By Tom E.
Curran
CSNNE.com
Coming down the homestretch in 2009, it felt like the Patriots offense had become woefully predictable.
And the numbers bore it out.
From November 22 against the Jets through December 27 against the Jaguars, Tom Brady completed 121 throws on 187 attempts. Nearly half of all his completions went to Wes Welker (58 receptions on 67 targets). One-fifth of those completions were to Randy Moss (20 receptions on 38 targets).
That’s 65 percent of all completed passes going to those two (78 of 121) and 56 percent of all passing attempts (105 of 187) going to either Welker or Moss.
What about the other guys? Well, during that same six-game span, Julian Edelman saw six passes come his way, Kevin Faulk saw 18, Ben Watson saw eight, Sam Aiken saw 18 (10 against the Saints), eight went to Sammy Morris, four to Chris Baker, seven to Laurence Maroney, five to Isaiah Stanback and one to Fred Taylor.
Now Brady can hardly be blamed for getting tunnel vision when one of the guys he’s targeting is a future Hall of Famer and the other is in the midst of making more catches over a three-year stretch than any wideout in history.
But Brady didn’t just go to Welker and Moss all the time because he wanted to. He did it because he had to. The Patriots running game in 2009 was dependable as a two-year-old; Brady’s faith in his tight ends seemed non-existent. Aiken, after a decent start at the third wideout position, broke Brady’s heart repeatedly with fingertip drops. Injuries wiped out the counted-upon youth (Brandon Tate) and ineffectiveness wiped out the veteran contributions (Joey Galloway).
So it came down to throwing to Welker over and over, a well-covered (and mostly discouraged) Moss, or the aging, balding, ridiculously dependable Faulk. And the three of them saw 66 percent of all the passes that left Brady’s hand coming their way.
One of the tenets Bill Belichick adheres to as a defensive coach is that you want to make an offense go away from doing what it likes to do the most. It wasn’t hard to figure out by the end of 2009 that the Patriots liked to bang it to their slot receiver more than anything else.
That can’t continue in 2010 for a couple of reasons.
First, Wes Welker blew out his left knee in the regular season finale and – even though he is recovering at an astounding pace – it just isn’t wise to throw to him 60 percent of the time. He will break.
Second, the predictability of the Patriots offense and irrelevance of their running game has to change. Since the departure of Corey Dillon, the Patriots have used the running game as a garnish rather than an entrée. They run the football because they should, rather than because they want to. The inconsistency of Maroney figures into that. So does the brittleness of Morris. Taylor wasn’t brought here to be a bell-cow but he is probably the best back New England has even at this advanced stage. As was obvious in the second half of last year, Brady can’t drop back 50 times every game and expect to make it through the season intact. He needs offensive help. And the Patriots – to become more potent offensively and not just a team that rolls up statistics – have to get more balanced and diverse.
The Patriots made offseason moves to work on this. Not the ones people may have wanted (Anquan Boldin in Foxboro would have brought on a mass case of priapism) but moves nonetheless.
Drafting tight ends Rob Gronkowski and Aaron Hernandez – both of whom are natural pass-catchers – implies that they are serious about getting the tight end back into the passing game. They used a third-round pick on promising Ohio University receiver Taylor Price who will come in and battle second-year man Brandon Tate for a spot. Torry Holt is at the end of a great career but he’s got enough savvy, skill and speed left to contribute (certainly more than Galloway or Greg Lewis had in 2009).
Edelman has been one of the hardest working Patriots in this offseason and could make a real jump and become more than just a slot receiver, but also as a possession-type X-receiver on the other side.
David Patten is old as dirt and was out of football last year but he was actually pretty impressive in July’s minicamps.
The simple fact is, the Patriots offense may continue to be Welker/Moss-centric but it can’t be exclusionary. For all the numbers the Patriots put up in 2009, they were easy for good teams to defend. Shadow Welker, shade coverage to Moss and whaddya got, New England?
Last year, the answer was…not much. This year? We’ll see.
Tom E. Curran can be reached at tcurran@comcastsportsnet.com.
Follow Tom on Twitter at http://twitter.com/tomecurran
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