Locked On Patriots - Daily Podcast On The New England Patriots - Locked On Patriots December 2, 2018 - Glorious Victory Edition

Episode Date: December 3, 2018

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hey there everybody and welcome on into a glorious victory edition of the Locked On Patriots podcast. Mark Schofield back in the big chair on this Sunday, December 2nd, 2018. The Patriots taking care of business against the Minnesota Vikings 24-10 in a game that I think was a statement game from the defensive side of the football. We're going to get into our great. We're going to get into our good.

We're going to get into our bad from this game. We're going to have takes of the game from the Locked On Patriots Slack channel. We're going to have game balls. Before we do all of that, though, a happy Hanukkah, a joyous festival to those Jewish listeners amongst us. Hanukkah, again, started tonight at sundown. I wish all of you a most festive and joyous Hanukkah, a joyous festival to those Jewish listeners amongst us. Hanukkah, again, started tonight at sundown. I wish all of you a most festive and joyous Hanukkah season. Of course, also a reminder to follow me on Twitter, at Mark Schofield.

Check out the work at places like InsideThePylon.com, Pro Football Weekly, The Score, Matt Waldman's Rookie Scouting Portfolio, Big Blue View, part of the SB Nation family of websites. Folks, if there's an outlet covering football, chances are I'm doing some work about the game we all know and love for them. Let's get into it though. We'll start with our great, we'll start big pitcher in this. Like I said, I thought it was a statement game from New England Patriots defense and taking a quick spin around the Twitter world, looking at some of the coverage that other outlets are giving to this game. it certainly seems that that's the vibe that most people are taking away from this Patriots 14 point victory over the Minnesota Vikings gets themselves to nine and three which is huge definitely still in line for

that number two overall seed gotta like the fact that look the two teams right above them and right below them right now in the standings Kansas City Chiefs Houston Tex, Patriots got a game in hand on both of those teams, so that's kind of good, kind of pivotal. Could be going down the stretch. But let's start big picture with our great stuff from this game. And I think the opening drives of this game, both on the defensive side of the ball and the offensive side of the ball, have to get mentioned here at the outside.

Defense goes 3-0 to start this game. You get an incompletion on first down. You get a run to the left side with Dalvin Cook, Lawrence Guy, Dante Hightower with the stop up front. And then on third and eight, we saw something that is going to be a theme of this game, the radar defensive alignment, where they've got Trey Flowers aligned as the lone down lineman on the inside over the center, Pat Elflin. They've got everybody moving around up front.

They throw a tunnel to Stephon Diggs, but there's great recovery by Kyle Van Noy. They've got Chun. They've got Devin McCourty down at defensive tackle. Alignment's really moving everybody around, and you get that three and out. Then you get fall. You go right down the field and score with just a fantastic offensive script where you go. You get a false start on the first play. That's fine. First and 10. You miss it to Edelman. Okay, fine. Second and 15. We're still okay. They drop eight after showing blitz. You get

Edelman on a slant for 13, third and two. Get a little rub concept. Hogan wide open in the flat. First down. Then you get Patterson in the flat where he chips from the wing and then releases the flat. He's wide open. Another first down play. Next play got two running backs. This was something the Patriots used a lot as well, but they had either White and Burkhead in the backfield at the same

time. They show fake wide zone to Burkhead. He releases the flat. He's wide open. Brady hits him. Good pocket movement on that play. Gain of 15. Another first down. End around to Edelman. He releases the flat. He's wide open. Brady hits him. Good pocket movement on that play. Gain of 15. Another first down. End around to Edelman. He's ruled down at the one, and then after Sonny Michel can't punch it in, James Devlin punches it in for a touchdown. You can't ask for a better opening script to the game than that. Another big pitcher, great thing, the screen game for the Patriots. I'll talk about their game plan a little bit later in our final section of the show,

a little teaser there, but the screen game I thought for the most part was pretty effective. The slip screens, some of the design screens, some of the more standard screens where you get guys really sort of pulling as well as those little slip screens where it's just one offensive lineman fanning out in front of the back. I thought the screen game in particular was very effective for New England, particularly early in the game. And I thought that they used that

to sort of soften up that Vikings pass rush a bit. So I liked the way they did that. The radar defensive look. I thought that, again, it's a copycat league. Getting confusion up front in that Vikings offensive line seemed to be a big part of their game plan, and they executed it to perfection. And the defensive game plan overall, I think,

was executed to perfection. Not just the first four drives of the game, but overall. Other than their touchdown drive, Stephon Diggs, Adam Thielen, they were pretty much kept out of this game. Of their 43 passing attempts that Kirk Cousins had, Diggs and Thielen were targeted on just 11 of them. And they did it in a bunch of different ways.

