Good post man. The guy writing the article needed to elaborate about his criteria for the rankings. Talent-wise the Jets are higher than 25, however, unproven, defense cheat up-wise, 25 might be right on. But our defense will be gangster, so if you stack the box on the Jets, your QB gets Brady'ed
I don't disagree that the Jets were a passing team. I only disagree that New England's line is better. Them running more frequently doesn't prove they were better at it; the yards per carry, in fact, disputes it. I think it's reasonable to say the lines are comparable in terms of run blocking. They ran for more yards, the Jets had a slightly better yards per carry, they were better gaining first downs (although again a whole lot of those were Kevin Faulk running out of passing formations)....comparable. Then in terms of pass protection, the Patriots attempted only 5 more passes than the Jets but allowed 18 more sacks. That's also significant. Different QBs (inexperienced but athletic versus experienced but sloth-like), but still a big difference.
In 07 Brady was sacked behind the same line 21 times on 586 attempts on the most prolific passing O in NFL history. Do you really believe with Clemens starting last year we wouldn't have had significantly more sacks and a lower YPC? We also ran a spread O most of last year and threw primarily short quick passes.
I understand what the Jets offense did last year. I'm just not sure why you believe that proves New England's line was better than New York's. So Favre made the Jets' line look better than it would have with Clemens (I agree), while Cassel made New England's line look worse than it was with Brady (I also agree). But you're contending the true measure of the Patriots' line is the best case (with Brady), while the true measure of the Jets' would have been the worst case (with Clemens). How is that fair? I'm not sitting here trashing New England's line. They've got a top-10 group. So do the Jets. I believe New York's is better, and nothing you've presented disputes that.
If you want me to dispute that here is my case. The Jets had the better QB, the better Running backs, the better TE and NE had the better WR. NE scored more points, had more first downs, ran more offensive plays, had more rushing yards, way more rushing first downs, more rushing TD's. I believe alot of that is attributable to the better offensive line.
The Jets had the way less mobile QB. The overall RBs were similar; not a big edge for the Jets last year. NE had the WAY better WRs. The rushing yards were comparable, and a whole lot of New England's rushing first downs came from Kevin Faulk and his 6.1 yards per carry for 500 yards running draws out of passing formations (which doesn't necessarily say anything about the line, just the team's success running draws against defenses worrying about the pass (which although New York had the better QB, was certainly balanced in terms of danger by the presence of a guy like Randy Moss). At this point I'm going to agree to disagree. The lines are comparable; you like New England's better, I'll take the Jets'.
Biggs- this is gonna sound a little screwy, but I think New England's edge in rushing yards and rushing touchdowns is solely attributable to their porous pass protection. If you subtract Favre's rushing contributions and Matt Cassel's rushing contributions, the Jets have 19 touchdowns and 1961 yards. The Pats would have 19 touchdowns and 2008 yards; still an edge, but a modest one. And if you look at what I'd call broken passing plays (a combination of sacks and rushing attempts) Favre had 21 rushes and was sacked 30 times. Cassel had 73 attempts and was sacked 47 times. (On a side note, Leon had three more rushing attempts than Matt Cassel- ugh). Granted a handful of Cassel's rushes were designed, but I think a large portion of New England's rushing first downs came from Matt Cassel running for his life. And I don't agree that we had the better quarterback. Not early on, when Favre knew squat about the playbook, and not later on, when he was too injured to be effective.
All fair points but the fact is NE had a more balanced attack, runs to passes, ran more plays, scored more points, rushed for more yards, rushed for more 1st downs. You also can't discount that with NE WR and an untested QB teams were clearly looking to put the pressure on Cassel to beat NE and I would guess that he was blitzed alot more than Favre was who got rid of the ball pretty quickly on short routes most of the time. NE was also without their No. 1 QB and Running back most of the season.
I'm sure he had input into it. Now that he's a resident Masshole he has to play to his audience. Yo Peetah, take ya hands off that last piece of BAHston creme!
The Pats line allowed 48 sacks in large part because they had a backup QB who hadnt played since high school and who took too long to find a receiver and get rid of the ball. Most of those sacks were not due to breakdowns in the Oline.
I understand that some quarterbacks, like Cassel, will make an offensive line look worse than it is. At the same time, other quarterbacks (like Peyton Manning, and Tom Brady, and Favre for most of his career) will make it look better than it is due to their quick release and quick decision-making. So if we're going to give Cassel much of the blame for New England's poor showing in terms of sacks allowed, it's also fair to give Brady some of the credit for its superior showing the previous year. Again, I'm not saying New England had a bad line anyway. Cassel certainly held the ball too long, but on the flipside I'd argue Moss and Welker did a better job of giving him open targets to throw to than Coles and Cotchery. Just seems unfair not to give the line any blame for offensive flaws (Cassel's fault) while not also acknowledging that some of its strengths were a result of having arguably the most dangerous wideout in the game keeping opponents from calling too many blitzes.
