Unless it specifically plans to prepare for Denver’s victory formation, the New England Patriots defense will not encounter much tape of the opposing quarterback this week. Jarrett Stidham, who will lead the Broncos into this week’s AFC Championship Game, played just four snaps all season and none of them can be classified as particularly revealing.
And yet, the Patriots need to find a way to get ready for an offense that lost starter Bo Nix to an ankle injury in the divisional round. They do have some intel on Nix’s replacement — Stidham spent the first three years of his career in New England and has worked with offensive coordinator Josh McDaniels for four of his seven seasons in the league — but how the team will be structured around him remains anybody’s guess.
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The overall theme of the week from a Patriots perspective can therefore best be described as, “Wait and see.” That said, the team knows it needs to be ready for anything.
“We’ll have to be prepared for the plan and the things that they’ve shown,” head coach Mike Vrabel said earlier this week. “I’m sure there’ll be some things that they haven’t shown.”
As Vrabel said, though, the Patriots need to build their own game plan off of something. One starting point is preparing for the core concepts the Broncos ran with Nix in the lineup, including moving the QB off the spot.
“I think that’s that’s the plan. We’re going to go in expecting that and then until shown otherwise, that’s just what they put on film,” said outside linebacker K’Lavon Chaisson. “Obviously, he hasn’t played a full game throughout the regular season. Just trying to guess what his game plan is going to be is a bit all over the place. But expect this, obviously what they’ve been working on all year and if they show otherwise we’ll be prepared for sure.”
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The uncertainty surrounding the quarterback position is not the only challenge for New England’s defense this week, however.
Led by a one of the most experienced head coaches in the NFL, the Patriots will face a varied offensive attack that Vrabel referred to as “tough to defend against.” And even though Sean Payton’s team ranked only 14th in the NFL in scoring during the regular season, it proved its offensive potency in divisional round when it scored 33 points in a win over the Buffalo Bills.
“I think he does a great job with his personnel, his scheme, the guys that he had in New Orleans and how they use those guys, and then, certainly, how he’s using the weapons offensively in Denver,” Vrabel said of Payton. “I think you have to prepare for a lot. It’s not like they do too much to where they’re — they’ve got rules for everything, they’ve got protections for everything. Good mixture in the run game. There’s some RPO with some big people personnel.
“I think he’s had his core concepts that he’s had for a lot of years, and then he’s just continued to add on to that as some of the game has changed and some of the ideas and the schemes have evolved. So, I think that that’s pretty unique. I think he’s got plays for certain guys that he wants to try to find ways to get them the ball. His record clearly speaks for itself. So, tough challenge. He’s a proven winner in this league.”
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For linebacker Robert Spillane, it ultimately all comes down to playing fundamentally sound football.
“They do a great job with personnel packages,” the team captain explained. “They can align in a lot of funky formations that maybe challenge your rules or challenge your schemes defensively. A lot of motions, a lot of ways to try to get people open at the end of the day. So, we just have to be really good with our matches, with our locations in zone coverage and playing sound in the backend especially this week.”
