Locked On Patriots - Daily Podcast On The New England Patriots - Locked On Patriots - October 9, 2019: Crossover with Locked On Giants

Episode Date: October 9, 2019

With the New England Patriots set to take on the New York Giants at Gillette Stadium in Foxboro, Massachusetts, host Mike D’Abate shares the mic with Patricia Traina Of Locked On Giants. They break down the game planning strategy for both teams and offer some predictions on what might be seen in this matchup on Thursday Night Football.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hello to all you Foxborough faithful, and welcome to our crossover Wednesday edition of Locked on Patriots, your daily home for news, notes, analysis, and the occasional opinion on your six-time Super Bowl champions, the New England Patriots. I'm Mike DeBate, and I am your host of Locked on Patriots, part of the Locked on Podcast Network. You can feel free to reach out to me on Twitter at MDABATEFPC, and be sure to follow Locked On Patriots on Twitter at LO underscore Patriots. As always on Crossover Wednesday, I will be joined today by Patricia Trena of Locked On Giants. Our crossovers are always

fun and informative, so stay tuned for what I hope you will find to be a great show. And the stage is set for Thursday night football. The New England Patriots will play their second straight game against an NFC East opponent when they host the New York Giants at Gillette. It will also begin a two-week stretch for the Patriots against New York teams for the third time in team history. It also happened in 1990 and again in 2011. The team will travel to play the New York Jets on Monday night football

for week 7, coming up on October 21st as well. And that will be the 13th time since 2000 that a team has played the New York teams in back-to-back weeks. Buffalo opened the year with back-to-back games against the New York teams, and Miami plays back-to-back games against the Giants and the Jets later this year. So everybody's in a New York state of mind in the AFC East this year, and it should be a great game on Thursday night.

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and she puts on an amazing show, and we all know Patricia's great work for the Giants maven of SI.com. She's one of the very best in the business, and this will be a fun show. We're going to discuss this matchup from a Patriots perspective, as well as a Giants perspective and hopefully give both fan bases something to watch for

in this one. And Patricia and I will take to the microphone to do so in just a moment, but first let's take a look at some of the history of this rivalry. The Pats and the Giants are going to meet for the second time in 2019 at Gillette Stadium after meeting for the 15th straight year in the preseason finale. While the two teams 15th straight year in the preseason finale. While the two teams have met 29 times in the preseason, they will meet for just the 11th time in the regular season. The teams played three times during the 2007 and 2011 seasons, with meetings in the preseason, the regular season, and in the Super Bowl. Oh yeah, folks, I'm going to get into that in just a second.

The Patriots and the Giants faced each other twice in 2015 with a preseason meeting in Foxborough and another regular season meeting at the Giants. And the Patriots do claim a 6-4 edge in regular season play. And I credit my friends at Patriots.com for compiling some great historical statistics on that. Hopefully it gives you a little background on what these two teams are bringing to the table when they will play Thursday night. Now, as Patriots fans, this rivalry has definitely had its share of highlights and some lowlights

as well, and we're going to get into those. But some of the more memorable moments of this rivalry, I think really started in recent years, started on December 29th of 2007. A thrilling 38-35 victory for the Patriots over the Giants. This game's most remembered for Tom Brady, Randy Moss, and preserving the 16-0 season. Definitely an indelible moment for Patriots fans and something that most fans will remember with fondness. However, it didn't end so well that season, and that brings us to February 3rd, 2008.

The Patriots face the Giants in Super Bowl XLII in Glendale, Arizona. I'll sum this one up like an episode of Seinfeld. David Tyree, yada yada yada, Patriots finish the season 18-1. Another Super Bowl meeting between these two teams happened on February 5, 2012, when the Patriots faced the Giants in Super Bowl XLVI, this time in Indianapolis. And the Giants took a 21-17 lead when they scored with 57 seconds left in the game, held the Patriots on a final drive to secure the win. And if there's been a kryptonite to this Patriots dynasty,

it has been facing the New York Giants in the Super Bowl. But we're not going to end this walk down memory lane with a sour note, right folks? Of course not. Leads me to November 15, 2015, and Steven Gostowski drilling a 54-yard field goal with one second to play, lifted the Patriots to a 27-26 come-from-behind victory over the Giants. The Giants had taken a 26-24 lead with only a minute 47 to play before Tom Brady drove the Patriots 44 yards, converted a fourth and 10 on the series to set up the game-winning field goal.

So a lot of history between these two teams. Some of it positive for the New England Patriots, some of it not so positive for the New England Patriots. Some of it not so positive for the New England Patriots. But they hope to reverse that trend and have a positive outcome on Thursday night. And I will be welcoming Patricia in in just a moment to hear her take on this matchup from a Giants perspective. But before we do, I have a question for you. Yes, you listening out there.

