A tale of two halves: Pats offense takes a while to sustain consistency
There's no denying, from the coaches to the players, the first half was awful. McDaniels can't control Rob Gronkowski or Wes Welker fumbling the football. He can't control dropped passes. But McDaniels struggled with some play calls in the first half. The calls didn't make it easy for the offense to develop fluidity.
He was stubborn in regards to the long turnaround pattern Brandon Lloyd kept running. And although Brady insisted on throwing it repeatedly to Lloyd's back shoulder instead of looking off the receiver, no throws were completed. The Patriots also didn't run the ball between the tackles as much as I wanted to see in the first half. That is where they gained the most yards: between the tackles. The slow-developing delays to the short side of the field aren't working. The sweeps aren't working. Stick with runs up the gut. On one play, Stevan Ridley got a sweep to the right, and instead of following his blockers, he cut it back inside for a positive gain. It may have been a designed counter, but to me it looked like Ridley improvising.
I think the throws on first-and-goal are too risky, and at times in the first half, they would go away from the run too quickly on a drive.
Lastly, Brady should've sneaked on that four down and short play in Bills' territory. I think Ridley picked up the first down the previous play and I wanted to see Bill Belichick use a challenge rather than a timeout. Instead of bringing Brady, one of the game's best short-yardage QB sneaker, off the sideline, he brought out Stephen Gostkowski. He missed the kick and things looked scary. It's easy to say in hindsight that a sneak would have been the better choice, but I think on most occasions, even if the other option is a 42-yard field goal attempt, it's best for Brady to churn his legs and stretch out his long body behind the center.
A disclaimer: All these play calls rely on the offense executing and Brady and the backs making the right type of reads. We don't know how much influence Belichick has on certain situations. We don't know of every audible, missed assignment or miscommunication, but the fact remains that in the previous two games, some of the play calls were questionable.
But that was the first half. We all know what happened in the second half. The offense clicked in every way imaginable and the Pats routed the Bills. It reminded me of the Week 16 and 17 wins over Buffalo and Miami at home last season. The two halves were night and day. In this league, however, you take any win, any way possible. So I'll take it. But as we've seen against Arizona and Baltimore, if the offense can't develop fluidity in all four quarters, then the game is going down to the wire.