We talked about going into this week, I talked about how you'd see what we typically see from the New England Patriots. They'd put Gilmore on one guy to lock him down, and they'd use bracket coverage on the other. They varied it. I mean, when you're seeing J.C. Jackson running step for step with Adam Thielen on a go route in the third quarter of that game, it's not a full heart in the throne akin to Julian Edelman covering Anquan Boldin

in the final drive of an AFC Championship game. But you're like, wait, don't we have some other options here? But the Patriots varied it up. They forced Cousins to check the ball down a ton. I mean, you look at this box score. You see who got targets in the passing game. You know, Aldrick Robinson, their wide receiver three, he got nine targets. Thielen still got 10, which was a team high, but he was tied with Dalvin Cook with 10 targets.

Their fullback, Chris Hamm, got two targets in the pass game. Latavius Murray got two targets in the pass game. And so when Stephon Diggs is only seeing five targets, Aldrick Robinson is seeing more. Sam got two targets in the past game. Latavius Murray got two targets in the past game. And so when Stephon Diggs is only seeing five targets, Aldrick Robinson is seeing more. Dalvin Cook is seeing more. The game plan came together. It was very well done by Brian Flores, Bill Belichick, and company. Between the radar defensive linemen, some of the twist games, which we're going to talk about in a little bit, which is something I mentioned coming into this game, and the way they were sort of able to force the checkdowns

through a combination of different coverage looks as well as the pressure working in tandem. And Belichick talks about that a ton, getting that pass rush and the coverage to work in tandem. Defensive game plan was great. New England's second touchdown drive. Now, this is the one that was sort of capped off with a throw to Gordon for the touchdown against a spot drop, cover three type look.

The aggression there. More of that, please. If you're a listener to the show that's a member of the Lockdown Patriots Slack channel, you know full well that in that stretch of late second quarter into mid third quarter, there was some angst in the discussion, myself included, frustrated with the game plan. Again, we're going to talk about that a little bit later. But on this drive in particular, they got aggressive. They put the pedal to the floor a little bit, and it paid off with a huge way.

I mean, shocker, you get aggressive on offense and good things happen, capped off with the Gordon touchdown throw from Tom Brady. And finally, big picture, tackling. And I feel like many times when I do this show and I'm looking for something bad to talk about, it seems like tackling and penalties are easy things to point to. The tackling today, I thought, was stellar. We had a lot of sort of open field tackling situations.

We had guys like Patrick Chun, Devin McCourty, Jonathan Jones at times, Jason McCourty, Kyle Van Noy, making these tackles in the open field where games passed, seasons passed, those plays would get turned into, instead of a gain of three, a gain of 15. Instead of a gain of two, a gain of 12. But they were limited in those plays. They were making those tackles. When you force the offense to check the ball down,

you've got to rally to the football and tackle because the worst thing you can do is force the offense to do what you want and then miss the tackle. And so the one-yard pass becomes a nine-yard gain anyway. Patriots' tackling, I thought, was great. Let's get into some specific stuff ever so quickly here. We talked about the first two drives on offense and defense. Minnesota's second drive of the game, a second and nine.

We get the first sack here. A twist game inside with Butler and Hightower. Butler and Flowers, you know, they hit home with some pressure. And it's looking to see who got credit for the sacks here. And it looks like Butler did get credit for that oneacks here and it looks like it looks like butler did get credit for that one because flowers got the one later in the game but again that that twist stuff inside talked about that going into this game um third and 17 play which is the very next play another twist look on the inside kyle van noy gets a huge shot on kirk cousins forces an emmert throw

and then the 48 yard attempt on fourth and 17 is hooked to the left vikings come away without any points vikings next possession they had a screen to dalvin cook on a first and template great read and recognition with dante hightower sniffing that one out stopping that for a loss of two on the play gets them into a third and six situation after a six yard gain on second and 12 they come with that radar look again you You get pressure from Trey Flowers. Helps flush Kirk Cousins to his right. Forces an incomplete throw. Again, you get Flowers aligned on the center versus Pat Elfman.

