Gash Prex said:
The Ridley "fumble" was pure bad luck- he fumbled without being hit and they just picked it up and scored a TD. How many times do you think Brady will fumble the snap on the 1 yard line again? Once is his career?
Difference for me was the pats forced those Bills turnovers, unlike the the Bills who were just lucky IMO
ivanvamp said:
Here's the difference. When the Bills gave up the football, the Pats did something to cause it. When the Pats gave up the football, they were unforced errors. Ridley was completely untouched. Brady fumbles a snap (!?!?). The interception went right off Sudfeld's hands and took a weird bounce right to the Bills' defender.
It's one thing to cough the ball up when the other team hits you (like Pollard drilling Ridley in last year's AFCCG). It's another to simply lose the football without getting touched.
We're really starting to go down the rabbit hole here, aren't we?
A turnover is a turnover, and they come all sorts of ways. Regardless if it was a preseason game or not, the team just turned the ball over 4 times in the first half against Detroit. The team has been very good at the +/- battle over the last decade,but turnovers happen all kinds of ways and at different times. Deciding that one turnover is better than another is an exercise in futility. Let's not do the, "our turnovers were random and lucky, but we earned all the turnovers against their team!" crap. Because that's what it is. Crap.
Ed Hillel said:
Sudfeld also slipped on the turf on that INT, which a lot of people seemed to have issues with. But, beyond that, what I look to is that the Patriots dominated the game when they did have the ball. We can talk about fluky vs. non-fluky turnovers, but when you have a:
~ 26 - 14 First downs advantage;
~3rd down conversion advantage of 11-20 vs. 4-13
~ 446 total yards to 286
~ A 38-22 time of possession advantage
~ Were far more disciplined
This is a much more substantial argument, although I come to a different conclusion on the bolded. The time of advantage is a direct correlation to the number of third downs this team got into in the game. it's nice to see the 3rd down conversion over 50%, but this team got into way too many third down situations. The silver lining was that it was generally 3rd and 6 or less, which makes the conversion that much easier, but it's still an issue.
When the Patriots were successful on defense in the early/mid 2000's, their "bend but don't break" philosophy was, "Don't give up the big play, make teams run as many plays as possible in a drive, make them convert their third down's." That lead to teams eventually beating themselves, either with turnovers or finally not converting 3 straight plays for a first down.
The Patriots offense was able to succeed yesterday despite being on the field for way too many third downs. people say the fumbles were garbage and random, but it's those kind of plays that happen when you're forced to run nearly
90 plays to score 23 points. Brady's yards per attempt was
5.5 yesterday. that would have been worst in the NFL last year by nearly half a yard. That's right. Blaine Gabbert would have done better.
This offense needs to find a better rhythm. They don't need to drive down the field in 4 plays, but they certainly need to be more effective.
