Locked On Patriots - Daily Podcast On The New England Patriots - LOCKED ON PATRIOTS- 11/14/16- Studs & Duds For Week Ten

Episode Date: November 15, 2016

Chris Simoneau examines the game and finds his "studs and duds" that stood out. #patriots Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Good evening, I'm Chris Simino, your host of Lockdown Patriots, your source for everything Patriots. Today is Monday, November 14th, 2016, like we do after every Patriots game. We're going to take a look at our studs and duds from last night's game. It's come to our attention that there's another radio show using the same term as us, but we did it first, so we're not going to change. That's the way I look at it. All right, let's go through the Patriots news first before we get to the studs and duds segment. Just a preview, the duds were easy to find.

They were pretty bad. Okay, moving on, let's go. Patriots news and notes. Everyone, including yours truly, was excited to see Deion Lewis back on the field during practice this week. Thought he was going to be ready to go for Sunday night, get activated, and then he was on the inactive list.

It was not meant to be. The Patriots kept him inactive for another week. Having Lewis may have helped, but I think that James White had a strong game out of the backfield catching the ball. What Lewis could have done, I really don't think he could have done much better. At this point, what they do with Lewis, whatever they do, wouldn't surprise me. So we'll just see how that thing goes because, again,

he just tore his knee a year ago, and not everybody's Adrian Peterson coming back in a year. It's just not going to happen. News leaked out yesterday regarding Martellus Bennett and his contract status. If you're a Bennett fan, you'll like this. Apparently the team and Bennett are mutually interested in getting a year added to his deal. So hopefully that gets done because he fits in seamlessly with this offense.

He's a good player for them, and I really think that that would be good to get that deal done. Having him and Gronkowski together helps Brady out. If Brady gets up there in the years, it's to him that tight ends and easy outlets that's what they are go up the seam a little outlet routes little things like that they can make plays and they're also good blocking too you know they add to the run game having Bennett Gronkowski they're probably the two of the top five best blocking Titans in football if maybe not just the top two. Having them both out there, it's like having two extra guards,

along with the fact when they start to throw the ball around too. Bennett makes plays after he makes a catch. He gets the odds out to catch, and so does Gronkowski. So getting Bennett locked up for another year would be huge. So just another thing I noticed yesterday, there were some change-ups on the Patriots defensive front, which we're going to get a little bit more deeper into in a little bit with the studs and duds, but this was surprising. Jabal Sheard only took 16 snaps Sunday night. I think that's a bad sign for a team that gives playing time based simply

on performance. So that says that Jabal Sheard is not performing. Trey Flowers took 61 snaps, which is by far the most of all the defensive ends. Ninkovich played 46, Chris Long got 37. I'm sure Shield will work his way back into more snaps, but it's becoming pretty evident that Flowers has worked his way into not only the rotation, but to the top of it. He showed why. He had two sacks, multiple quarterback pressures.

He was excellent last night. He really was giving a lot of trouble to Russell Wilson and constantly getting after him. So I can see what the Patriots like about him, and I can see why he's worked his way up there. But, you know, they need Jabal Sheard back because if they can play Sheard and they can play Ninkovich, Long, and all these guys and be able to rotate them,

you're not going to have as much guys getting tired. You're going to have everybody fresh, and I think that would be better. So hopefully that Jabal Sheard can get it together. We'll see, though. So another thing happened last night. Rob Gronkowski got absolutely croaked by Earl Thomas. Sorry about that. And it was a great hit. And Gronkowski didn't say it as much.