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That's promo code LOCKEDON. Visit MyBookie.ag today. You play, you win, you get paid. And once again, Wednesday is always a big day for all of us across the Locked On Podcast Network, especially for the NFL shows. And as our Patriots prepare to host the New York Football Giants on Thursday Night Football, it's my pleasure and honor to share the stage today with Patricia Trena of Locked On Giants. Patricia, thank you so much for joining us on Crossover Wednesday today. My pleasure, Mike. Always glad to talk ball with the Locked On hosts, the best hosts,

the best knowledgeable folks out there. Oh, absolutely. I definitely love that, and I'm very honored and humbled that you would include me in that great list as well. It's definitely my pleasure to be here and speak with you especially. Patricia, definitely an interesting game we have coming up here on Thursday. The New England Patriots come in unbeaten at 5-0. The New York Giants come in at 2-3.

And the Patriots have had some issues on offense. I know a lot of people have looked to find a crack in their wall, so to speak, in terms of what the Patriots are able to bring. They've looked very formidable. But offensively, they seem to have had some difficulties. And one of those areas is in the running game. They actually haven't employed the running game as well as a lot of people would have liked. Sonny Michel did have a pretty good game on Sunday, but we haven't seen a whole lot of him consistently across this season.

The Giants' run defense has been – they've had their difficulties, I guess, is the best way and most diplomatic way for me to put it. How do you see the Giants running game being, how do you see the Giants run defense, excuse me, being able to attack the Patriots running game and hopefully keep some of those guys that the Patriots are trying to employ? How do you see them being able to keep them in check on Sunday? There's a few things, Mike. First off, we cannot have what we had last week against the Vikings. Basically, Giants run defenders were not getting off blocks. And when they did get off blocks, they were missing tackles. They were taking bad angles and they were lunging at ankles.

And you just can't do that against an NFL running back and expect to stop the run. But I think most importantly, what we also saw with the Giants that they have to pay attention to is they have to maintain their gaps and be disciplined. You know, you can't just go running and shooting up the field, you know, blindly. You have to have a plan. and it starts with playing contained, attacking your gaps as the scheme requires, getting off blocks, making tackles, and wrapping guys up, I think the Giants should be able to have some success with stopping the Patriots' running game. And I think that's an interesting point that you bring up in terms of doing that. And like I said, the Patriots have had their issues in being able to uh you know to run

the football effectively i think they're going to look to do that on thursday night but you bring up some good points in terms of how the giants may employ some schemes that may prevent them from doing that flipping gears for a second not too much but staying on the giants defensive side of the ball and moving to uh the patriots offense, and that is the passing game. And the Giants have had their struggles against the run for sure, but they've also struggled against the pass. Opponents have a passer rating of 106.8 against New York's secondary. They're allowing an average of 280 yards per game. Now, on paper, they do have a great amount of talent in that secondary.

Janoris Jenkins, Rudy DeAndre Baker has played well. Antoine Bethea and Jabril Peppers have played well at safety in addition to that. If you're the New York Giants defense, you take a look at some of the struggles that the Patriots offensive line has had. Tom Brady has looked unlike Tom Brady at certain points when he's not comfortable in the pocket and is off his game. Is this a scheme that the Giants will look to employ on Thursday night? And if so, how can they defend against the Patriots' pass attack to ensure that Brady does not have a comfortable game?

First off, they have to get pressure on Brady. Brady historically has shown that if you get after him, if you hit him, if you get him off his mark, he is going to be, you know, he's going to look human like the rest of the world does. But here's the thing. You cannot blitz Brady. You have to try and get that pressure

with your defensive front because if you bring the blitz, Brady will burn you every time. I mean, you could put that in stone, put it in ink. He will burn you every time. So it is important to try and get that push up front. Now, if I'm the Giants, what I would do, and this has worked for them in the past, earlier in the season. They didn't do this as much last week. I would deploy their big nickel and their big dime packages

where they have an extra defensive back that takes some of the onus off of the linebackers. Both Alec Ogletree and Tay Davis are on track to return. You know, the announcement has been made that they're going to play, but they both have been practicing in full. Tay Davis had the concussion, Alec Ogletree, the hamstring. So I think what you have to do is you have to try and take some of the onus off of them and maybe bring Jabril Peppers up into the box and you have him play as sort of that

pseudo linebacker so that if the Patriots decide to run, you know, you have a guy, a safety who can, who's got that linebacker mentality who can help out there. If they decide to pass, then you have a guy who can safety who's got that linebacker mentality who can help out there. If they decide to pass, then you have a guy who can cover that. So I would like to see the Giants, in their defense of the Patriots offense, use that big nickel, as they call it, or the big dime, where they have maybe six or seven defensive backs, and see how that works out for them. I think that's a good point, especially with Ogletree and the guys coming back from injury.

