Pats 16, Jets 3: Additional Comment

I don't understand what everyone was complaining about today, either. Maybe some people were expecting New England to beat the Jets 42-0. Maybe they expected a completely flawless game. Maybe they expected New York to put up no fight at all. I'm not really sure.

I know I expected the offense to get into the end zone a couple more times, but we've seen that happen more than a few times in the last several years. And in those years, the Patriots had all their starters and played far worse teams, and had much better game situations.

Let me explain. Over the last several years, we've seen a lot of games the Patriots should have dominated that they just squeaked by, either because the defense gave up too many points or because the offense didn't score enough. But there are a lot of reasons before and during a game that cause those results.

Sunday, it was field position, and that was mostly the fault of the defense. The defense played well overall. It was that "bend, don't break" style we're all too familiar with. But even in all the games we've see that prior to this year, this year there's still one thing missing that makes the difference: turnovers.

Turnovers create a short field and make it easier for the offense to get their job done. Most field goals -- by any team -- are the result of (a) an opponent's red zone defense, and/or (b) a team having to traverse the length of the field. Yes, some teams can just march down the field, very obviously, most teams don't score at all. They punt, or they turn it over.

So let's look at a couple stats.

The Patriots average field position to start their drives was their own 26. That's not too good. Only a couple teams Sunday had a worse average. The Jets was their own 29. A couple teams were in their own 40s. Only on three drives did the Patriots start at their own 40 or better. The first two ended in field goals. The last followed the defense's only turnover of the game, an interception with 4:04 left in the game. The Patriots lone touchdown capped a drive New England started on their own 15. That was one of five drives started inside the 20. Two drives started at the 1 or the 2.

The only reason things looked as good as they did was that the offense had only two three-and-outs and punted only four times. New England had three drives of 10-plus plays, all scores. New York had just one drive of 10 or more. It was just 10, started on their own 34, and they got their only score of the game out of it.

When you ask coaches what the most important statistics are, they are usually, in order: turnovers, time of possession, and third-down conversion percentage. But prior to the game, they always talk about controlling the clock and winning the field position battle.

Incidentally, New England did dominate time of possession, 38:10 to 21:50. It doesn't necessarily turn into dozens of points, but it turns into wins, and those are what counts. The Pats led time of possession 19:01 to 10:51 in the first half.

Individual Performances

Tom Brady looked great, overall, which is typical of his performances following disasters like last week. He finished 27-of-37 for 271 yards, no touchdowns, no interceptions. Possibly six of his incompletions were receiver drops, at least one in the end zone. Brady also ran four times for 19 yards. Brady hit seven receivers, at least twice each.

Troy Brown was the major beneficiary, catching five balls for 64 yards. Deion Branch and David Given also each had five receptions. Only Ben Watson caught passes for the tight end squad. Once again, he just looked spectacular on his plays. Corey Dillon and Kevin Faulk had four catches each coming out of the backfield.

Dillon carried the ball 16 times for 63 yards; Faulk, 10 carries for 43 yards. Mike Cloud even got in there for 5 carries and 27 yards.

The offensive line, in general, was less than impressive. Outside of a few holes they opened for the ground game, Brady was under relentless pressure and got hit a lot more than you want Brady getting hit.

The Jets had only 55 offensive plays, so the defensive stats aren't all that spectacular. Ellis Hobbs, Tedy Bruschi and Ty Warren led the D with 6 tackles each. Hobbs also had the interception at the end of the game.

Mike Vrabel and Rosevelt Colvin had 4 tackles each. Colvin had one of only two sacks of Jets quarterback Brooks Bollinger. Jarvis Green had the other.

The Jets defensive stats were none too impressive, considering the Patriots had 74 offensive plays. They defended just 1 Brady pass and had just two sacks, despite all the pressure. Former Patriot Ty Law had a meager 5 tackles and no other stats.

Another former Patriot, Curtis Martin, had just 29 yards on 15 carries. He needs to average about 67 yards per game to become the first running back in NFL history to reach 1,000 yards in 11 straight seasons, which are also his first 11 seasons. The Patriots certainly did him no favors Sunday.

Martin also had 4 catches for 26 yards. His total of 55 yards from scrimmage was the Jets team-high, followed by Laveranues Coles, who had 4 catches for 35 yards. The Jets had a total of 176 yards.

Otherwise, the Pats were 50 percent on third-down conversions (8 of 16), which is an improvement. The defense held the Jets to 4 of 14 (29 percent). New England was inefficient in the red zone, one of four (25 percent).

Mike Pereira's Worst Nightmare

Referee Jeff Triplette and his crew are an embarrassment to the NFL. As an upper echelon team, fortunately we don't see this idiot too often, except in games like these, where the opponent is futile as well.

Usually, I rip the inane commentary of whatever "analyst" we get stuck with; but, today, Triplette will endure all my wrath.

Let's start with the play on which Brooks Bollinger fumbled, Mike Vrabel recovered, illegally pitched forward to Willie McGinest, who was hauled down by his facemask by Coles. Turns out that Richard Seymour also facemasked "someone" at the line, evidently microseconds before the fumble. First of all, I'm not so sure they got the call correct, but just for fun let's assume they did. Triplette's effort to explain the call was -- well, I don't have a worse word for embarrassing. He stumbled over his words. Had no idea what to call either team. Had no idea what players (usually announced by number) committed the penalties. All he knew is that at the end he was going to say the penalties offset, and they would replay the down. He couldn't even get that out of his mouth without stuttering and laughing.

The officials called several really weak penalties: the clipping penalty on Stephen Neal. Neal barely touched the player, and the guy didn't fall. He even made the tackle. Not to mention I haven't heard clipping called in years. I didn't think it was even still in the books with all the other blocking penalties they've created. Then there was the roughing the passer on McGinest that negated Bollinger's intentional grounding. The neutral zone infraction when one of the Jets defenders jumped, causing Nick Kaczur to jump, but they called it on Kaczur. The dual offensive holding penalties, one on Troy Brown. It's a ridiculous list.

You just have to hope you never meet these guys in an important game somewhere.