Locked On Patriots - Daily Podcast On The New England Patriots - Domination: Patriots Humiliate The Panthers, Win 42-13
Episode Date: September 28, 2025The New England Patriots responded after last week’s tough loss in a HUGE way by dominating Bryce Young and the Carolina Panthers. Josh McDaniels made life miserable for the Panthers, while the Patr...iots Defense shut down Carolina after a tough start.Stefon Diggs had his coming out party, the Offensive Line was nearly flawless, and the run game showed some life on the edges. Oh, and a Patriot made franchise history! Let’s break it down.Follow & Subscribe on all Podcast platforms…🎧 https://link.chtbl.com/LOPatriots?sid...Locked On NFL League-Wide: Every Team, Fantasy, Draft & More🎧 https://linktr.ee/LockedOnNFL#patriots #newenglandpatriots Support Us By Supporting Our Sponsors!5-Hour ENERGYEnough with boring, flavorless caffeine, it’s time to give your caffeine a flavor upgrade with 5-hour ENERGY®️ shots. Get the favorites you love or be bold and try something new in-store and online at https://www.5hourENERGY.com or Amazon today.PelotonLet yourself run, lift, flex, and push forward. Explore the new Peloton Cross Training Tread+ today at https://www.onepeloton.com.RugietReady to level up your confidence in the bedroom? Head to https://www.rugiet.com and use promo code LOCKEDONNFL for 15% off your first order.Monarch MoneyTake control of your finances with Monarch Money. Use code LOCKEDONNFL at https://monarchmoney.com/lockedonnfl for 50% off your first year.SquareTo learn more, go support your favorite neighborhood spot and see what Square has been up to in your neck of the woods. And then if you have extra time, check out https://square.com/go/lockedonnfl.PrizePicksDownload the PrizePicks app today and use code LOCKEDONNFL to get $50 in lineups after you play your first $5 lineup.GametimeDownload the Gametime app, create an account, and use code LOCKEDONNFL for $20 off your first purchase. Terms apply. Download Gametime today. What time is it? Gametime.FanDuelRight now, new customers can bet just FIVE dollars and if your bet wins—you’ll get THREE HUNDRED dollars in bonus bets to use across the app.FANDUEL DISCLAIMER: 21+ in select states. First online real money wager only. Bonus issued as nonwithdrawable free bets that expires in 14 days. Restrictions apply. See terms at sportsbook.fanduel.com. Gambling Problem? Call 1-800-GAMBLER or visit FanDuel.com/RG (CO, IA, MD, MI, NJ, PA, IL, VA, WV), 1-800-NEXT-STEP or text NEXTSTEP to 53342 (AZ), 1-888-789-7777 or visit ccpg.org/chat (CT), 1-800-9-WITH-IT (IN), 1-800-522-4700 (WY, KS) or visit ksgamblinghelp.com (KS), 1-877-770-STOP (LA), 1-877-8-HOPENY or text HOPENY (467369) (NY), TN REDLINE 1-800-889-9789 (TN)
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The Pats respond after a tough loss last week against the Pittsburgh Steelers
and absolutely humiliate the Carolina Panthers at Gillette Stadium.
Let's break down the route.
This is Lockdown Patriots.
You are Locked-on Patriots, your daily New England Patriots podcast, part of the Locked-on
podcast network, your team every day.
What a day, what a day, what a day at Gillette Stadium.
What's happening?
I'm your host, Nick Cattles, born and raised in New England,
been covering the Patriots for the past 16 years.
Also co-host of the Greg Bedard Patriots podcast with Nick Cattles
and a sports talk show host veteran.
On today's live post game, the defense settles down after another lazy bad start
in that first quarter.
Also, one, one Patriot makes franchise history.
But first, Josh McDaniels had a day.
