- 4 minutes ago
It was NOT PRETTY in the first half... but a WIN IS A WIN, as Patriots win 24-19. Drake Maye and the Patriots dominated the second half. What do you make of Maye's play in Miami yesterday?
Did the Patriots handle the A.J. Brown injury correctly?
Did the Patriots handle the A.J. Brown injury correctly?
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00:00But I will enjoy one final day in my 50th.
00:03Yes, as you should.
00:04And it was not pretty in the first half yesterday, certainly, in Miami.
00:09What an ugly, ugly game.
00:13It's like you didn't come to play.
00:14Well, I was wondering if you were going to say that.
00:18It was, I mean.
00:19It was what?
00:20It was ugly.
00:21Mike Vrabel has spoken on this show not so long ago about historically bad,
00:27this team being historically bad when it comes to turnovers.
00:31And you got Efton Chisholm coughing up that ball.
00:35And then Dolphins go down, put three up.
00:39And I'm thinking to myself, all right, it's not going to be as easy as I thought it was going
00:45to be.
00:45I can't.
00:46When you say that they weren't ready to go, I still have to make some allowance
00:51when it comes to the injuries that they're dealing with.
00:54Because they just are, they're beat up bad, this football team.
00:59I agree with you.
00:59But then you have Hunter Henry going out.
01:01And then they looked way better in the second half.
01:03So I fall with Wiggy in off air before.
01:06Wiggy was saying it was like cruise control in the first.
01:08And they thought that they could just run right over the Dolphins.
01:10Yeah, I don't like the injury thing.
01:12Like, you know, going into the game, what your injuries look like, right?
01:15So I understand that you're missing some key guys.
01:19But you know that going into the game.
01:21So you're prepared for that.
01:22It's not like, Courtney, you bring up the Hunter Henry thing.
01:26He's been practicing all week.
01:27He's part of your game plan.
01:28And then, boom, he gets hurt during the game.
01:30You're like, all right, we have to figure something out for him here.
01:33But Eli Radden's been doing a really good job, you know, even with Hunter Henry there.
01:37So he was a guy that could kind of step in and could give you some production.
01:42For me, I just felt like watching the first half, you were just like sleepwalking,
01:47especially offensively.
01:48You just were like, I don't know what it was.
01:51Your run game didn't look great.
01:52I don't know if it was the weather as far as the rain.
01:55But you just looked like you were sleepwalking in the first half because in the second half,
01:59you're right, really until the skies opened up at the end of the fourth quarter,
02:03you look like a completely different football team.
02:06Yeah, the Dolphins, even with the injuries the Patriots have, are nowhere near the Patriots.
02:10And that first half was awful, awful.
02:15And it was awesome the second half.
02:16I thought it might have been Drake May's best game of the year.
02:19I know that's sort of blasphemous because he's had several great games in a row.
02:23But yesterday, if you want to say that Drake belongs back in the MVP conversation after the horrific start,
02:31without Drake May, they lose that game 24-4, 24-3.
02:36They have to get two safeties.
02:38They had, what, 41 passing yards in the first half?
02:40And then it was like completely...
02:41They flipped it in the second half.
02:43And the biggest play of the game to me was Ramond Ray-Stevenson, that third down pass,
02:47that was literally a centimeter off the ground.
02:49Yeah.
02:50Because the refs were awful.
02:53That ref crew, if you're wondering why, how bad they were.
02:55So they were initially scheduled to be the Sunday night game.
02:59And that crew was demoted to the Patriots-Dolphins game because they didn't want to see them on primetime.
03:05They are awful.
03:06No, Mike Vrabel was pretty upset, and rightly so, about the call on Christian Ellis, which I thought was ridiculous.
03:14I mean...
03:15The helmet-to-helmet?
03:16Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
03:17You're allowed to hit the wide receiver.
03:20I don't know what the rule is.
03:21Well, they basically were...
03:23I think we'll ask him about it when he's on at 630, but it sounded like they were...
03:29You know, he hit them too high or whatever, but I'm sorry.
03:32See, I don't know, Greg.
03:33When I played, you could clean guys going, but now it's like the defenseless receiver thing.
03:38So I don't know if that five-yard window is still there where you...
03:42It is.
03:42The window's still there, but they were arguing that it was too high of a hit.
03:47I mean, I don't know how you're supposed to control that when you're...
03:50Yeah, I mean, I've seen that happen all the time, but, you know, when I played, so, I
03:54mean, I didn't think nothing of it, but I didn't know if the rule had changed now where you can't...
