The late season matchups for the Miami Dolphins on the road against the New England Patriots haven’t yielded the best results in their franchise history. In the Brady Era, the Dolphins have travelled to New England six times and have lost all but one game. The one game they did win, was the last game of the 2005 season where Matt Cassel and Doug Flutie had significant playing time because the Patriots had already locked up their playoff seed. With their win in the snow last week in Buffalo, however, the Dolphins could be better prepared for the inclement conditions then they normally are.
For the Patriots, their focus is going to have to outweigh the Dolphins’ pride. Owning the number one playoff seed after everything fell right last week and controlling their own destiny, the Patriots will have to remain focused to beat the Dolphins who have won five of their last seven playing for little more than pride. This week is one of two remaining chances to answer the yet unanswered question: can this defense lead them to playoff victories?
Here are three things to look for in this game:
The Andre Carter Replacement(s)
To add insult to injury, or injury to insult, the Patriots’ porous defense will be playing without Andre Carter (+22.3) – their best defender by a healthy margin. So what exactly does that mean? In terms of simply snaps per game (not including his injury-shortened previous week), the Patriots will be looking to fill about 61 snaps per game. Although, given Carter’s ability to be used at a variety of positions the problem only becomes more complex, as he's played half his snaps at 4-3 DE, a third at 3-4 DE, 15% at OLB and a handful at DT. This means you not only have a magnitude problem, but his extreme versatility means the problem isn’t a plug-and-play solution. One of the likely candidates to assume a larger role is Shaun Ellis (-6.0) who watched his snaps dwindle from Week 1 (41 snaps) to averaging seven snaps per game in the past four weeks – mostly due to his inability to generate any pressure on the pass rush. Ellis will likely take Carter’s 3-4 defensive end snaps and potentially some at 4-3 defensive end. Mark Anderson (+17.2) is likely the candidate to increase his snaps the most given his ability to play both at 4-3 defensive end and marginal snaps at outside linebacker, but the question remains if he can be as effective with closer to 60 snaps/game after only averaging around 24 snaps/game on the season. If he can’t, can the defense actually be worse than it already is? Mark it TBD for now.
Reggie Bush vs. Patriots Run Defense
Two equal and opposite forces of note in the recent weeks, are the evolving skills of Reggie Bush as a runner (+0.9 rush grade) and the devolving skills of Patriots defense to stop the run. If there was one thing (and yes there was only one thing) the Patriots could hang their hat on, in a season where their pass defense woes reached critical mass, it was that they played the run stoutly. The past two weeks and the performances of the Redskins and the Broncos' running games begs the question if their run defense is shakier than it appeared at first glance. In last week’s matchup against the Broncos the Patriots run defense had a drastic drop-off in the fundamentals. After averaging about 2.5 missed tackles per game, against the Broncos they missed 11 tackles! The person hoping those fundamentals remain shoddy is Reggie Bush, who after averaging in the mid-twenties for game snaps during the middle of the season, the past four weeks has watched his workload increase to just over 50 snaps a game. Though he only ranks 13th on PFF’s Signature Elusive Rating, which measures a runner's success beyond being helped by his blockers, he ranks in the top ten in Breakaway Percentage, which shows he gains yardage in big chunks. If the Patriots don’t get their tackling down this week, they could be watching Bush break a similar run to his 76-yard touchdown last week.
Brady’s Weapons vs. Dolphins Secondary
Let’s just make this one simple: Tom Brady (+37.2) has more weapons than a warlord at his disposal. It would be boring, but every week it’s a new one that steps up. Last week, it was Aaron Hernandez (+8.7) who reminded teams that the Patriots have two legit tight ends, particularly after forcing 21 missed tackles, Hernandez leads all tight ends and receivers by seven despite having as many as 30 less receptions then some. Without belaboring the point, Wes Welker (+21.1) is the highest-graded wide receiver, Deion Branch (+1.3) is sixth-best at not dropping passes, Rob Gronkowski (+26.5) has the second best Yards per Route Run, and finally Chad Ochocinco (+0.2), who might just be ready to start contributing after his second-most active game in a Patriots uniform. The only (former) member of the Dolphins secondary who might be excited for this game is Benny Sapp, who was cut days after the season opener against the Patriots when he let up 7-of-10 passes for 169 yards and two touchdowns. At least if the Dolphins let Brady go “off” again, ol’ Benny will get some vindication.
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