September embers
Team has history of rising from ashes of ugly losses
Despite their success in the Tom Brady era, the Patriots are no strangers to ugly losses in September.
In fact, a handful of their most memorable regular-season games in that span have seen the Patriots lose in embarrassing or extraordinary fashion in the opening weeks of the season.
The most recent example, other than Sunday night’s 26-10 loss to the Lions, would be opening night last year, when the Chiefs exploded for 42 points on the night the Patriots raised Super Bowl banner No. 5.
Kansas City also victimized the Patriots in September 2014 on Monday Night Football, routing the Pats in the game that sparked Bill Belichick’s “On to Cincinnati” press conference.
The Patriots have experienced this kind of frustration before and bounced back from it, but that wasn’t at the front of Belichick’s thoughts yesterday.
“I don’t really care anything about any other year, or any other team, or any other month or anything else,” he said. “We’ve just got to take a look at the situation we’re in right now and figure out how to improve it. That’s what we’ll try to do. I don’t think anybody’s real happy with where we’re at right now at any part of the football team.
“Again, we know that we all have to do a better job and we’re all committed to doing that.”
The most infamous September loss might go all the way back to 2003 in a trip to Buffalo best remembered as “The Lawyer Milloy Game.” Milloy was surprisingly cut by the Pats right before the start of the season. He signed with Buffalo, and his Bills blasted the Pats, 31-0, on opening day.
Sunday night’s debacle in Detroit will certainly join the list of ignominious losses. It was one of the Pats’ worst offensive performances in years, and things weren’t much better on the defensive side.
The good news for fans is the Pats usually shake off September losses and end up deep in the postseason anyway. The last time they lost two games in September was 2014, and they used the defeats as a springboard to their first Super Bowl win in 10 years.
The Patriots also lost two games in the opening month in 2012, although a Week 3 loss at Baltimore foreshadowed the Ravens upset of the Pats in the AFC Championship Game.
Wide receiver woes
With tight end Rob Gronkowski double-covered for much of the game, Patriot receivers consistently failed to gain separation from the Detroit secondary.
The fourth quarter was the most striking representation of these struggles in the game and overall this season. Both Detroit sacks of Brady were caused by coverage, not immediate pressure by the defensive line, and both came in the fourth quarter with the Patriots down a couple of scores.
A pair of deep heaves showed Brady’s frustration with his lack of targets in the passing game. His interception came with the Pats down 13 and time running out in the fourth. Looking for Phillip Dorsett, who didn’t have a catch on five targets, Brady forced a deep ball into double coverage that was picked off Darius Slay.
There was also Brady’s intentional grounding penalty, which came on a deep pass down the middle that wasn’t even close to any receivers.
“It’s just overall execution. It was bad,” Brady said after the game. “Not being on the same page and we go from secondand-1, or whatever it was, to third-and-long and those things shouldn’t happen. This is pro football.”
Offensive coordinator Josh McDaniels also chipped in.
“We don’t always start the season exactly where we want to be,” he said. “(The receivers) are working hard each week and we have enough variance in our system to tweak it based on the opponent that we play and that’s our job.”
D-line pushed around
It was an ugly night for the defensive line as well.
The Pats were knocked off the line in the run game, surrendering 159 yards on the ground, and they only hit quarterback Matthew Stafford once in 36 dropbacks.
There was a lot for defensive line coach Brendan Daly to go over yesterday, starting with the line’s inability to get off blocks.
“Yeah, you know, I think that was a struggle. I think there were a number of things that were a struggle last night,” Daly said. “You know, I don’t think any of us from a coach’s or player’s standpoint are happy with our performance. I think we’ve all got a great sense of urgency to improve, getting off blocks is one of them, but there’s a long list there.”
Daly also said the lone sack (by Deatrich Wise Jr.) the Pats managed over the last two weeks wasn’t a complete representation of the team’s pass rush, but it wasn’t a good sign, either.
“I think there’s a lot of different variables in terms of evaluating pass rush, and the sack is one of them,” Daly said. “In general, do we need to be better in terms of our pass rush? The answer to that is yes. I think we need to get more production across the board, and that’s affecting the quarterback overall.”