That's a matchup they must have loved. And you've got other guys moving around, floating around down near the line of scrimmage. They turn to that radar look a ton. New England's third possession of the game. This is the drive that ended with a Stephen Kostowski field goal to make it a 10-0 lead. Couldn't get into the end zone here. You know, we've talked about some red zone struggles,

but there were some nice plays on this drive. They had a third and six. They went fly sweep to James White. Trent Brown did a great job pulling to the outside. And what was good about this, and it was mentioned in the Locked On Patriots Slack channel as well, when the Vikings are going to show you so much pressure on the inside, they did a lot as well with those sort of pressure looks,

particularly on the interior. You use those end rounds. You use those sort of fly sweeps to get to the edges quickly and get away from that interior pressure. And I'm trying to find out who had that take in the locked on Patriots slack shot because I thought it was a very good one yeah

Huzifa Patel want to crowd the line of scrimmage to confuse Brady on who's coming beat him laterally can't get to the edge of you one yard off the ball I thought that was a great insight and that's exactly what they were doing the next play after that fly sweep to James White, they run one of those little slip screens to James White.

Shaq Mason with a huge cut block downfield. Basically takes out two defenders, number 54 and number 20. Cut blocks to linebacker Kendricks and the defensive back sort of trailing over. I believe it was Alexander. He basically gets taken out of the play as well. They also face a third and three on this drive. The Patriots' third offensive driver of the game. James White in the left flat and Brady drilled it in there. I talked about this throw.

It was something I was going to be watching all game to see. He drilled in this one. Felt a little bit better. That was one of those, okay, I can stop worrying about these now. Vikings' next possession. They get a third and 17. Another pressure look. Kyle Van Noy with the pressure. Forces the check down uh devon mccordy the one of those tackles i was talking about they want to sort of cover one rat when they bring mccordy down they play man coverage but he comes down to a robber type alignment and he's the one that after there's a check down he's going to make the tackle and he makes it great tackle in the open field spinning ahead into the second half that catch by Cordell Patterson on that deep crosser

pulling it off the Turk just a fantastic, fantastic catch from him play calling it a little sketchy a little bit later on the drive, that was a great catch from Patterson Minnesota's seventh drive of the game, this was the J.C. Jackson drive, at the end of that you get two different nine balls, one when he's covering Thielen

another one when he's covering Robinson on both of those, Jackson in fantastic positioning he had a very very good game obviously played a role in the interception which we're going to get to then you come back with a touchdown drive of your own this is when you need a touchdown drive it's 10 to 10 they just tied it with a field goal you need to answer they come out aggressive they throw the backside hitch to gordon great catch and run on that play then you get a throw throw to Gronk, pick up another first down, white to the left side for a gain of 12, and then touchdown Brady to Gordon. Spot dropping into a cover three type look. It's just an easy in cut, easy pitch and catch in zone coverage. Touchdown. Brady moves to 579 TD

passes all time. Put it tied with Peyton Manning. That's TD passes in regular season and postseason games. Then you come out of that. You want to get the three and out as an offense. Sort of, okay, your offense just gave you a touchdown defense. Let's go get the three and out. First and ten, deep shot, nobody home in completion. Second and ten, they go wide zone to the left. Murray picks up five.

Then in the first play of the fourth quarter, you get another sack. Trey Flowers coming off the right tackle alignment. He's aligned aligned up not on the inside like we saw him earlier in that radar alignment but now he's across from the right tackle and it's a twist it's what the patriots refer to as mike for sam too where basically he is the sam defender on this play trey flowers and he loops behind two blitz and linebackers kyle van noy and john simon actually just get done writing about this for the score. So you can check that out in the morning, my weekly by design piece. I break this play down.

And again, it's something the Patriots call Mike 4, Sam 2. Two linebackers go. He loops behind them into that A gap. The center, Pat Elflin, he fans to his right to help with those blitzers. Flowers just comes in right between that hole. Loops around, gets the sackle. You get the three and out. Patriots come right back, go down the field and score a touchdown run.

James Devlin, if you play James Devlin in a cash game, A, you're crazy, but B, you're crazy like a fox because he had two Russian touchdowns and a huge day for him. Minnesota's ninth drive of the game. We get to the tackle and we get Bill Belichick and Adam Thielen, John, and each other. It was Derek Mason. That's who it was. Remember that video of Derek Mason, John at Belichick, and Belichick telling him to shut up and look at the FN scoreboard?