We appreciate you joining the show, making us your first list.
and for being an everydayer, the Lockdown Patriots podcast, a proud partner of the
Lockdown Podcast Network, your team every day. The Patriots were absolutely unequivocally
dominant against the Carolina Panthers, especially after the Panthers' first drive
during today's game. That is a dominant performance from your football team. All three
phases. Defense pitches a near shutout after that first drive. Of course, you've got to
count that last touchdown by Carolina in Garbage.
time, but they almost pitch a shut out after the first quarter, and the Panthers really weren't
competitive in this football game after the first five or six minutes. But I want to start
offensively because I want to give Josh McDaniels his flowers. I have been saying this over the
past couple of weeks. There is a contingent of Patriots fans, and I think there is also a contingent
of some people in the media that just don't want Josh McDaniels as the offensive coordinator.
They don't think he's very good. They think Tom Brady,
created who Josh McDaniels is as a play caller.
And I have been saying, past couple of weeks,
Josh McDaniels has been on a heater.
He was really good against Miami.
He was really, really good against Pittsburgh.
And if his offensive players didn't cough up the football five times against the Steelers,
who knows how many points they would have scored and how much they would have won by.
And then he walks into today's game and Josh McDaniels cooked against Carolina.
It's as simple as that.
He cooked jet sweep calls to make sure that they take advantage of the vulnerable edges of this Carolina defense.
Josh McDaniels also moved the pocket several times with Drake May today,
which we continue to see happen more and more as Josh McDaniels gets used to Drake May
and understands his strengths, understands his weaknesses,
and how to put his quarterback in the best possible situation.
We saw it again, the moving pocket.
on that Hunter Henry touchdown throw.
A perfect example of taking advantage of your quarterback's strengths
and driving a defense absolutely crazy.
Josh McDaniels was a five-star chef today.
We've been talking about the lack of explosive plays.
Mike Frable's been talking about the lack of explosive plays
from this Patriots offense.
Not today.
The Patriots just in the first half, Evan Lazar posted,
had gains of 24, 21, 22, and 33.
And what you saw beyond the explosive plays, and what you saw beyond Josh McDaniels understanding
who his quarterback is and how to get the best of Drake May, you also saw Josh McDaniels adding
to the menu.
The play call menu got larger today.
And this is something we're going to see throughout the season.
Josh McDaniels has said over and over and over again that he will continue to add.
That's what he does.
You start with the base.
You want that foundation as an offense.
And as the season goes on, you understand what your team does well, and you start to add to the menu slowly but surely.
And we saw that today. Taylor Kyle's of CL&S posted in the first half, things the Patriots offense has shown for the first time this season.
They ran a tight end screen.
They ran a counter bash in the run game.
They ran a counter hot protection.
They used a sixth offensive lineman putting Vidarian Lowe on the offensive line in a jumbo package.
inside the five, something that I wanted to see last week against Pittsburgh.
They did it today.
So you're adding more elements to this offense.
You're adding more play calls to this play call sheet as you move along.
And I also mentioned during the preview on Friday's show.
I mentioned that the Patriots, in this game specifically, had to finish drives.
You could talk about Caroline the Panthers in their defense, and obviously they have some major
holes defensively, and they were fighting against it today.
I did not think they showed special effort once this game kind of got out of hand.
But the one thing the Carolina Panthers defense did heading into this game today was that they would stop offenses in the red zone.
Carolina's defense was the seventh best red zone defense walking in two week four.
The Patriots finished four out of four.
They touched the red zone four times.
They scored four touchdowns.
that's finishing drives.
That's a great job by your offensive coordinator.
It's a great job by your quarterback.
And we saw as Stefan Diggs coming out party today.
That was nice to see.
I've been patient with Stefan Diggs.
People were saying, oh, is he done?
Is he washed?
He's not giving this team much at all.
I've said from the very beginning,
I'm going to give Stefan Diggs the grace of the first four to six weeks
so he can knock the rust off.
We have to remember, ACL surgery.
He's in his 30s.
give him some time he's not going to be the same electrifying wide receiver he was in
Minnesota he's not going to be the same guy that he was in buffalo but if he's healthy
and he gets back to what he was in Houston just last season he is a good at times really good
wide receiver and today was his coming out party six catches over a hundred yards he had not
one but two big plays and the most important play to me was the fourth down conversion
from May to Diggs. Because once again, you know, Drake May, who has been terrific on third
and fourth down, we've been pounding that point for the last couple of weeks.
