From the Hart: Missing Mayo a scary thought
Written by Andy Hart on September 15, 2009 – 2:51 am -As the dust settles on the Patriots comeback win over the Bills on Monday night, we must turn our attention to Jerod Mayo. The second-year linebacker, defensive captain and expected playmaker left the game against Buffalo with a right knee injury in the first quarter.
Mayo walked to the sideline and then locker room under his own power. He was announced as being “questionable” for a return. He did not. New England scrambled a bit defensively and looked to have a little bit less flexibility in terms of versatility with Mayo out of action.
Gary Guyton stepped in for Mayo at middle linebacker in the 4-3 and also as the team’s defensive signal caller by wearing the green dot helmet with the communication device in it. But it’s one thing for Guyton and others to step in for three quarters and something else to play an entire game or games without the reigning defensive rookie of the year.
“We just picked it up. Everybody had to pick their game up when Jerod went out,” Adalius Thomas said of Monday night’s action against Buffalo. “I didn’t really know what was going on. So me and Gary went in there and just had to communicate with guys, guys kind of moving around everywhere. So it was definitely an adjustment on the fly.
“Whatever it is, whatever 11 people are out there it is our job to get it done.”
Bill Belichick said he didn’t have an update on Mayo’s status after the win. But in true Patriots fashion Thomas said any time the sophomore misses is a chance for someone else to shine.
“When you lose your middle ’backer that’s a big thing, it’s always a big thing,” Thomas said. “He’s the quarterback of your defense. But you just have other guys who step up. That’s part of the game. Guys step up, they communicate, they get the job done. That’s why you have to be a professional at what you do. You have to always be ready for opportunity that presents itself.”
A New England defense that’s already seen so much turnover this spring and summer can ill afford to lose another key cog like Mayo. For the second-straight opening day the Patriots saw a captain limp off with a knee injury. Tom Brady missed the rest of the season a year ago. Hopefully the same fate won’t befall Mayo, the team’s rising star at linebacker.
But the tone of some of his teammates’ postgame comments wasn’t overly positive, including the following sentiments from Pierre Woods.
“Guys gotta step up. He’s a great leader, young guy, second year in the league, captain … it’s terrible, but, you know what, we gotta keep going,” Woods said.
Hopefully New England won’t have to “keep going” without Mayo, as it did with Brady a year ago. Because while it’s a little early to compare Mayo’s importance to the team to that of Brady, it’s not too early to say the Patriots defense simply cannot afford to lose another weapon and be expected to compete at a championship level. That would indeed be “terrible,” as Woods said. Even early in his career Mayo is too important to a defense that’s already too thin in terms of linebackers, leaders, playmakers and reliable options.
We had our doubts about the defense even before Richard Seymour was traded. If Mayo goes down for any extended time, what do we think about the defense now? Let us know with a comment below!
Posted in General |
September 15th, 2009 at 3:33 am
Scrappy i hope….lol…i thought guyton played well and is continuing to get better lets hope this young d continues to grow.
September 15th, 2009 at 10:38 am
our D would be rhymes with “mucked”
September 15th, 2009 at 12:22 pm
I thought the D played pretty well. Our secondary sure showed up, laying some big hits anytime they went for a pass. One thing I did notice with Mayo out was our speed at LB was gone. Tully cant cover a RB like Mayo can. I think at this point he could be out for a couple weeks. Maybe Pyror can come back next week and help that line terroize the QB. One thing the Pats are missin right now is the pass rush. Came up huge at the end of the game, but we needed more sacks on that inexperienced line.
September 15th, 2009 at 12:30 pm
Well the obvious move would be to see if Bruschi would come back. With the team in need, I think he would strongly consider it. He is no Mayo at this stage of his career, but it could work.
September 15th, 2009 at 12:32 pm
Ring Ring… Hey Junior hows it going?
September 15th, 2009 at 12:41 pm
seau is on his way to mass. by now i predict
September 15th, 2009 at 12:51 pm
We’ll be worse but try not to be so negative Andy.
Anyway I am interested to see what you and PFW boys say about the D this game. Yeah it looked bad but the Bills were running no-huddle like most of the game weren’t they so you figure that might have some bad effects for sure.
What I would be more worried about is if the offense cannot pick it up. You guys fully expected the D to maybe take some time to come together but now if the offense has to do that too considering our hard schedule and the fact that the AFC East seems to be a much tougher division than it was only two years ago I would say we may have a lot to worry about.
September 15th, 2009 at 1:17 pm
I still don’t see the point playing so much 4-3 against Buffalo. They have a history of struggling against 3-4 def. Add to this their young and inexperienced O-line. We had no pressure out of the 4-man D-line alignments beside TBC. We have noone on the roster who can play 4-3 MLB if Mayo goes down for an extended period.
I can’t see how this hybrid 3-4/4-3 front seven can work against serious opponents and help out the offense if it needs to.
September 15th, 2009 at 1:21 pm
Andy,
I think Mayo COULD be our biggest playmaker so it would be a huge loss.
Unfortunately even with him in there this defense is below average.
September 15th, 2009 at 2:01 pm
hopefully just a sprain and they were being over protective of their budding star . fingers crossed!!!
September 15th, 2009 at 3:31 pm
with Mayo out this puts the Seymore trade in a different light.
Are there any decent LBs out there the Pats could get, and if so who gets cut to make room on the roster?
If we ain’t got Mayo its gonna take a Miracle (Whip) to get it done.