03:58Like, you know, there's no blindside blocks, and there's no...
04:00So I didn't know if that fell into that category where you can't hit a guy who's looking at the
04:05quarterback and the ball's not coming to him.
04:07Well, a win is a win, and so Mike Vrabel will join us coming up in about 20 minutes here
04:13at Gillette Stadium this morning, and guess what?
04:16Well, I was just going to say, Vrabel, despite how he may have felt about the refs, very
04:20respectful with them.
04:22Very.
04:22He did seem like he was being nice.
04:24I hope so.
04:25Like he was being nice.
04:26Yeah.
04:26It's just...
04:27It was...
04:28That first half was, like, Mac Jones era, not that it was Mac Jones versus Drake.
04:33Just the...
04:34It was such a slog.
04:35It was awful.
04:36I agree they weren't ready.
04:38I don't know why.
04:38I mean...
04:39Luckily, you got Malik Willis in the Dolphins.
04:41I mean, in hearing the Jeff Halfley pump-up fest in that broadcast, it was like, are they
04:49on the payroll?
04:50They're like, they're the happiest 1-5 team.
04:52I'm like, that's not a compliment.
04:53If you're happy at 1-5, it shouldn't be a good thing.
04:57They kept saying, like, they're not the old Dolphins.
04:59They're the aggressive Dolphins now.
05:01They're not, like...
05:02They suck.
05:02It's constant.
05:03Everybody in there is for Halfley.
05:05It was so wild.
05:06I was like, he's going to be gone in, like, 18 months, and you're going to sound like idiots.
05:09But I did like Logan Ryan.
05:11Yeah.
05:11I mean, I thought he was fine.
05:12You did?
05:13Yeah.
05:13I was...
05:15I did not like Logan Ryan.
05:16He's very good friends with Tom Brady.
05:17Yeah, he is.
05:18Yes, he is.
05:19I mean, he had really interesting insight, because he did play for Vrabel, and he did play for Halfley.
05:23All those guys sound the same to me, unless you just got awful, like Jason Witten was, like, several years
05:28ago.
05:28They all sound fine to me.
05:30I mean, I just looked at this Miami Dolphins team, and it all starts at the quarterback.
05:35You know, I know Vrabel tried to pump the tires a little bit on Malik Willis, but it all starts
05:40there.
05:40You know, it all starts at the quarterback position, and you start to look at, all right, you know,
05:45how are you going to be able to win football games?
05:47And you look at Drake May.
05:49You know, you're down your top three wide receivers, and you're still able to go out there, obviously,
05:53in the second half, and perform at an extremely high level.
05:56And, all right, is he now getting to the point where he can make guys around him better?
06:01He can elevate those guys.
06:03Even though I know, you know, like, Chisholm made a couple really nice catches.
06:07The touchdown of Pop Douglas was a great job on a scramble play where a receiver,
06:14and we'll ask Vrabel about this.
06:16So, I kind of jotted down my nose.
06:18Nice job by Pop knowing, understanding, come back to the quarterback because you're running
06:22a deeper route when the scramble rule takes place, and Drake making a nice throw, nice
06:26throw and catch, and catch and run after that.
06:29My thing, though, too, is, like, we talk about halftime adjustments, and they did that a ton
06:32in the broadcast.
06:33The Patriots got the ball first in the second half and went three and out.
06:36Yeah.
06:36So, it's not like they had this, like, Rubik's Cube at halftime, and they got it.
06:41It was a very slow, methodical.
06:44They changed the offensive line.
06:45Eventually, it worked, but it wasn't this, like, cheat code at halftime that all of a
06:50sudden they came out and were better on offense.
06:52So, you know, so you don't, you didn't see that there was a clear difference between first
06:57half and second half offense-wise.
06:59Well, they got the ball to start the second half.
07:00No, no, I got that.
07:01I got that part.
07:02But I just, like, I felt like they were intent on throwing the ball downfield in the second
07:06half, and they were not in the first half.
07:08Yeah, I think that the game, you're down 10 points.
07:11And it's now 11 minutes left in the third quarter, as opposed to when you got the ball.
07:15Like, if they got the ball to start the second half and all of a sudden went down 80 yards
07:18and scored a touchdown, I'm like, oh, okay.
07:21They got the ball, and they went backwards to start the second half.
07:24Yeah, but overall in the second half, it was a completely different offense than we saw
07:28in the first.
07:28And you could look at even the stats of, yeah.
07:30Yeah, I think they, I will ask Coach about it.
