Courtesy of: ESPN.com
This is a friendly public service announcement to remind you that the Super Bowl will be played this Sunday in Glendale, Arizona. I can understand if this annual event has somehow slipped your mind over the past week and half; what with the NFL doing its best “All The President’s Men” impression. Don’t get me wrong; I love talking about #DeflateGate. Some of you may be sick of it by now, but not me.
I love everything about it. I love that the internet has pooled all its resources for the sole purpose of producing this and this, and a little of this. I love that the NFL is conducting “a thorough investigation” which involves interviews with a bunch of people not named Tom Brady, and is now focusing in on a locker room attendant and what he did in a bathroom for 90 seconds. I love that Bill Belichick held a Saturday afternoon press conference that felt a lot like a summer school version of Physics 101…and I really love that Bill Nye the Science Guy called BS on him. That’s right people, we now live in a world where Bill Nye the F’ING SCIENCE GUY is posting a viral rebuttal to the New England Patriots’ head coach’s science fair experiment involving the air pressure of a football in certain weather conditions. If someone could please find Mr. Wizard and get him and Nye on First Take with Stephen A. Smith and Skip Bayless going at it; my head might just explode.
Phew…I feel better after getting that out of my system. Now let’s get back to the fact that the greatest spectacle in sports is happening this week and there are some legitimate storylines in play. The Seattle Seahawks, vying to become the first back-to-back Super Bowl champs since their opponents, the New England Patriots, did it in 2004 and 2005. And those Pats, trying to nail down that dynasty label that has eluded them after losses in Super Bowls XLII and XLVI. Tom Brady’s saggy balls aside (sorry, last one I promise), we will be treated Sunday night to a Championship game between the two best teams in the NFL; which is something we don’t always get to see in these games.
As we look ahead to Sunday’s matchup, it is easy to look back at the last time these two teams played each other as a barometer of what’s to come; however that last tilt came in October of 2012 so it’s a bit of apples and oranges here. There are some indicators though that may come in handy when predicting a game plan for both of these teams. The first thing that jumped off the page to me when I looked back at this last meeting was that Tom Brady threw the ball 58 times for just under 400 yards against the combination of Richard Sherman and former Seahawk/current Patriot Brandon Browner.
What is interesting about this passing performance is not so much the numbers themselves, but the way they were accumulated. Brady and company attacked the Seahawks secondary with bunch routes, crossing patterns, and a lot of over the middle completions to slot guys and tight ends. Sherman and the Seahawks secondary like to play physical coverage and bump guys right off the line, then use the sidelines as additional defenders to press receivers and their QBs into tight windows. Brady and Co. tailored their attack away from those strengths and forced Seattle to adjust, which they eventually did, holding Brady to just 5-13 for 81 yards in the 4th quarter.
On the offensive side of the ball for Seattle, the 2012 meeting seems like a lifetime ago. Russell Wilson was making just his 6th NFL start and was still learning on the job. The only identity the Seahawks seemed to have at the time was that of Marshawn Lynch and a power run game. Today, Lynch remains a focal point of this offense, but is more of an important cog rather than the machine itself. It’s Wilson driving the bus these days and as he goes, so will go the Seahawks on Sunday. This season, Seattle ran the read-option; now an effective arrow in Wilson’s quiver, nearly 180 times for a league-high 983 yards. The situational timing of this play, as well as its effectiveness, will be a key component in the offensive scheming of the Seahawks this week.
When I look at the current state of both of these teams, while the personnel has clearly changed, the type of offensive and defensive systems being run seems reasonably similar to the game in 2012, with one glaring exception. In that week 6 game, the Patriots ran the ball 26 times with a combination of Stevan Ridley, Brandon Bolden, and Danny Woodhead producing 87 yards, or 3.3 YPC. Heading into this rematch, New England is coming off of a dominant rushing performance against the Colts to the tune of 40 carries for 177 yards, the bulk of which came from LeGarrette Blount who also tallied 3 scores. Granted, the Colts defense is porous to say the least against the run; however, if we learned anything from the Packers collapse last week against Seattle, it is that the Seahawks can be run on as well.
Courtesy of: NY Daily News
It is a false assumption that Seattle’s front line is the immovable object that their overall defensive ranking suggests. Over their final 6 regular season games, Seattle faced Arizona (twice) and St. Louis, two teams ranked in the bottom 12 in overall rushing as well as a San Francisco team (twice) that was collapsing onto itself (yet still managed 140 yards on 32 carries in one of those games). In their two playoff victories so far, they’ve been run on 60 times for 267 yards, or 4.5 YPC. I firmly believe that if the Packers would have stuck to the run with Eddie Lacy, we’d be previewing Rodgers/Brady today.
My point is that when you can attack Seattle on the ground, which the combination of Blount and Jonas Grey can do, it opens things up on the backend for a Patriots team that already knows how to scheme a passing offense around Sherman and the Seahawks secondary. Last week, everyone playing in the game, watching it at home, and talking about it throughout the week knew that the way the Patriots would go after the Colts would be on the ground. That’s exactly what they did, and the Colts still could not stop them.
The addition of Browner to the Patriots (and by definition, the Seahawks loss) is something that should not be overlooked. Browner adds the physicality that the New England secondary needed this year, to go along with still-elite cover ability of Darrelle Revis. This much improved defensive unit should be able to matchup with the solid, but unspectacular wideouts of Seattle, requiring Russell Wilson to be spot on with his throws. The combination of a power run game and an improved Patriots secondary is what will make the difference in this game and what I believe will be the key to their victory.
There is one thing that can derail this trip to Dynastyland for Brady and Belichick however; and that is the possibility that Seattle is this year’s “Wonk Team”. Credit my sports columnist idol Bill Simmons for the concept of the “Wonk Team”. Simmons believes that each year a team comes into the playoffs with an air of uneasiness surrounding them and through a combination of strange plays, amazing individual performances, or just “wonkiness”, they pull an upset. This year’s presumed Wonk Team was Carolina, coming off a losing season but still somehow hosting a playoff game. The problem with this theory was that the Panther’s victory over Arizona in the Wild Card round seemed almost inevitable from the start so it was hardly a surprise.
So what if the true Wonk Team of 2014 is Seattle? Coming off an improbable win against Green Bay that should have resulted in a Mike McCarthy firing, they head into Super Bowl week practically invisible thanks to the controversy surrounding their opponent. It’s hard to believe a Wonk Team could be the reigning Super Bowl Champs…but doesn’t it seem at least plausible at this point. Personally, I don’t see it happening. Frankly, if something is going to derail the Pats, it may just be the Pats themselves and this limp pigskin situation (BTW- if someone doesn’t go out and start a faux-hard rock band called “Limp Pigskin” ASAP…well, the terrorists win). I still think New England pulls this one out and just for fun, let’s put a number on it…Patriots 23, Seahawks 17.
Now if you will excuse me, I have a meeting with my high school physics teacher. I’m going to get to the bottom of this, don’t you worry!