If they're able to do that, and again, I like the suggestion about bringing Peppers in and having him be sort of that pseudo-linebacker position. We see the Patriots defense employ things like that all the time. That's been a staple of a Bill Belichick coach defense for quite a while. So the Giants are always good about adapting to plays when they need to and adapting to their opponents. So I think that's going to be interesting. One thing that I thought was very, very interesting

and somebody that I'm keying in on this week, if I'm a Patriots fan, is Dexter Lawrence. And according to Pro Football Focus, Lawrence ranks second in the NFL in interior defensive line pressure rate with 17.3 percent that trails only calais campbell he has nine pressures in his last three outings 13 total tackles six solo two sacks one force fumble to me this is going to be a guy that i'm very very closely watching and if you're a patriots fan out there folks definitely keep an eye on dexter lawrence um he could be a game changer in this and really set the tone for a Giants defense

that could end up giving the Patriots some difficulty. They're a little banged up on offense right now when it comes to the wide receiver position. So I think he's a guy that could end up giving them some difficulties as well. Staying on that topic for a second, Patricia, I just wanted to kind of get your take on Lawrence and how he's been as a rookie, what he's meant to this Giants defense, because I know Daniel Jones has gotten a lot of the press, and we'll get to Danny Dimes in just a minute,

but Lawrence is a guy that impressed me so much, especially in this draft. How has he been in terms of what the Giants game plan is not only now, but will it be during the rest of the season? The amazing thing about Dexter Lawrence is, number one, how mature he is. I mean, I've spoken to him several times, and I just walk away thinking to myself, wow, this doesn't sound like a 21, 22-year-old young man. This sounds like a guy who's been around, you know, 30, 40 years of his life. From a football perspective, for a man who's 300 plus pounds, I think he's like 340 or

something like that, he moves with the gracefulness of a ballerina. I mean, this isn't a case of a bull in a china shop. This is a guy who can get around and who can move and who can just chase guys down. And you watch him and you say to yourself, wow, how is he doing that? He's also a big body guy who can take up multiple blockers. And you can tell he's really starting to feel comfortable in that defensive scheme. He's starting to hit his stride. And I think he's going to be a staple of that defensive front for a long period of time. And, you know, I just like how he's also having an effect on the others around him because he's kind of like with his play, taking the lead, if you will.

And then the others are able to kind of, you know, ride the coattails and do their thing. And it's just been really nice to see that come together the way it has. Absolutely. And, you know, selfishly, Dexter Lawrence has been a guy that I've scouted for a little while now, especially coming out of college. He was someone that I had projected or hopefully projected as a Patriots pick late in the first round in this year's draft. So to see him be able to come into his own and do everything he's done for this Giants team is really amazing. And to me, like I said, he's going to be an X factor. And Patriots fans, keep a close eye, keep a sharp eye, as I like to say on Locked On

Patriots, on Dexter Lawrence this week. And that's great insight, Patricia, especially from someone that covers him, knows him, and has watched him emerge from training camp to now. Definitely great stuff. And again, it's a joy to watch him on the field. I'm going to switch gears now, officially switch gears, and move over to the opposite side of the ball. And that's when the New York football Giants are going to attempt to now, officially switch gears, and move over to the opposite side of the ball, and that's when the New York football giants are going to attempt to score

on what has been a very, very stingy Patriots defense without question. There really is perhaps no runner in the league more dynamic than Saquon Barkley, and when he went down with a high ankle sprain in Week 3, we thought he'd be missing for at least six to eight weeks. There is a slight chance that we may see him on Thursday night, although that chance dims by the day. ESPN had a report on Tuesday morning that said that he was unlikely to be cleared, and it doesn't look like he will be able to go. But if there is a way that the New York Giants might be able to move the ball against the New England Patriots defense.

It might be by establishing the run early. If the Giants choose to do that and if Barkley is not able to go, and of course Wayne Gallman is still in concussion protocol as well, meaning that John Hilleman and even the fullback Eli Penny might see some time, how might the Giants effectively run the football against what has been a very stingy Patriots front seven? Well, I think first off, they're going to have to loosen up that Patriots defense. You know, maybe do a little play action, you know, kind of mix things up a little bit. Maybe even get Daniel Jones involved in running, you know, some rollouts or some RPOs.

I think you're going to see a lot of RPOs from Jones and the Giants this week. But you have to loosen things up because the Patriots right now, you're right, they have a historic defense going on right now and playing against the run, they've just been so stingy. And from the Giants' perspective, this is not the week you don't want to have Saquon Barkley, but I think I would be surprised if we see him. But yeah, I think RPOs is going to be on the menu for the Giants. I think you're going to see some design runs.