Drake May has been really good on third and fourth down this season. And there you are,
fourth down. And what does Drake May do? He delivers an anticipatory throw downfield towards the
boundary, back shoulder to Stefan Diggs. That's the chemistry. That's when you start feeling good
about watching this offense and the quarterback to wide receiver connection.
When you're throwing a back shoulder downfield on fourth down and Stefan Diggs knows
exactly what to do in that situation, that's the type of chemistry you want to see
between the quarterback and the wide receiver.
And it felt like today some of that rust got knocked off of Stefan Diggs.
And he looked a little bit more like that guy that we saw even last year in Houston.
Let's give the offensive line some love because we're going to sit here.
to watch Drake May. We're going to talk about Drake May. We're going to talk about Josh
McDaniels and Stefan Diggs. But the offensive line was really, really good. Now, yes, some of
this is the Carolina Panthers defense. In our preview show, we talked about the Panthers have not
gotten pressure all year long, one of the worst pass rush teams in the NFL. And they did not get
close. They did not get close to Drake May in the pocket. The offensive line, pass protection,
zero pressure all day. You had one sack, quote unquote, and that's because Drake,
May took the sack. He slid. He scrambled and he didn't, you know, break the line of scrimmage.
So the sack was actually on the quarterback. And Drake May said in the post game that he
apologized to the offensive line for costing them a sack stat. But the offensive line was
really good. Zero pressure all day. Jared Wilson was out of this game. Ben Brown started at
left guard. There were no issues with Ben Brown. I thought Ben Brown made a couple of really good
blocks in the run game. But the offensive line stood tall, no pressure on the quarterback. You got some good
push in the run game they were really good in the red zone that's how you finish four or four in
the red area and you know just a complete performance from this offense from the OC to the
quarterback to the offensive line to your skilled position players hunter henry austin hooper make
a couple of nice catches henry with the touchdown mac hollins gets involved on that motion slant
route and really made uh rose boom you know look conflicted on that touchdown catch
Hollins got in on the fun.
Kisham Booty made a play downfield.
Ramondre Stevenson responded.
Antonio Gibson was pretty good and his touches.
Travion Henderson looked more comfortable today.
So, I mean, from top to bottom, this offense.
And let's finish with the offense with Drake May.
Because, look, was this an incredibly difficult task?
Not really.
He had to remain patient.
He had to make sure he made the right reads.
He got off to a shaky start again.
his first throw-down field was, you know, high and behind.
Kishan Bouti could have been an interception, but then he settled down quickly and
Drake May made some throws.
That third down throw to Hunter Henry at the goal line was ridiculous.
That is a Garrett Crochet, shot out to the Red Sox postseason bound.
That was a Garrett Crochet 97-mile-per-hour fastball threading the needle to Hunter Henry on a third down when you had to have it.
Fantastic.
Fantastic.
Hitting Kayshan Booty downfield towards the left side, left boundary.
Drake May on the move.
Moving that pocket again, off the roll, finds Kayshan Booty for a first down.
I thought the first throw to Stefan Diggs, the first big play he had was a nice throw.
It was a layered throw.
Hit him pretty much in stride, and then he made the back shoulder throw downfield.
So Drake May had a good day.
the offense had a really good day.
Josh McDaniels cooked.
Let me know how you feel about it.
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All right.
The defense found its sea legs after another rough start.
It's coming up next.
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You know I'm always honest, and I've got to be honest with you.
At the beginning of this game, the way the defense started, I was concerned.
It was another rough start.
The Carolina Panthers came out with their opening script.
Dave Canales had the opening script ready.
And the Panthers marched down the field, easy, peasy, one, two, three,
against this Patriots defense, a number of 10 plus yard,
plays. They were averaging like 10 yards of play on that first drive. We once again had some
early flags. And I was concerned. I was saying here we go again. Another rough start. Is this
defense going to make Bryce Young look like Patrick Mahomes? Because you can't do this against
this Panthers offense. The offensive line, a couple of backups on the interior. They're all
banged up at wide receiver. The very first snap is a jet sweep and end around to David Moore.
he gets hurt, he leaves in the very first quarter.
