We're not going to do Audibles for tonight's Patriots-Ravens game -- I think everyone is a little emotionally spent, not to mention a lot of the East Coasters are asleep. I was going to share my thoughts in the DVOA commentary Tuesday, but I know people are going to want a place to talk about the game a little sooner than that, other than on the FO open game discussion board . So here goes...
- Hey, remember when we wrote in PFP 2006 that KUBIAK projected Kyle Boller to improve, but we would never know for sure because the Ravens had signed Steve McNair? He sure looked good tonight. He stood up in the face of the pass rush, and, after watching that last Hail Mary, it is clear he still has that magical "I can throw it through the uprights from my knees" arm strength.
- I'll have to count, but I bet this game set the season high for quarterback hits from both teams. Boller and Tom Brady were both getting slammed into the ground over and over. I was shocked nobody from either defense was called for roughing the passer.
- Where the hell has this Willis McGahee been all year? Or for the last couple years? He was just awesome.
- That being said, I was offended by the whole suggestion that McGahee, Ray Lewis, and Ed Reed were playing harder because they were inspired by the memory of Sean Taylor. A lot of those McGahee runs came right up the gut past Vince Wilfork, another 'Canes alum. Does this mean Vince Wilfork doesn't care about the memory of Sean Taylor?
- Once again in this game, the Patriots seemed to show some serious hubris, sticking to their usual offense when it clearly wasn't working. Hey, guys, you can't throw the deep ball with these swirling winds. Knock it off and try something else. Actually, they did try something else in the second half: running the ball. It proved pretty effective.
- Logan Mankins totally sucked tonight. You couldn't make MDS's "Pro Bowl suggestions" article look good, Logan?
- We can talk about how much the Pats missed Rosevelt Colvin, the problems stopping the run, two straight games of receivers dropping easily catchable balls, or the poor game by the offensive line -- but the Patriots aren't going to go out to get new linebackers, or new receivers, or new offensive linemen. However, they have one clear problem that is easily fixable with a simple personnel move. You can't count on punting two times per game in the playoffs. Chris Hanson sucks. Replace him.
- To quote Ben Riley on the staff e-mail list: "The league now has a definitive blueprint for stopping the Patriots offense: high swirling winds and at least four critical drops."
- After the game, the ESPN guys were talking about how the Steelers fit the proper mold for taking it to the Patriots with a physical game, just like Baltimore did. I agree whole-heartedly when it comes to the great Pittsburgh defense and the Dick LeBeau zone blitz scheme, but since when is Willie Parker a punishing, physical inside runner? (Then again, since when is Willis McGahee a punishing, physical inside runner? Since tonight, apparently.)
- At the end of the game, the Patriots kicked off from the Baltimore 35-yard line. I went back and looked. In 12 years of PBP data, there has never been a kickoff any closer than the opposing 40-yard line. This came in the same week where the
Giants (Whoops, I meant Dolphins) at one point kicked off from their own EIGHT because of two penalties. So in one week, we have the most extreme kickoff position of the last dozen years in one direction, and the second-most extreme kickoff position of the last dozen years in the other direction. (Last year, you might remember Washington's Nick Novak kicking off from his own five-yard line against Indianapolis because of penalties.)
Now, for the issue I know a lot of you want to talk about and argue about: officiating. Every Patriots fan thinks that the officiating was biased against New England in the first half. Every Ravens fan thinks that the officiating was biased against Baltimore in the fourth quarter. Once again, we get back to the same problem that comes up in Audibles all the time. Nobody knows what the rules are, and they seem to be applied willy-nilly.
A good example is the holding that let the Patriots convert fourth-and-6 at the end of the game. Clearly, Jermaine Winborne is holding Ben Watson on that play. The question is: Is this the kind of holding that actually gets called as holding, or is this the kind of holding where there's an unwritten rule that we don't really call it as holding because it isn't that significant? The answer is that, because we're talking about nebulous "unwritten" rules, everyone is going to see the play through the prism of their own rooting interests. That's the problem with NFL officiating, not actual bias towards one team or the other.
Many people will argue that the Jabar Gaffney touchdown should have been overturned. Michael David Smith compared it to a Marcus Pollard catch that was overturned late in a game against Tampa Bay back in Week 4 of 2005 . There's a good argument there, but do remember that the Patriots would have had first-and-goal from the two-yard line on the next play, thanks to Bart Scott's double hissy fit.
If the Ravens scored on that final Hail Mary, and the officials had let it stand without calling offensive pass interference on Derrick Mason, Bill Simmons would have exploded. Seriously. You would have found pieces of him as far as New Mexico.