I think maybe you see the Giants attack the edges because the Giants have had some problems trying to run up the gut of late and they'll just see if they can – I'm not expecting any big runs per se, but if they can just chip away at that, you know, pick up three, four yards at a time, I think they would take that if they get that opportunity. I agree. I think that is a good way to attack it. And you did mention Jones and his ability to extend plays with his legs.

And that leads me into my final question for you. And that is Daniel Jones coming into Foxborough. And it's pretty common knowledge that Bill Belichick has given rookie quarterbacks fits over the years. We've seen rookie quarterbacks come in having decent seasons, play against the Bill Belichick coach defense, and they've looked – they've struggled, I guess, is the most diplomatic way for me to put it. But Daniel Jones brings an interesting skill set. He can extend plays with his legs, like you said,

but he also has the ability to find open targets. He does do that very well and has showed, I think, poise and wisdom beyond his years in the first couple of games that we've seen him under center in New York. One thing to keep an eye on, of course, is the fact that Sterling Shepard is probably out for this game as well. It's still in concussion protocol. So that is a weapon that he may not have at his disposal. Evan Ingram also looks like he may not be able to go.

He hasn't been 100% ruled out yet, but it's unlikely that he will be able to do so. So Jones is going to have to rely on guys like Golden Tate and Lattimore to be able to open up holes in the passing game. If the Patriots do enough to contain the Giants' running game and prevent Jones from being able to extend plays with his legs. Does this Giants' offense have enough for Jones to be able to sit in the pocket? If the Patriots' defense forces him to stay in the pocket and throw the football, who might we look at as an X-factor on the Giants' offense in a receiving core or a tight end that might be able to make some plays happen for them. I think you mentioned Golden Tate, but a guy you want to keep an eye on who is constantly underrated but who's a very good pass receiver when pressed into action is tight end Red Ellison.

This is a guy who I think can do some damage down the field. I mean, he's not the fastest guy out there, but he's a guy who's usually good for picking up, you know, about eight to ten yards per clip. Here's the thing, though. I mean, the Patriots have a very good pass rush. So if they're going to allow for Daniel Jones to drop back and hit Red Ellison, they're going to have to find a way, I think, to max protect or at the very least slide the pocket around to get him away from the rush, wherever it's coming from, whichever direction the Patriots throw it at. So I'm not so sure if they'll be able to get Ellison involved. But, you know, if this were, I think, any other normal week,

I could see Ellison being a big part of that passing game. Yeah, and I think it's interesting that you bring up Ellison and the tight ends. And that's one thing that we haven't seen the Patriots do a whole lot of in terms of defending, is have to defend a prolific tight end. They haven't had the option to do that yet. And, you know, I'm not saying that Ellison is in the same grade as a Travis Kelsey or a retired Rob Gronkowski or anything of that nature. But a tight end that is an option in the passing game that can make plays and extend plays and not only be a blocker but also a threat in the passing game is something interesting.

So I'm glad that you brought that up. Patriots fans, keep an eye on Red Ellison, and I will be as well. I think that's definitely an interesting point. And we'll look to see if our assessments were correct. There's no question about it. Thursday night football is always interesting, Patricia. There's no question about that. And I football is always interesting, Patricia. There's no question about that. And I

thank you very much for joining me today. Excellent insight. Spot on analysis as always. For Patriots fans that are unfamiliar with Patricia's work, and you shouldn't be because it's probably, I think, in the football lexicon of what should be every NFL fan, definitely check

out her work for the Giants Maven at SI Now. She does an amazing job. And Lockdown Giants is also a great listen as well. So, Patricia, thank you so much for lending your wisdom and counsel to Lockdown Patriots today. My pleasure. And it was great chatting with you. I hope that you have enjoyed Crossover Wednesday here with Lockdown Patriots and Lockdown

Giants. I thank Patricia for her insight and analysis. And I'm confident that she has given all of us some key points to watch for in Thursday night's matchup. And from a New England standpoint, we're also very excited about the launch of our newest sports channel covering the NHL. As you know by listening to this show, we feature local experts covering the biggest news, and now we're covering the ice

with daily hockey podcasts. Check out the latest on your Boston Bruins with Locked On Bruins and your host, Ian McLaren, and find your favorite NHL team on our website, www.lockedonpodcast.com. As always, please be sure to join us each and every day on the Locked On Patriots podcast and on the Locked On Podcast Network via your preferred podcast provider. For Patricia Trena of Locked On Patriots podcast and on the Locked On Podcast Network via your preferred podcast provider.

For Patricia Trena of Locked On Giants, I'm Mike DeBate of Locked On Patriots. Thank you so much for listening today. Have a great day, everybody.