But thankfully, thankfully, the Patriots defense settled down.
And I want to start with the defensive line.
I don't know how many people pay close attention as you're watching live to the trenches,
the defensive line, offensive line.
But I got to tell you, the defensive line of the Patriots continues to be good.
And it's really led by Milton Williams.
Milton Williams has been worth every single solitary penny that the Patriots decided
to pay him during free agency.
Milton Williams has at times been a game wrecker.
He has destroyed offensive lines single-handedly multiple times during this season.
He has been really, really good.
And today, another couple of impact plays from Milton Williams against the pass, against
the run, he's getting pressure, he's getting some run stuffs.
If he doesn't get the run stuff, if he himself doesn't get his hand on the quarterback,
He's creating opportunities for others on this defensive line.
Milton Williams has been really good.
And I thought Christian Barmore woke up today.
It's been a little up and down for Christian Barmore,
which is understandable coming off last year with the blood clots.
He was managed all camp long.
But I thought Christian Barmore played good football today.
And I thought that he made some impact plays.
And he was driving the interior offensive line of the Carolina Panthers
absolutely bananas.
So a good job by Williams, a good job by Christian Bormor, and you started to see the pressure.
As this game went along, the Patriots started to pick up the pressure on Bryce Young.
And I thought after the second drive or so, Bryce Young looked incredibly uncomfortable.
He was incredibly uncomfortable in that pocket.
He was concerned about the Patriots pass rush.
He was concerned about the big guys in the middle getting to him.
You could tell he was kind of bouncing up and down in the pocket looking unsure.
there were some plays where it frankly looked like Bryce Young short-circuited in his head.
It happened multiple times during this game.
And that's because of the pressure.
Whether you're getting it on the edge or you're getting it on the interior,
you're getting the pressure.
And as the pressure picked up,
as the defensive line played better and better,
Bryce Young's play declined more and more.
And they had no chance.
The Carolina Panthers had no chance once Bryce Young was shook.
And again, I think he was shook after.
that second drive.
And most of the game, he looked like somebody who was not comfortable.
We also have to point out, after that first drive, the Patriots, really you look at the first
drive, and then you look at the Panthers last drive, which was garbage time, and you
got a bunch of backups out there.
But I thought after that first drive and until the final drive, again, the defense steps
up, and I thought they limited big plays.
You didn't have receivers roaming wide open in the secondary.
You didn't have 20 plus yard plays over and over and over again.
You're left shaking your head, wanting to rip your hair out.
We didn't have much of that today.
The Patriots defense did a good job of limiting the explosive plays.
Now, we talked about this on the preview.
Carolina's offense has not been very explosive.
It's been Tet McMillan or bust.
And if you limit Tet McMillan, then you're not going to get
a lot out of this passing offense in Carolina.
You're just not.
And I thought the Patriots did a decent job against McMillan.
Not great.
I thought McMillan beat Carlton Davis at one point down the boundary and Bryce Young just
missed him.
That should have been a touchdown.
So I wouldn't say the Patriots were excellent against McMillan.
I don't think they shut him down.
He had opportunities.
I think his quarterback let him down a few times.
But all in all, you limited the explosive plays.
You got to the quarterback.
You shook him up.
You were pretty good against the run.
after that first drive and again the late runs whatever when you're when you're up by 30 and you've got a team that's going to run the football you're not worried about them running the football you're playing pre-event you're playing very safe you're not looking to give up big plays so a team's going to be able to run on you if they want to run on you when they're down by three four five touchdowns that's just what's going to happen but i thought the defense played much better limiting the chunk plays limiting the explosive plays creating some tough down
in distance for Bryce Young and the Panthers offense.
I was interested to see how Christian Gonzalez was going to be deployed.
It was great to see Christian Gonzalez back out there for the Patriots today.