I was reminded of that, seeing Adam Thielen, Belichick, John. But you get a second and long, a third and long, and a fourth and long. And you get a great, great tackle on that second and long, Adam Thielen in the flat, Jason McCourordy with a fantastic tackle third and 16 flowers in a nose tackle in that radar alignment feeling on a crosser great tackle by jason mccordy holding it to a five yard gain and then fourth and 11 they show all out pressure they forced a quick throw on the slant and it's an immediate tackle by stefan gilmore and treadwell on that play they had a true double on feeling so it's basically he had to throw where there's single coverage you make an immediate tackle by Stephon Gilmore and Treadwell. On that play, they had a true double on Phelan, so it was basically he had to throw where there was single coverage. You make the immediate tackle.

Just a fantastic, fantastic play. Finally, last great play we'll talk about, the interception. Vikings get the ball back quickly. We'll talk about Weiland a little bit later. But they get a nine ball to Robinson. JC Jackson gets beat on it but doesn't give up on the play, fights to the catch point. Tips the ball in the air.

Deron Harmon, the closer himself, comes over, picks off the tip for the easy interception, basically stealing the threat. And that was a lot that I just threw at you, but there was just a lot of great stuff to cover from this game. Up next, we're going to talk about the good from New England's 24-10 victory over the Minnesota Vikings. But first, I've been talking about a lot of different football teams.

I've been talking about a lot of different players. And I've been throwing a ton of stuff at you. And maybe, hopefully, fingers crossed, some of the good stuff has absorbed. Now maybe you can, perhaps, just perhaps, make some money off of that. I mean, sure, watching football is fun. But it's more entertaining when you get some actions on the game, right? Guys, girls, you heard me talk about this game for weeks, and some of you might still be on the sidelines. Whether you're an expert or a rookie, you should be betting at MyBookie. If you're the kind of person who likes to bet a little and win a lot,

like playing the numbers on roulette, you can create a big parlay. Pick three teams to win, and if you hit all three, you can turn $100 into $600. There's so much to bet on. College basketball, college football, NBA, NHL, custom props, esports, whatever, you name it. MyBookie is the one bet I know you'll be happy with all year. I recommend these guys because I really trust them. They've been in business for years. They've got great online reviews and their mobile site is so easy to use. Sign up this week and MyBookie will give you a 50% deposit bonus to jumpstart your bankroll. It's a great way to bank even more money when you win.

Also, be sure to follow at BetMyBookie on Twitter. They personally respond to every mention and DM, not to mention that they've given away more than $10,000 in free money to their followers this football season. You'll be the first to know as soon as new odds and props are posted. Don't miss out on one of the best weeks to bet on sports this year. Log into MyBookie right now

and use promo code LOCKEDON to get 50% deposit bonus. That's promo code LOCKEDON to get 50% deposit bonus. That's promo code LOCKEDON. You play, you win, you get paid. Up next, some of the good stuff from today's victory over the Minnesota Vikings. Mark Schofield

back with you now here. Glorious victory installment of the Locked On Patriots podcast. Going to quickly roll through some of the good stuff here. Actually, we're just going to go big picture good stuff here because I mentioned all of the Locked On Patriots podcast. Going to quickly roll through some of the good stuff here. Actually, we're just going to go big picture good stuff here because I mentioned all of the great stuff. And I really didn't mention, I didn't really highlight any specific plays as good ones in this game. So keep it nice and tight in this section.

Nice, tight little couple minutes here talking about big picture good stuff. Shaq Mason. We've had an ode to Shaq Mason. I might have to do another one. I've joked about writing a book about Shaq Mason. I might have to do it. Just as solid and as stout of an offensive guard as I've seen in a while. He's just a fantastic, fantastic player. We mentioned the little screenplay, the cup block on the screen a little bit earlier. He just had a fantastic fantastic player we mentioned the little screen play the cup block on the screen a little bit earlier he just had a fantastic game from start to finish the whole offensive line did

look you're coming into this game worried about their pass rush that was pretty clear from the game plan they don't get a sack how many quarterback hits do they get one harrison smith and it's on the interception. I'm going to talk about that play, of course. But they take care of business week in and week out this offensive line. And Troy Aikman said, you know, it's not a dominant group.