He said it was a great hit. He hit him right in the chest. Well, he also hit him in the lung and appears to have punctured it. Possibly. That's what we're hearing out of the news. He reportedly may have punctured a lung. If he has, in fact, punctured a lung, he will most likely only miss one game, which is amazing. It's also amazing to think that Gronk came back into the game and made a catch,

a great catch to set the Patriots up at the one in the final minute that they didn't score on, as we all know, because of awful play calling. That was dumb. Run, run, play action, run. That's your sequence on four downs at the one-yard line. But, no, that's not what they did. That's a story for another day. So, Patriots have a tougher game than people think this week up in San Francisco. So, not having Gronk is going to hurt if he does have a punctured lung,

but they should be able to get the win. Hopefully, they don't have the Russell Wilson disease all of a sudden that they can't stop running quarterbacks because going up and dealing with Kaepernick is going to be pretty tough, and Russell Wilson destroyed them. And they've had that issue before. Running quarterbacks get out on them, and they start to struggle, and they start hitting some plays, and next thing you know, the Patriots lose, so they've got to keep an eye on Kaepernick this week, and that should be interesting to watch. So where are you going to watch a game from this week? You've been on Seat

Geek? Well, I think you should. It's the smartest, easiest way to find tickets for football games you want to see live and in person. I use the SeatGeek app on my phone. I use it actually for Celtics games and for Bruins games. Not really Bruins games so much, but if you're a Bruins fan, you know, check it out. I actually go on it for my Celtics addiction because I love the Celtics.

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shop for tickets on SeatGeek, you can have confidence that they're going to take care of you if anything goes wrong. Best of all, my listeners get a $20 rebate off their first SeatGeek purchase. To get a $20 rebate on tickets, what you want to do is download the SeatGeek app like I was speaking of, the one that I have on my phone. Go to the Settings tab and click add a promo code and to promo code LOPATRIOTS, that's L-O-P-A-T-R-I-O-T-S, SeatGeek will send you $20 after you've made your first ticket purchase. So again, that's go to SeatGeek app,

go to the settings tab, add a promo code, and to the promo code LOPATRIOTS and get your $20 from your first ticket purchase. Check it out. It's definitely worth doing. If you're a fan, you want to go to games, and you don't want to spend a ton of money, you have to go check out SeatGeek. It's awesome. So today is a tough day for the studs and duds. We did have some good players last night. Guys stood out.

There weren't many, but there were some that did. So we'll get to them first. We'll go positive to start it, and then we'll go negative to end it. It kind of stinks, but that's the way it is. So first out of the day, Martellus Bennett, and I think that was an easy one. He was simply awesome last night. Finished the night seven catches for 102 yards. He had a 36-yard catch, which was the play of the night.

Seven catches on seven targets, which means that he was making plays and he didn't drop the ball. Bennett was also excellent run blocking, as we've come to expect. I still feel the Patriots are holding back with these two dynamic tight ends, and one of these weeks, they're going to pick up 100 yards receiving each, or 150 each, and they're just going to go off, and I can't wait to see it happen, but Bennett was awesome last night. Again, 102 yards on seven catches, and he was just tough to take down, smashing people on the run blocking. So Martellus Bennett, first stud of the night.

Number two, another pretty easy selection. We were talking about him just recently. Defensive end Trey Flowers. So Flowers essentially stole Jabal Shia's job last night. And he came up big for a team that's been searching for someone to get to the quarterback. Flowers finished the night with two sacks. And he also caused chaos with pressure throughout the night. He was moved outside, inside.

He was all over the place. When he was moved inside, he still gave the Seahawks trouble. So he's flexible. He can do a lot of different things. Flowers is most likely to put himself into a full-time role for the remainder of the season. And, you know, he reminds me of Trace Armstrong. I don't know if a lot of people remember Trace Armstrong but Trace Armstrong used to play for originally played for the Bears and then he went to Miami late in

his career later in his career he had a renaissance man he was awesome he was a true pass rushing disruptive 4-3 and that just caused so many problems. He killed the Patriots. Flowers reminds me of him when I watch him. I may be crazy. People may not agree with the assessment, but that's okay. This is how I see it. Flowers reminds me of Trace Armstrong,

and I think that the Patriots have something here with this kid as far as a pass rusher. The guy's job that he stole is pretty good, so it's not like he thought he's taking some Joe Schmoe's job he's taking Jabal Sheard as a Patriots best pass rusher and limited to 16 snaps so Flowers is getting it done and that's why he's the number two stud of the week the number three stud goes to somebody who just be surprising depending on if you look at just his total numbers for the carries and yards. But LeGarrette Blount had 21 carries for 69 yards, but he also had three touchdowns. He didn't have the best yards per carry, but he was good.