But what was interesting about it was the Patriots, they decided not to move Christian
Gonzalez.
And we had talked about this during camp.
It felt like Carlton Davis likes to be on the left side and the Patriots just kind of stick
him on the left side and they don't move him.
So Christian Gonzalez did not travel with Tett McMillan today, and that was interesting because if I were the Patriots defense, look, it ended up working out fine.
But going into this game, I thought you put Christian Gonzalez on McMillan and you let him do what he does, and Carolina is going to be in trouble.
But interestingly enough, the Patriots did not have Gonzalez, they did not have Christian Gonzalez travel with Tet McMillan.
The good thing, though, was that Christian Gonzalez was out there.
I didn't see him take any snaps off until the game was out of hand.
Until the Patriots rolled out there back up defense,
I think Christian Gonzalez played practically every single defensive snap in this game,
which is really nice to see because that tells us he's healthy.
So not only did Christian Gonzalez play,
but this was not like a ramping up.
He was out there the entire time through the first three cores.
He might have missed a couple of snaps,
but it felt like he was out there for every snap defensively.
And I didn't know what his workload was going to be.
So it was really nice to see Christian Gonzalez not only playing today, being active,
but also being out there and just in his role, starting with the defense and playing pretty much all the snaps.
Carlton Davis does have to clean some things up, a couple of flags.
That's kind of how he plays.
He's physical.
He's grabby.
Craig Woodson gave up not one but two touchdowns.
He got picked on two routes.
It's a learning curve for the rookie.
I thought in the second and third quarters,
Woodson made some plays,
but, you know, Craig Woodson,
he's got to make sure he's on the details.
And that's going to happen.
Again, young player.
All right, not only,
not only did we witness a thumping today,
because that was a thumping.
We also witnessed history.
That's next.
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part of the Lockdown Podcast Network,
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That was a fun day.
That was a fun, fun day, wasn't it?
Watching this team not only win but dominate on a Sunday at Jolette Stadium,
a place that they haven't played well.
They haven't won a lot of games the past couple of years.
years. They have not defended their home turf. Today, the Patriots did all of that.
A dominant, dominant performance. We've talked offense. We've talked defense.
Patriots haven't scored 40 plus points since like January of 2022 against the Jacksonville
Jaguars. And a big part, a big part of their offensive success was their field position today.
And now we've got to talk about Marcus Jones, don't we? I mean, I feel like it's almost criminal
that I had to wait beyond 20 minutes to get to Marcus Jones.
Marcus Jones was awesome.
Marcus Jones has a house call on a punt return when the Patriots were in their punt safe mode.
They were concerned about a fake punt.
And what happens to have that type of punt return for a touchdown when you're playing it safe,
when you're playing your punt return safe, it's an unbelievable, unbelievable return by Marcus
Jones. Everybody, including myself, thought he was going to call for a fair catch.
He doesn't. He gets by the first couple of tackles, somehow, some way, and then it's off
to the races. Takes it to the house. And that was a big momentum swing, because the Patriots got
off to a slow start, as we mentioned earlier. The defense got marched on. Drake May, first
throw, almost picked, offense, three and out, not great. But then you have that punt return
for the touchdown, and it just felt like everybody in the stadium took a big breath.
I mean, that was a tremendous punt return.
And then he comes back and he has another punt return that he almost takes to the house.
He got tripped up by the punter of all people.
But he was so close.
He was so close to having two house calls in the punt game.
60 plus yard punt return.
Later on, he made two or three other guys miss.
He had another punt return that was 20 or more yards.
Marcus Jones was unbelievable.
today. Unfreaking believable. And he made history. Mike Reese posted this. Jones's 167 punt return yards are the most by a Patriots player in a game in franchise history. We witnessed franchise history today thanks to Marcus Jones. He broke Mike Haynes' old record of 156 punt return yards. That was set on November 7, 1976, almost 50 years ago.
I do have a question.
Why did Carolina keep punting to him?
What do you?
I have no idea.
If you are Carolina, how on God's green earth do you keep punting to Marcus Jones?