September 15th, 2009 at 4:05 pm
What is the future, Bill? You let playmakers like Law, Milloy, Samuel, Seymour, Branch, and Vrabel go. You draft players for depth. Depth for what? You barely have starters! All I see on defense, other than Wilfork, Warren, Thomas, and Mayo, are average role players. They’re average at best. Corners can’t cover. Pass rushers can’t get to the QB. They can’t play. The guys who COULD play, you let go. I think you need to stop being so cocky and accept the fact that you could have won more SBs if you had paid those who could play. I’ve defended you for too long while you keep patching up the sinking vessel that once was a great ship. The Dynasty is over.
September 15th, 2009 at 4:15 pm
I’m predicting that Mayo will be back in the mix by the end of the month. I don’t have any inside info, just my gut telling me he’ll be OK. (And a little bit of desperate hope)
September 15th, 2009 at 5:02 pm
@JRC
they had to play so much 4-3 because mayo went down dude…. not enough LB’s for a 3-4
duh
September 15th, 2009 at 8:20 pm
I think they are in serious trouble this year after watching that game last night, I hope Brady and the Offense can put up lots and lots of points, they are gonna need it. Maybe Bill will dig into his magic bag of tricks and get us a Solid defense, Julius Peppers would be nice??
September 15th, 2009 at 10:08 pm
I like football
September 16th, 2009 at 12:16 am
Call up derrick brooks, he played in a 4-3 in tampa, prolly best avaliable to get
September 16th, 2009 at 12:17 am
You are doomed. D is old and slow with Mayo, now you better score 36+ a game. 9-7 best…
September 16th, 2009 at 11:13 am
Mayo will be fine and tedy along with seau could/should come back and how about D. Brooks BB loves that experience and he is still unsigned so the pats should make a move for all 3 of them then our weekest part of D might become the strongest!
September 16th, 2009 at 12:39 pm
Derrick Brooks and Junior Seau
September 16th, 2009 at 2:25 pm
Before Tedy retired and Seymour was traded, I thought this defense had an above-average chance of being good enough to win a championship as long as neither Adalius Thomas or Jerod Mayo went down. At this point, I’d say this defense is average at best, though with a lot of potential to improve.
September 17th, 2009 at 7:25 am
@Alex from Panama
“they had to play so much 4-3 because mayo went down dude…. not enough LB’s for a 3-4″
I believe we started to play 4-3 because of Mayo playmaking ability in the MLB and to be able to use Burgess as RDE. Now without Mayo we have noone who could cover the middle. Guyton maybe? Then who is the weakside OLB? Or we stick to the nickel packages with a 4-man front?
In the base 3-4: we have now Woods/TBC-Guyton-Alexander-Thomas.
just an idea.
September 17th, 2009 at 9:35 am
I’ve always been a fan of “In Bill we Trust” even when I see guys like Vrable, Law, Samuel, and now Seymour go elsewhere… I hated it but I accepted it… I must say that now I’m starting to questions things a bit more… I’m not sure it is cockiness or just a bad case of the grass being greener…. I really would love to have Vrable, Seymour, McGinnest, Law, and Samuel all back.
Oh well, I guess we’ll see. I don’t have 3 rings so I can only hope at this point.
September 17th, 2009 at 10:51 am
Big Trouble. The whole off season seem to be an enormous double down on the key role of Mayo. Trade away Vrabel. Both James Laurinaitis and Rey Maualuga were passed over in the draft (Pat Chung at 34? really?). Outside LB was largely ignored (Adalius Thomas is the best guy for the inside now- as ironically he is pretty poor at coverage- leaving us Wafer thin at outside). We missed Jason Taylor, Bugress is a DE. We move to a more 4-3 alignment, Teddy (who must have been a question mark even before training camp) retires. Seymour traded just before the season starts. All of these moves make Mayo the most important member of the D. To have him go down in the first quarter of week 1. Devastating. If the O line plays well we can still beat anybody in a shootout.
September 17th, 2009 at 1:06 pm
the tool giants fan talking on a patriots blog? wwow beat us in 1 superbowl, remember getting blown out by the no offense ravens??? Yea we got 3 in 4 years get over it, best win streak at 21 straight. Brady is a beast and Manning is overpaid and overrated just get over it.
September 17th, 2009 at 4:46 pm
The negativity here is dumbfounding. First of all, the Pats have some guys who can play. Guyton is getting better all the time. Thomas has extensive experience on the inside. Even Ninkovich can play DE, weakside and inside. Plus, we have a bunch of pretty decent safeties and the corners can cover significantly better than last season.
Second, the defense actually did pretty well against the Bills. The Bills ran 18 times, including two forced scrambles by Edwards. Only five of those runs went for more than five yards, the other 13 averaged less than 2 yards per carry. WRs Evans and Owens were targeted 12 times and came up with five total completions for 71 yards. Most of Edwards’ passes went to RB Jackson and the TEs (an area the Defense DOES need to work on). In addition to the four sacks, the pass rush forced Edwards to run twice, hurried him on several other occasions and generated a couple false starts and a couple holding calls.
Third, the Pats running game averaged better than 4 yards per carry until it was basically abandoned starting with the two-minute drill at the end of the first half. Brady completed 79% of his passes in the last three quarters for a 7.7 YPA. Watson caught 6 of 7 balls thrown his way including the two TDs.
Seriously, what’s everybody whining and woe-ing about?