QUARTERBACK
Whenever your offense is 1-for4 scoring touchdowns in the red zone, it is a subpar game. Tom Brady threw for 333 yards the hard way: short. He was forced to accept the Chargers' deep drops and focus on throwing to his running backs, which he did well. Brady avoided the Chargers' pressure much of the time with pocket awareness, shortening his drops to get the ball off quickly. His best moment came early, completing his final six throws on a 14-play touchdown drive that took 6:19. On the touchdown, his play-action fake drew defensive end Melvin Ingram toward the line, opening space for tight end Rob Gronkowski to run free for six points. But Brady also made several bad decisions, one when he tried to jam a throw to receiver Chris Hogan on third-and-14 into double coverage when he had running back Rex Burkhead open short with likely enough running room to convert. He made a worse decision when he launched a ball toward doublecovered receiver Brandin Cooks that nearly was intercepted on a flea-flicker when he had Hogan wide-open behind the defense. Brady ducked under defensive end Joey Bosa's rush once to avoid a sack and later drew him offside, but he also took a bad sack in the second half when he refused to throw the ball away. One of his best plays was a flatfooted, third-down throw to running back James White on which he couldn't step up because of pressure. Overall, the Pats kicked too many field goals. Their quarterback was not terrible, but he was not Brady-like.