He was really good, actually. He set the tone early, and they should have went to him more, specifically when they moved the ball to the two in the final minute of the game. Like I said, on four downs, New England ran the sneak twice, one fade, and they only gave it to Blount once in that sequence of downs. So the guy has already proven that he can get through and score. So why only give him one shot? It doesn't make any sense.

The sequence should have gone first down, Blount. Second down, Blount. Third down, play action. Second down, blount. Third down play action to ease the tight end. And then if you have to get the fourth down, you go back to blount again. I know Brady has a good history with the sneak, but Seattle

is waiting for that. Use your big back that leads the league in touchdowns and he'll get the job done for you. If you do it three out of four times, I guarantee he's going to punch through. So, blount though, three touchdowns and he'll get the job done for you if you do it three out of four times i guarantee he's gonna punch through um so blount though three touchdowns on 21 carries 69 yards he had a great game and again he was setting the tone i think if they got him 30 carries he would have run for over 100 yards and another couple touchdowns he was he was pretty good and he looks again like one of the best running backs in the league this year. So time for the duds.

Big old duds. The firecracker you light that never goes off. And you can't go near it because if you do, it might blow up. Crazy. So these are the duds. Number one dud, Matt Patricia. So, hey, Matt, I was just going to, are you going to figure this thing out or just keep using different personnel until they seem like they can stop someone? Because there is absolutely no identity to this defense in 2016,

partly because of the talent they've traded away in Collins and Jones, and partly because they just, Matt, you're not as aggressive as you need to be to be good in today's NFL. I'm reaching out to you here. Come on, Matt. This is ridiculous. This defense is sitting back. It's not good.

It's not going to work. I bet a bunch of you are saying to yourselves, over Chris, they don't allow that many points, which is a valid point. But last night was the first time they were tested by a good quarterback, and he scorched them Just like I've been warning people of And that's exactly what happened last night

So Matt, Patricia, I'm calling out to you man You gotta do something here You gotta talk to your boss and convince him to be more aggressive Because this is not working You have to use Mingo You gotta mix it up Start getting out to the quarterback and start doing some different things because this is a mess. This is not good.

Any good offense is going to tear apart this Patriots defense because they've just tanked too much with the personnel and it's just not working. So, Patricia's number one dud of the day because he hasn't figured out how to convince Belichick how to be more aggressive. Or, he's the one who's made the decision to be this sit back and play, you know, patty cake type defense. And it's not going to work. It works against Cleveland. It's not going to work against Seattle.

Number two dud, well, I have to give it to this guy because for what we expect out of him, what he is, not good. Jabal Sheard. Getting reduced to 16 snaps means that you're practicing poorly, and when you do get in there, you continue to struggle, and you get benched, and he's also expecting a big payday. Well, I don't think that's going to happen. I'm starting to wonder if the Patriots are going to pay anyone on their defense.

I think they hate them all. You know, it's crazy. They're just left and right. You know, you're going to get paid? No, I don't think so. I'm sure Sheard will start to get more reps, more than he had on Sunday when he only played, again, 16. But if he becomes a part-time player, that's going to hurt his value big time

in the market. Sheard being a non-factor is one of the reasons the defense was so bad yesterday. So that is why he's on this dud list. I'll go through other duds tomorrow after I watch the All-22 All-Awesome editions. But when you play 16 snaps, and you're not supposed to be the best pass rusher on this team, and you have a look on your face of confusion on the sidelines, something's not right. So he better figure it out.