07:34I feel like there clearly was, that they clearly went in and made some adjustments.
07:39But maybe.
07:40Yeah, the adjustment was Mike Brable said, get your head out of your asses.
07:43You're better than this team.
07:45Play like it.
07:46Yeah, that's kind of what I'm, if I was in the, if I was a fly on the wall in
07:50that locker
07:51room, and you said, we'll ask Brable.
07:52I think it was more about him, you know, going in there and chewing their asses out and saying,
07:57we're, like you said, we're better than this.
07:59Get your head out of your ass, especially offensively.
08:01And then that's what they were able to do offensively.
08:05The, what a finish to that Chiefs-Broncos game.
08:09That was awesome.
08:10Wow.
08:10That was an awesome finish to that football game.
08:14And then after you have, like, Brittany Mahomes going on social media on a rant saying, like,
08:18oh, of course the calls don't go our way because we're the Chiefs.
08:21Isn't it quite the opposite?
08:23Like, the Chiefs always get the calls.
08:25And so for you to go and complain about something like that, it was a great ending.
08:28You can't really flinch.
08:29You know what I mean?
08:29You can go either way.
08:30You can't really flinch in that situation if you're the right tackle, knowing how important that is.
08:35But then you have another crack at it.
08:36You know, obviously you're an extra five yards back, but you've got to be able to take,
08:41you've got to at least be able to be in a position where you can throw the ball into the
08:44end zone.
08:44And unfortunately, I forget if it was the left guard or somebody got cooked right from the beginning.
08:49They did a quick stunt on the defensive line and somebody got right in the face of Patrick Mahomes.
08:53Yeah, nothing you can do there.
08:54All right.
08:55Now, whenever you're outside with them.
08:56That costs you an arm in a lake.
08:57Oh, yeah.
08:58Oh, yeah.
08:59That was because they have to do the imaging on the like on the his liver and they have to
09:06do all that.
09:07They had to do all those things.
09:08So, yeah, he's OK now.
09:09He's fine.
09:10Good.
09:10All right.
09:11Anyway, Sean.
09:11Good morning.
09:12Hello.
09:12Good morning, Greg.
09:13Greg, I think that was a tough, hard fought win for the Patriots in a bit of a stormy game.
09:19A lot of rain going on there.
09:20It seems like Florida got pelted with rain yesterday because that Tampa game, if you saw any of that, that
09:25was an absolute mess there as well.
09:28But it was nice to see Drake may have a really good second half and kind of take control of
09:32that game for the offense and allow the Patriots to kind of come out and get the win that they
09:35needed to get.
09:36This is a win you had to have against a bad Miami team.
09:39And the more I continue to, like, think about it after the fact, and I was talking to, you know,
09:44Ted and Arcand and Mega yesterday on Football Sunday about it.
09:47Like, the way they handled this A.J. Brown thing was just so bad.
09:53I don't like it.
09:54I feel like they rushed him back.
09:56I feel like he's injured again now because he was overcompensating for a bad ankle, which resulted in the knee
10:02flaring up again.
10:03And so now you're going to miss him for another couple weeks when, in reality, all you needed to do
10:07was be 4-4 entering this Green Bay game.
10:10And basically, without him, you're 5-3.
10:12Like, you could have been entering this Green Bay game with a now fully healthy A.J. Brown.
10:18And so, personally, I just think you rushed him back for a Jets game you didn't need him in and
10:23for a short week against the Bears that he was irrelevant in anyways.
10:28Like, it just, the more I think about it, you could be in such a much better position right now
10:33if you had been, if you had just slow played it with A.J. Brown and hadn't rushed him back.
10:37Yeah, but if he's healthy, though, I guess I could agree with that.
10:40You even said last week, like, he didn't look healthy, right?
10:43No, no, I just said he looked slow.
10:45That don't mean he's not healthy.
10:47I mean, you would have to prove to me that the knee became re-aggravated because of what he was
10:53doing to rush himself back or what they were doing to rush him back.
10:57Right.
10:57I mean, I, how would I, like, is it the right knee?
11:01Which ankle was it?
11:02It was, like, it was the knee on the same leg as the ankle.
11:05Yeah, but I mean.
11:05And it's the same knee that he had the issues with before.
11:08Correct.
11:08But that, that, that might not be because of the ankle.
11:11No, no, no, I know, Wiggy, but if you have a knee problem like that and then you have an
11:14ankle issue, I'm with Shine.
11:16Like, you, it does kind of seem like you're rushing him back where you know that those two are connected
11:20and something could erupt again.
