to the first half, but could
be applied to the entire game too. The pass protection for Mallet throughout
was suspect. Early on, Mallet made a nice throw to LaFell to convert a 3rd
down only to see it taken back because of a Solder holding penalty. The rest of
the half Solder struggled. Mallet’s struggles could be directed toward the OL
play in front of him. They struggled to contain the Skins pass rush all night.
o
The run blocking was rough as well. On the first
attempt of the day, Ridley saw at least 4 Redskins in the backfield the moment
he took the handoff, luckily he found a way to gain 2 yards somehow. As a team
that Patriots had 24 carries for 63 yards and a really crappy 2.6 YPC average
and a lot of that falls on the offensive line for not opening up holes for the
runners.
·
Ryan Mallet
o
Yes, I know the OL play was bad, which could be
a reason for Mallet’s struggles but still he did not look very good. He didn’t look
comfortable in the pocket and rushed his movements and progressions. The easy
play to look at with a magnifying glass is the quick slant to LaFell that was
thrown at his feet killing the chance at a first down. The offense didn’t do anything
when Mallet was at the helm, which sucks because this was sort of a showcase
game for him.
·
The Front 7 (Anderson, Beauharnais and Fleming
in particular)
o
Didn’t come close to hitting the quarterback and
did a really poor job penetrating the LOS on run plays. All of the LBs took
really bad angles all night and looked to be caught out of place a lot. The defensive
line rarely set the edge well, too. Granted, the team did not have the entire
starting LB core and the starting DL only played a couple series, but still
these depth players did not do their jobs very well out there.
·
Logan Ryan
o
This is mainly because I have very high
expectations for Ryan heading into this season to develop into a better player.
Two plays in particular stick out from Ryan’s play the other night. One was in
the first half I believe and the Pats had the Skins backed up on their own 1
and Ryan let Robinson slant right in front of his face for an easy 15 yard
pickup getting them out of trouble. Then, a second play Ryan got beat down the
sideline on a nice throw and catch. Overall I thought he looked subpar.
Hopefully he can turn it around and become the player we all expect him to be.
Positives:
·
Jimmy Garoppolo
o
Yes, he was playing vs. vanilla defense against
Washington’s 2s and 3s but still this kid looked good. He looked to be very
comfortable in the pocket and made a lot of very good decisions. He throws a
beautiful deep ball, that’s for certain. He had 3 throws that beyond impressed me;
all of them were thrown toward Tyms. The first was the deep ball in the third
which was incomplete, the second was the first play of the 4th
quarter where Jimmy sent a beauty down the sideline to Tyms for a huge gain,
and the 3rd impressive throw was the TD toss to Tyms, yet another
perfectly placed pass over the shoulder. IF Garoppolo can continue to make
throws like that in these situations Mallet may be on the chopping block.
·
Brandon LaFell/ Josh Boyce and Brian Tyms
o
LaFell didn’t do much, but he looked good when
he was out there and did do something. I thought he looked smooth running
routes and seems to have a lot of length to offer on the field which Brady will
use to an advantage. Boyce made a couple catches but again just looked electric
to me once he touches the ball. This kid is certainly talented, but he can’t
seem to fully put it together yet. Hopefully he does, because he is dangerous
with the ball in his hands. The obvious positive here was Tyms as he put up 120
yards and the lone Patriot score of the game off of a beauty pass from Jimmy G.
Tyms may have been playing vs. vanilla defense and not much contact at the
line, but he still went out and produced in the stage that demanded it. It will
be interesting to follow him the rest of preseason and see how he and Garoppolo
develop together.
·
Malcom Butler
o
Effort is the first word that comes to mind when
I think of his performance. Butler was all over the field all night. He should’ve
had at least 2 interceptions as well which really would’ve helped his chances
at a roster spot. He is a smaller corner but his effort makes up for that. He
showed very well on Thursday night and with Brandon Browner suspended the first
4 games of the season Butler could find his way onto the roster if this type of
play keeps up.
·
Tavon Wilson and Patrick Chung
o
BB was
pretty obvious in his attempt to give Harmon, Wilson and Chung all equal reps
on Thursday and I think Wilson did the most with his. He was the most active
out there making a lot of tackles looking pretty big but not slow. He didn’t make
any glaring mental mistakes, which shows growth on his part. He looked pretty
good in my opinion coming up and playing the run game. Chung didn’t rack up the
same tackle number as Wilson but he still looked smooth out there. He didn’t impress
me as much as Wilson, but he looked better than I thought he would for some
reason. I am rooting for Wilson to win out in the safety competition and take
the starting role but I also like Harmon a lot too and wouldn’t mind seeing him
take it either. We also can’t rule out Jemea Thomas making a push in the coming
weeks for the spot either. The competition at the second safety spot is the
most interesting to me at this point in the season.
Overall the game wasn’t pretty for the Patriots, but there
were the bright spots that I outlined above. The team heads back to Gillette to
joint practice with the Eagles before their game on Friday night. Friday night
should see more action from the starters and it should also answer more questions
about position competition and who will stick on the roster.