I guess technically, I would not use the phrase dominant to describe this offensive line, but they're very, very good. They are a very good group. And so, you know, Shaq Mason, all of these guys, Joe Thurney gets flagged for a horrible, horrible hold and penalty.

It was not a hold and penalty. That killed their momentum on that drive, but offensive line, fantastic. Patterson, such a great example again I've talked about on the show of the Patriots finding a role for a person using him as an athlete not forcing him into we want this route from you every single they let him do what he does best which is be an athlete in space make some plays The hands he showed on that catch,

Gordon-esque, Edelman-esque, to pluck that ball inches away from the turf as it dipped into the Gillette Stadium night. A fantastic throw. I mean, excuse me, a fantastic catch on what was an underthrown ball. It was a low throw, but for Patterson to make that catch at that moment, a huge, huge, huge, huge play. J.C. Jackson. I mentioned earlier some of the plays that he had, but just overall, to step up the way he did, he got the start, as pointed out by Dave Archibald on the Locked On Patriots Slack channel, I had Dave Archie on Twitter,

and it seems like he's making a name for himself when, you know, you hear stories and you read stories about, oh, they didn't address the cornerback position the way they wanted. Look, J.C. Jackson and, to another extent, Jason McCourty, they had big games today. This was a huge matchup for the secondary against those two receivers, those two great route runners in Diggs and Thielen. And, again, even the touchdown that Thielen had,

they had the right coverage. They had a double on them. It's just the route design, the rub concept. You basically had Gilmore and McCourty basically collide on the coverage. And so that allowed Thielen to get three. But look, Stephon Diggs, five targets, five catches for 49 yards, no touchdowns.

Adam Phelan, 10 targets, five receptions for 28 yards and one touchdown. If you were given those as the numbers pregame, I'm pretty sure you would have taken those in a heartbeat. Sure, if that's all they're going to get from those two guys, either somebody else is going off or the Patriots are going to win this game. Patriots won the game. Twist games. We talked about it.

I'll just say, look, you know, I'm not going to pat myself on the back or anything, but look, that's how other teams got pressure on Kirk Cousins. You show some twist stuff up front. You move guys around a little bit, whether it's, you know, nut studs up front with a nose tackle and a tackle itself, whether it's, you know, the tackle and exchange,

whether it's that Mike 2 Sam Ford, Mike 4 Sam 2, excuse me, that we were just talking about. The Patriots used some of that stuff to get pressure, to get some sacks, both of those sacks. You saw some twists up front, some of the other pressure. They did it with twist games. I don't know. We'll have to take another look at the Miami Dolphins

and see if that's something they'll go back to, but they were certainly effective tonight. Tom Brady, record watch. You get 579 in terms of all-time touchdown passes in both the regular season and postseason. Tying himself with Peyton Manning, that's great, but the one he's probably proudest of? 1,000.

He got there. Now scramble early in the game, Tom Brady slides into history, finally reaching that ever so lofty goal of 1,000 yards rushing over a career. And to their credit, Fox, I think they did a pretty funny thing with Terrell Davis and Barry Sanders. Barry Sanders with that great line. 1,000 yards in a season is great, but 1,000 yards over 20 seasons. That's impressive. A nice little thing that they put together for Brady to have that in the can

just in case he hit 1,000. As we were talking about in the Locked On Patriots Slack channel, it would have been pretty hilarious if Belichick and McDaniel said, okay, you've got to take a knee here to ice this game, and he loses a yard. So it goes back to 999. But congratulations to Tom Brady on 1,000. And finally,

speaking of odes, James Devlin. Two Russian touchdowns. I know Fantasy Football Twitter was on full-fledged tilt seeing James Devlin get two Russian touchdowns. But look, listeners to the show, I know fantasy football Twitter was on full-fledged tilt, seeing James Devlin get two Russian touchdowns. But look, listeners to the show, Patriots fans,

know what he has meant to this offense over the past couple of seasons. He's a critical component, particularly this year, of what they're doing. You see him so much more and more week in and week out now. So much usage of 21 personnel, sometimes 22 personnel. To see him get two Russian touchdowns, great for him. That was some of the good stuff. Up next, we'll talk about some of the bad. Close out this glorious victory edition of the

Locked On Patriots podcast. Mark Schofield back with you now to close out this glorious victory edition of the Locked On Patriots podcast. And as we do on all of the glorious victory edition shows, we do talk about some of the bad things, some of the things that we didn't like to see, that I didn't like to see, that you didn't like to see.