And I'm going to figure out as much as I can from what I pick up on the All-22 tomorrow from his first few plays because that's what probably got him in trouble. But something's not right with Jabal, and he needs to get that figured out. Third dud, duds on this one, at the S there, the whole entire secondary, every one of you guys in the lot, you guys going to pick someone up? Seriously, you going to pick someone up? I was just wondering because, you know, there's wide receivers, tight ends, and running backs, specifically running because, you know, there's wide receivers, tight ends, and running backs, specifically running backs running free and making catches all over the field,

so you want to pick someone up maybe? C.J. Proceiss, he looked like Marshall Falk in his prime last night because the Patriots refused to account for him. So then they finally do account for him. They still can't cover him, or Baldwin for that matter. You know, the pass rush was actually pretty good last night, but the coverage was absolutely terrible. Justin Coleman, Patrick Chung, Logan Ryan, all bad. Real, real bad. They were the easy choice for the third dud of the night. In fact, I think the secondary was worse than Matt Patricia and Jabal Beatt. Sorry about that. Jabal Beard is actually a funny name.

But I would take the secondary. I'm going to do this right now. It's my show. I'm making them the number one dud of the night. Matt Patricia, you've dropped down to number two. Jabal, she had number three. You've had a rough enough night to begin with. The secondary was absolutely awful.

Justin Coleman getting scorched. Patrick Chung on that touchdown at the end of the half. It was clear that they were in cover three. You've got the back quarter of the end zone. That's your spot. You see the guy go. You've been communicated to. You can see it on the film.

I didn't even see the All-22. I saw this just watching the regular game. And Chung knows that the guy's behind him, and he still doesn't get back in cover. And that's a touchdown to end the half that never in a million years should have happened. But, of course, it did because the Patriots, when they get into the zone coverage, are the worst. Stick to man, guys.

Enough of the zone. It doesn't work. So Justin Coleman, Patrick Chung, Logan Ryan, garbage ryan garbage yesterday sorry guys it's just the truth so they're the easy choice for the third dud again i decided to move them up to first because they were that bad so again that's how the night went it was ugly it was an ugly game and i know the final score was 31-24, and the Patriots were at the goal line with a chance to tie and this and that, but there was a lot of bad stuff. On Sunday before the game, I did a preview, and it talked about special teams, and I didn't think that it was going to play a factor

because both teams were ranked in the top ten and just didn't look like it was going to. Well, I didn't take into account human nature. The Patriots screwed it up. After their first score, Steven Gaskowski kicks one out of bounds. Lo and behold, Seattle gets the ball at the 40. They're an on-kick field goal at 7-3. That doesn't seem like much, but that's three points for Seattle

that they maybe didn't have if Gaskzi doesn't kick that ball out of bounds and the Patriots are maybe defending at the 15, the 20, or even 25 instead of at the 40. So it's little things like that that made a difference. Also, the punt coverage team didn't do very good. Seattle picked up a nice return that set them up for a score also. So special teams came into account last night, and Seattle stepped up. The return teams did a better job than the Patriots coverage team.

So that was a big part of the game too. So, again, there was a lot that went into it. And tomorrow night, or tomorrow afternoon, actually be sure to listen in as I go through the All-22 and figure out who really screwed this thing up. And we'll just blame it. Who deserves it? So check us out tomorrow if you want to hear that,

and we'll go through all the news and notes, injuries, things of that nature. I'm sure there will be plenty. Tuesdays are always busy when it comes to injury news, so come check us out. I want to thank you all for listening to Locked On Patriots, part of the Locked On Network, the fastest growing podcast network in the world. Again, be sure to tune in tomorrow as we go through the All-22 Coach Estate and break down the core reasons for the Patriots' loss on Sunday. Again, I'm your host, Chris Cimino.

Have a great night, Patriots fans. Thanks for listening. Whatcha doing? Ran out of space on my phone, so I'm deleting some stuff. Bye singing dog. Bye goal. Bye wedding ceremony. Stop. At MetroPCS, you get two free phones with twice as much memory.

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