‘Three-headed monster’ leads rushing attack
FOXBOROUGH — If a good running back is a quarterback’s best friend, then Tom Brady is a popular guy this season.
Brady and the Patriots have LeGarrette Blount, James White and, since his Week 11 return from knee surgery, Dion Lewis churning up yards on a weekly basis, and the team’s 1,872 rushing yards and 19 touchdowns are its most in three years.
Like the points on a militia man’s tricorn hat, each member of the Patriots’ trio of backs balances a diverse rushing attack in a different way. For an opposing coach trying to prepare to stop them, they’re more like a three-headed monster.
“I just think again they’ve done a great job of bringing in a very diverse group of running backs,” Texans coach Bill O’Brien said Tuesday.
“It’s a very, very difficult challenge for us and it’s a difficult challenge for anybody that goes against them because of that group of guys. They’re all very good at what they do.”
Blount distinguishes himself through size: He is 6 feet tall and weighs 250 pounds. He’s a bruiser, a battering ram who can push piles of defenders.
Blount can turn on the jets, too. He’s had a number of long touchdown runs, including a 43-yard score on fourth-and-1 against the Rams in which he juked his final defender to get into the end zone.
“Blount is a just a very, very big guy, but he’s got really good athleticism,” O’Brien said. “He’s very difficult to tackle. He never stops his legs. He’s always churning for extra yards. You have to square him up in the hole. You’re not going to be able to get him down with a glancing blow from the side and he’s really been a productive player for them.”
Lewis and White are both smaller — Lewis is generously listed at 5-8, 195 pounds, and White at 5-10, 205 — but they fill different roles for the Patriots.
White plays in the mold of pass-catching thirddown backs like Kevin Faulk and Shane Vereen, often targeted on short passes and screens where he can try to make yards after the catch.
“Those guys had a lot more catches than they had carries, so it’s just a little bit of a different usage of the player,” Patriots coach Bill Belichick said in December. “Not saying those guys couldn’t carry the ball, not saying these other guys couldn’t catch the ball, but it’s a little bit different.”
The Patriots have handed White the ball 39 times, but they’ve thrown in his direction 86 times. White has 166 yards on the ground and 551 yards and five touchdowns through the air.
Lewis is used primarily with the ball in his hands. He has 283 yards rushing on 64 carries, and 94 receiving yards on 17 catches and 24 targets.
Lewis has been on the field for 31.7 percent of offensive snaps since his return in San Francisco, playing more and more as the weeks have gone by. Overall, Blount has been used the most, having played 47.1 percent of offensive snaps this season, while White has played 38 percent, but the Patriots have evened out their use of all three in the final weeks of the season.
Balance doesn’t just help Brady, either. Having three productive backs helps keep all of them fresh and, according to Texans nose tackle Vince Wilfork, “very, very, very explosive.”
“With those backs, you can be attacked in all different kinds of ways. I think that’s one of the hardest things for a defense to prepare for, when you have multiple backs that can go in the game and be fresh going into a game,” Wilfork said. “It’s a handful.”