Kansas City Chiefs Paul Pulley

The Genius of Andy Reid

LadnerMorse January 17, 2019 No Comments

 

 

 

 

The Genius of Andy Reid

 

by Paul Pulley | January 17, 2019

 

For a solid week we heard, from almost every pundit that could get his hands on a soap box, that the best game plan for the Indianapolis Colts, who currently happened to be the hottest team in the league, was to run the ball against the Chiefs. Run the ball against the worst run defense in the NFL. Control the clock, keeping Patrick Mahomes II and the Chiefs number one offense on the sidelines. So what does Andy do? Runs the ball consistently, plays ball control offense, controls the time of possession to a factor of almost 2-1, and completely smothers and discombobulates the entire Indianapolis team. Exposing the genius of Andy Reid.

 

Andy had the defense playing such an aggressive style it was amazing. I had flashbacks to Marty’s defenses, with Derrick Thomas and Neil Smith getting after the QB and with Dale Carter, Kevin Ross and Albert Lewis patrolling the backfield.

 

The only success the Colts offense had was at the end of each half when Andy let his defensive coordinator run his ‘stop nobody’ dime defense. The Colts were able to pile up yards and should have scored twice. The first was a missed field goal by Adam Vinatieri just before halftime and the second was a dropped pass by wide open WR Daurice Fountain, a rookie 5th round draft pick, at the end of the game. One caveat to that final Colts drive is that the Chiefs had several subs in the game in the waning minutes.

 

Andy Reid was aggressive with the offense, attempting 4th down conversions four times and being successful on three of them. The first time, little more than halfway of the 1st quarter at practically midfield (the Colts 47), set the tone for the entire game. The Chiefs were going to be aggressive on both sides of the ball and I believe that caught the Colts off guard and forced a lot of bad plays by Indy, from both their offense and their defense.

 

 

 

 

 

 

On To The New England Patriots

There are a couple of things I’m pretty sure about in this upcoming game versus the Patriots. First, New England will not be running a vanilla defense, allowing Mahomes to pick them apart. Second, Tom Brady will not be affected by the elements, playing outdoors.

 

How can Andy surprise the Pats?

On the defense, getting Dorian O’Daniel healthy and back on the field would play a huge role (although he was out of Wednesday’s practice). Also the return of Eric Berry would be a huge uplift to the Chiefs defense (and he WAS a Full Participant on Wednesday). Either one of those players should do a better job of covering Gronk than Sorenson or Murray. Watching Sorenson try to play Dime backer was painful Sunday, O’Daniel is an upgrade there.

 

On offense, Spencer Ware could be a surprise for the Patriots (Ware was also a Full Participant Wed.). Getting Ware into the game and getting him some carries could provide a spark, but with the way Damien Williams played, I’m not sure a spark is needed in the run game.

 

 

 

 

 

 

I thought it was interesting that Kelvin Benjamin was a healthy scratch for the Colts game (I’m assuming that as I never saw his name on an injury report). Also interesting is that Gehrig Dieter had more offensive snaps than Demarcus Robinson. Dieter also had a reception, but was Andy playing Dieter because he has earned the spot or… was he saving Benjamin for something special to run against the Patriots? I guess we’ll find out soon enough….

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Patriots Road Woes

During the 2018 season, the New England Patriots went undefeated at home in Gillette Stadium. Playing on the road in 2018 has been a different story altogether. The Pats ended the regular season with a road record of 3-5. The only playoff team they faced on the road was the Chicago Bears, but the Patriots did win that game. New England only played two other road games against teams that finished the season with winning records and lost both of those. Finishing the regular season with a road record of 2-5 against non playoff teams can’t be considered very impressive, and one of the wins was coming off the bye week.

 

Divisional Playoff Workload

The Chiefs defensive players had a relatively “easy” game against the Colts. Only one player logged more than 50 defensive snaps and combined with special teams, only three defensive players logged more than 70 total. The Chiefs top defensive players, Kendall Fuller, Steven Nelson and Dee Ford had fewer than 50 game snaps, while Chris Jones and Justin Houston had less than 40.

 

The Chiefs offensive players had a little more work Saturday, as was evidenced but he time of possession dominance, with all five starting offensive linemen, Mahomes, Travis Kelce and Sammy Watkins each playing more than 80 snaps. In the case of four of the OL, Eric Fisher, Andrew Wylie, Mitch Morse and Mitchell Schwartz also playing special teams, they each logged 92 game snaps.

 

That seems like a lot of snaps for our offense, but the Patriots almost equalled the output with their offensive linemen, along with Brady and Julian Edelman each playing at least 80 snaps in their contest against the Los Angeles Chargers.

 

The Patriots defense got quite a bit of work also, with 10 of their players getting at least 50 snaps on defense alone and adding in special teams, the Pats had three defenders log 80 or more game snaps. That’s a lot of plays to get worn down a little or dinged up some and that could play a role this coming Sunday.

 

The Weather: The X-Factor?

The prognosticators are predicting all kinds of nasties for later this week. Possibly rain, freezing rain, then snow, followed by plummeting temperatures. After living in Northwest Missouri most of my life, one certainty is that long range precipitation forecasts are seldom very accurate. I almost never pay attention to anything forecast more than a couple days out. Unfortunately, the opposite is normally true about temperature forecasts, so I am planning on this upcoming weekend being a very cold one.

 

With all that being said, I really don’t think the weather will be a factor for the players. Even if the temps are horrendously cold, the under-field heating system in Arrowhead will have the playing surface at a decent temperature.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Tom Brady and the Patriots are accustomed to playing outdoors in cold weather and as we all witnessed last season, when Patrick Mahomes led the Chiefs to a victory in week 17 in Denver. “MVPat” had no trouble playing in the cold. This should be a fantastic game and may the best team win, which is… of course… the CHIEFS.

 

 

Paul Pulley — ArrowheadOne

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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