Also, a little bit later, game balls and takes of the game from the Locked On Patriots Slack channel. And I've been talking about the Locked On Patriots Slack channel a lot today because we had a great conversation, very lively in there today, a lot of fun stuff, a lot of joking, a lot of camaraderie and all that good stuff. So if you'd like to be a part, if you feel like you're missing out,

well, come join us. Hit me up at Mark Schofield on Twitter or mark.schofield at insidethepylon.com for an invite. Let's get quickly to some of the bad stuff. Big picture, the first offensive position of the possession of the second half.

And generally speaking, look, the end of the second quarter and the start of the third quarter, that was just bad. They give up the touchdown, and okay, giving up the touchdown is fine, but the opening possession of the second half of the offense to go three and out in that situation was not something I was really excited to see. And that sort of leads us to a discussion to a certain extent about the offensive game plan. Because I'm not one to get on Josh McDaniels.

I know when a team struggles, when a team loses, it's easy to say, oh, the play calling is bad. And usually I try to shy away from that because Josh McDaniels has forgotten more about football than I'll ever know. And that's just a simple fact of life. And I try to assume that, look, they've got a reason for that.

However, as Dave Archibald said in the Law to Patriots last night, it's a very good point, they were playing this game offensively from a play-con standpoint at least late second quarter, midway into the third. Like they were afraid of their offense.

It was a very conservative game plan. Yes, the screen game is working, but they really started to ride that. Yes, the run game is working, but they really were starting to work the ground game. And you got the sense that they were overly worried about that pass rush. And so they were really sort of being conservative with how they were doing things. And maybe it was a function of, look, our defense, we've figured them out.

So we don't need to push the envelope too much on offense because we're going to get stops. It's not like we're going to suddenly give up touchdown drives to these guys. We've got them figured out from our defensive standpoint. So let's just be smart, pick our spots, and we'll find a way to win this game. And that could be it. But they got conservative in the middle. And then you saw the quick change when tie game, what do they do? They come out, they're aggressive, they're throwing it downfield,

they're attacking the boundaries. And let's not forget, Xavier Rhodes was banged up and basically sort of on a pitch count at one corner spot, and then they lose Trey Waynes. You've got an undrafted rookie in Holton Hill out there covering Josh Gordon. When you see that, you've got to think that, look, now's our chance at tackle on the boundaries.

We've got two banged up corners out there. You know, forget trying to work the middle of the field where, you know, guys like Eric Kendricks and Harrison Smith are. Let's push it to the boundaries. And when they finally got aggressive, they went right down the field and scored. And so, again, I'm not going to harp on the play calling too much, but it was just like, we could be doing some better stuff here. Just saying. Let's do some specific

bad stuff here before we close this thing out. Minnesota's second drive of the game. Dalvin Cook, 32. Those sort of wide zones gave them fits, particularly when they were running to the right side here. Kyle Van Nooy, he fills inside. Landon Roberts is slow to fill to the outside.

That allows him to get to the outside. Third and six on New England's second possession. Edelman with a drop. This was one of those two running back looks. Then you flex Rex Burkhead back up, more of an up back. Clearly sliding the protection. Edelman has a drop on what looked to be that same type of gaudy type concept where you go on the outside on an option route from the slot receiver.

Same basic route that he scored on last week against the Jets. It's open, good throw, and he just drops it. Edelman's had some drops this year. They happen, but you hate seeing it on a third down. Zimmer, credit to him. When he threw the challenge flag at the end of the first half on that crosser to Gronkowski. It looked like a curious decision.

It's like, look, it's either first down or third and inches. Curious decision, but kudos to him because it worked out because on third and inches, they go direct snap to James White, and he doesn't get there. And then they go right down the field and score. So that was the beginning of this sort of bad sequence, late second quarter into the middle of the third quarter where the Vikings go down the field and score,

and then the Patriots, they go three and out, and they're open in possession. The defense gets a stop, and it looks like the Patriots are going to have fantastic, fantastic field position on their ensuing possession. You get a great return from Julian Edelman. It looks like they're going to have first and 10 in Minnesota territory, but a holding penalty on Brandon King pushes it back to their own 24-yard line. So instead of having it, you know,

the plus 45 or so, you're at the minus 24 to start a drive. And then you get a false start penalty on Sonny Michel. So now you're facing first and 15 at your own 19. Talk about a swing of field position of about 36 yards. That's tough. Making things worse, that's the penalty where you get the dumb, hold the penalty on Joe Thune, which he instantly knew. Like he was instantly looking like

incredulous at that flag. And then Gostowski pushes a field goal wide to the right. That was one of those moments where I sort of dropped the notepad. I'll say I dropped it. I'll just leave it at that. Look, I threw it, okay? I threw it.