11:22He was out six weeks.
11:23Four weeks.
11:24Four weeks.
11:24Yeah, and that's what I'm saying.
11:26So it was four weeks, right?
11:27And then wasn't he out, didn't he miss a game?
11:29So wasn't he out a total, like, how did he miss, like, five?
11:32No, he missed four weeks.
11:33Four weeks.
11:33He went, he left in the Seattle game, missed four games, and then came back.
11:38All right.
11:40Yeah.
11:40All right.
11:40And I'm saying, like, you could have said him, and I'm saying you could have slow played it.
11:44You didn't need to rush him back right away.
11:46Because at the time.
11:46You didn't have to play him all those snaps.
11:48Shyam is so right here.
11:49100% Curtis.
11:50It's not even a second guess.
11:51We were saying this in real time.
11:53I said that you didn't have to, like, necessarily play him on all those snaps.
11:57I'm just not going to buy into that the knee injury was because you rushed him back and had something
12:04to do with the ankle.
12:05I'm no doctor.
12:06I mean, we can quibble over the details.
12:07How do we know that, though?
12:09That's fine.
12:10We can quibble over the details if you want.
12:11But regardless of the fact, like, they should have slow played it with him.
12:15Especially because when you brought him back, Romeo Dobbs hadn't gotten hurt yet.
12:17Like, he got hurt in that Jets game.
12:19And so there was no need to rush him back.
12:21You weren't trotting out Ryan Miller as a receiver option into a game against the Dolphins.
12:27Like, you didn't need to have him back yet.
12:29And so I just, in retrospect, now he's going to miss multiple weeks, it feels like.
12:33And they're not putting him on IR because they have to activate other guys from IR and, like, all this
12:38stuff.
12:38And I just, I feel like they could have done a better job with this.
12:41I mean, personnel-wise, it didn't help that Matt Collins went down.
12:45I mean, you were kind of, you had no choice, really.
12:48And it's easy to say.
12:50But if he's not healthy.
12:51I can go hindsight.
12:53But it wasn't hindsight.
12:54It was in real time.
12:54But I think he, I mean, he seemed like he was healthy.
12:58I mean, he looked healthy against the Jets?
13:00No.
13:01What are you guys talking about?
13:03What did he look like against the Jets?
13:04He looked slow as S.
13:05Yeah, but that.
13:06And he can't catch for crap.
13:07But, I mean.
13:08So what are we, like, literally the story Monday, I said, why did he play that many snaps?
13:11This isn't after the injury.
13:13This was in real time.
13:14The catching has nothing to do with your ankle.
13:16I didn't, I said, I said he looked slow as S.
13:18And slow, he didn't look that fast before the injury.
13:21That could mean chime or the swear.
13:23Right, right.
13:23But he didn't look super fast before the injury.
13:25He looked like, there was the one curl row where I was like, all right, he did look slow.
13:29But if you're going to clear him to play and you're going to bring him back to play,
13:33I would think that Mike Brable and the coaches know that he's good to go.
13:37He's 100%.
13:38Yeah, I don't think he was.
13:40I think anybody who watched that game and thought he was 100% was lying to themselves.
13:44And I think the organization may have been.
13:45And I'm concerned about the fact that A.J. Brown's like, I'm ready.
13:48And they go, okay, whatever you need, sir.
13:50But I don't think he said it like that.
13:51I don't think he goes, oh, I'm ready.
13:52And they're like, oh, you can play.
13:53Okay, well, it was clearly a mistake.
13:55Clearly.
13:56Yeah, I don't know.
13:58Like I said, I'm not going to say it was a mistake because I don't think.
14:01So you think they handled the return properly?
14:03I think they did because when we had this conversation, if people are like, all right,
14:07if he's ready to go, get him a game at home or some people are like, oh, don't play him
14:12against the Jets.
14:13Wait to Chicago to play him.
14:15And then he's on the road.
14:15Like nobody said, hey, he should probably sit out both the Jets and Chicago and come back.
14:20I did.
14:20I said you should aim to bring him back for the Green Bay game.
14:23That's what I said.
14:24I didn't hear that.
14:25And listen, I didn't hear that.
14:27If you did, you were the only one who said that.
14:29You were the only one.
14:30No one second guessed this when he was coming back.
14:33No, I think I said, don't play him for the Jets game.
14:36And you said the week leading up to him, you said, you know what?
14:38I would get him in a couple snaps.
14:39And I said, you're right.
14:40They played him the entire game.