How many times does he have to roast your special teams coverage before you kick it out of bounds,
before you kick it a mile away from the game?
I have no idea.
I have no idea how in the world.
Carolina decided to keep punting the football to Marcus Jones as he continued to dice them.
Slice them and dice him.
My goodness, bad coaching.
That's bad coaching.
But Marcus Jones, shout out to him.
He was truly terrific today.
A special game.
A special game for him on special teams.
There are not a lot of guys in the league that can do what Marcus Jones did today.
He continues to be an absolute weapon in special teams.
And it was great to see him get going.
and that huge momentum swing in the beginning,
it's like the Patriots never looked back
after that first punt return for that touchdown.
It felt like they never looked back.
Now defensively, another observation,
I thought defensively the Patriots,
they tackled better today.
The initial tackle was better today.
More wrapping up,
more not allowing guys to, you know,
fight for that extra yard or two.
Now, Evan Lazare has done a really good job
of pointing out that, yes,
the Patriots have missed a bunch of tackling.
for the first three weeks, but it really hasn't hurt them. They haven't given up a ton of yards
after contact. So they're doing a good job of swarming to the football, but the initial guy
is missing the tackle. I thought they were more sure today with that initial tackle.
Christian Ellis got off to a bad start again. I don't know why he's starting over Jack Gibbons.
I thought Jack Gibbons went out there and played decidedly better right out of the gates than
what we saw from Christian Ellis. I would not start Christian Ellis. Now, of course, we'll see,
Jalani Tavai is, you know, possibly going to be able to come off the IR.
So you could have Tavai in the mix this week at practice.
We'll see if that happened.
So maybe Jalani Tavai takes those snaps from Krishnelis.
But I thought Jack Gibbons did a pretty good job early on in this game,
kind of settled things again.
He did the same thing against the Pittsburgh Steelers.
I mentioned Craig Woodson, young guy.
He's got to get going.
He was, you know, he gave up two touchdowns on pick plays.
And he's got to get going a little bit here.
It's only the first month, but Craig Woodson has had some struggles the past couple of weeks,
and he's usually the man on the scene when the Patriots give up a touchdown or a bigger play
the last couple of weeks.
So you need better play from Craig Woodson, but that's nitpicking on a game like today.
I mean, today was tremendous.
It's exactly what you wanted to see.
It's exactly what we discussed on the preview, silence the critics, show them that that Pittsburgh Steelers game was an anomaly,
respond the right way, hold on to the football, take care of the ball, zero turnovers
today from your offense.
And that's what they did.
And I know Carolina is not a good team, but that's what you want to see.
You want to see the Patriots get to a point when they're dominating bad teams.
That's what they're supposed to do.
If you start to take that step forward, you should dominate teams that aren't good,
that are banged up.
And that's precisely what the Patriots did.
they dominated a bad, hurting team.
They humiliated them at home, which is precisely what you wanted.
And I thought that, you know, the foot was on the pedal from the beginning, pretty much all the way to the end.
And that was nice to see as well.
They had urgency.
They didn't come out in the second half, laissez-faire.
They continue to play hard.
Pop Douglas, who had two snaps in the first half, he's downfield blocking not one but two
Panthers on the Hunter Henry touchdown.
fantastic compete from Pop Douglas.
And now you are two and two heading into Sunday night football at Buffalo next week.
I'll take it.
I think we should all take it.
A two and two start, you're sitting at 500 after the first month.
You got Buffalo, but then you get the Saints and the Titans.
The schedule loosens up a little bit for you.
And so now we look forward this week to a primetime game on Sunday night against
Josh Allen and the undefeated Buffalo bills.
I will take two and two and we'll hope to see continued steps in progress.
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That'll wrap up this edition of Lockdown Patriots.
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Have a fantastic day. Nice win by the Patriots. Dominant win at home. You'll love to see it. Josh McDaniels cooked. The defense played better after that first try. They settled in. Great special teams from Marcus Jones. Andy Baragalas made all of his extra points, which was nice to see. Great win by this football team. We'll talk to you tomorrow.
Thank you.