We'll move on. Some other bad stuff before we go. The Brady interception. First of all, as we were just talking about, you've been running the ball game. Now you get, you know, the stop on 4th and 11. You're up 14. ball game. Now you get the stop on fourth and 11. You're up 14. It's mid to fourth quarter here.

This is the time. You've run the first down at second and eight. Let's work a little bit of clock. I'm fine with three runs and a punt. Dave Archibald said it too. That's the moment where I'm fine with three runs and a punt. Take a couple minutes off the clock. That's fine. Now you're working with the clock more than anything. Brady throws a pick.

And this is not Homer quarterback here, but look, let's just be fair here. Brady slides the protection. They show blitz pre-snap. Brady slides the protection to the left. You see 3D fan left. You see Andrews fan left. You see Burkhead going to the outside.

Doesn't pick it up because you expect the left tackle to fan out as well trump around fans inside that leaves harrison smith unblocked off the edge gets in a shot on tom brady blitz is not picked up brady's throw is picked off by kendrick's who made a good play and it was a bad throw influenced by the pressure so it's one of those situations you get a missed call up front. Trent Brown fans the wrong way. We see an interception. But again,

why are we throwing the ball at that point? I'm fine with three runs and a punt. Everybody's fine with three runs and a punt. Let's just do that. And maybe that's the situation where like since everybody's probably playing it

for three runs and a punt, try to get a cheap first down in the air. Just make sure you get it blocked up. So that would do it that's what we'll end on in terms of the bad stuff let's talk game balls this is one of those situations where i would just love to say look game ball for everybody but gotta be a little i'll be a little strict about these so offensive side of the ball james devlin

look two touchdown runs that's great to see so let's get our boy game ball and josh gordon talk about the guy that has done everything right from on the field and seemingly off the field as well. Got himself a big part of this offense. Big jolt to this offense on that touchdown drive that he capped off himself with a catch-and-run touchdown against his own coverage. The type of stuff that we need to see from him. He could play a pivotal role for this team down the stretch. And so, fantastic game from him.

And then I will do this. Brian Flores and the entire defense. They had a fantastic game from him and then I will do this Brian Flores and the entire defense they had a fantastic game plan they executed it to near perfection kudos to them you all get a game ball as far as taking the game look there were far too many from choose to choose from I mean you had something we already talked about we had the great Chuck A basically taking one for the team and saying, look, I'm going to stop watching because the two drives I watched, the opening touchdown drive when the Bears game was still on where I was, as well as the other touchdown drive when I was doing some dishes, they scored touchdowns.

So I'm going to stop watching. You had, you know, people making out some other great calls as well. Mr. Pink talking about Trey Flowers and how we need to pay that guy. Chuck A, you know, pay that man his money. Dave Archibald, always chiming in with good stuff. John Lombaracus, look, it was a great conversation. So y'all get take of the game. You guys were fantastic as always.

And again, if it sounds like fun to be a part of, that's because it is. It's fun over there all the time, especially on game day. So if you want to be a part, hit me up at Mark Schofield on Twitter for the invite. That will do it for today's show. I know I went long here,

but it was a fun game to talk about. It's always fun to talk to you guys and girls. It's just a joy every day, especially on Glorious Victory Editions. That will do it both for today. I will be back. I will have the polls up at some point for what we want to break down on Tape Tuesday.

And then we are back to Dolphins Week. We'll be talking to our boy, Travis Travis Winfield from Locked on Dolphins for Wednesday's show, a little crossover. Thursday, take Thursday, get some questions in. I know Reluctant Trade, my boy on Twitter, is going to get some over to me from across the pond as he does every week. But we'd love to hear from more of you. And then Friday, game day edition, we are back rolling into it.

Always a blast here in football season. Until next time, keep it locked right here to me, Mark Schofield, and Locked on Patriots.