Maine-iac

Does the result differ between the Pats or the Chargers? Does it matter how good the defense is because I don't think it's the defense causing most of our problems.

If we were playing ifs and buts then we could add in drops and we could also imagine that Allen hit his deep throws and didn't throw low and behind on half his throws and then he would have been 25 of 30 for 300 yards 2TD's passing and 2 rushing but it doesn't work like that. WR's need to be better as much as Allen but Allen has the ball in his hands every play.

If anything thank god for Brady because he is willing to lean on the running game which has been our best offense and probably saved us from more turnovers because I'm not sure throwing it 50 times in the last 4 or 5 games would have produced better results.

People consistently saying he doesn't have the speed yet there's a boat load of guys much slower (Kupp, Adams, Nacua) catching 100 passes. Shakir has the same size, weight, and 40 time as Diggs. The line is that he has shorter arms for what that's worth. Either way if Davis left in free agency and we somehow don't replace him I'm not against Shakir getting a shot outside.

Allen has had a hard time finding the open guys (because they have been open)all year. He also holds the ball for the guy 15 yards down the field until the short pass is no longer there and then he gets chased around and sometimes he makes a big play and sometimes he gets sacked. Defenses are all playing for the deeper passes and throwing in blitzes and the short passes are (and have been) there every single game and Josh turns them down over and over again. I for the life of me can't understand why Cook doesn't get more simple swing passes (as an extension of the running game) for the easy and 5 or 6 yards. We start killing people with short passes they will have to adjust their defenses but to this point they adjusted by run blitzing more but ultimately they still play deep coverage because we just don't throw it short consistently.

The game wrecking CB was Douglas the guy we traded for at the trade deadline. On offense Allen is off, as in not very accurate off. Throw in a few ill advised throws and then the fact that he loses his mind on occasion and looks to lateral the ball with guys hanging all over him. Then throwing deep to a covered TE (double covered actually) on 1st down all ill advised. Luckily our defense was making stops to go along with the turnovers because we've lost or fell behind in games just like this one too many times this year. McDermott seems to have finally the right mix of when to bring pressure and when to cover.

Why don't we have swing passes and easy short throws to the TE? Why is everything so hard?

Not how I want to get in but I could see Baltimore's back ups beating the Steelers.

I'm going to call it half time adjustments, things got a little better in the second half. Allen seemed to start hitting guys a little better in the second half (minus Diggs wide open deep). Why are swing passes to the RB and/or screen passes so hard for this team. We are straight up bad at the short passing game. Almost every throw is 10 yards or deeper. As some would note drops are a thing to go along with Allen missing guys or placing balls in hard to catch places. No one is going to call the passing offense surgical that's for sure.

Knox had that thing fired at him. Still a drop but it was pretty hot. Allen needs to throw better. Our pass catchers, all of them Diggs included, have been dropping passes for a few weeks now.

1 drop doesn't make up for all the passes receivers dug off the ground or had to reach behind to catch and that's just the catches. If you can't see Allen has been off all game I'm not sure what you are watching.

No doubt. Murray was the worst. Hopefully Allen the the pass catchers have it out of their system and can get on track.

Run game is working fine. Probably better than you'd think against the Pats. Allen can't hit the broad side of a barn and throws the ball into double coverage to a TE on 1st down.

Accuracy a little off we can survive but the horrible decision making is going to bite us in the butt.

A double covered TE deep on first down (regardless of the penalty) is just a horrible choice.

We have been mixing in a lot more man defense lately ...................

I think the Ravens vs Miami game might weight in on this pretty heavily. Hill comes back and goes off. Lamar goes off. Hell even Mostert if he puts up big yards and a couple more TD's could be talked about. McCaffrey and Purdy will be talked about either way.

.... but only if Purdy doesn't score a TD and put them ahead. If Purdy throws a TD and walks off and the Raven's score again and win none of Purdy's turnovers count.

What in god's name are you talking about? It isn't a what if scenario if it actually happened. The Viking's game we turned the ball over and lost. The NE playoff game we didn't turn the ball over and we killed them. There's no "what if" scenario. Bronco's game, Jet's game, even the Eagles we turned the ball over and gave up easy scores and lost. You can argue the weight of the turnovers but you can't argue the fact that we turned the ball over and we lost. Like someone else said show me a game with no turnovers and I'll show you a win 94 percent of the time.

The irony of you saying this is immeasurable.

I'm totally on board with this. I know some interceptions are the cost of doing business but there are games where you just need to come in and take care of business and turning the ball over gives them the chances they wouldn't otherwise have.

The part that I'd emphasize also is that there's a good chance the Raiders don't score enough to beat the Chiefs if Mahommes doesn't throw them the ball twice.

Don't give them free points and you don't have to think at all.

So we are talking about things we could have done that would have kept them from scoring a field goal ................ because I can think of a couple.

I'm trying to think if anything else might have helped? Like if the other teams offense got the ball already in scoring position. How would that happen?