Advancing: New England Patriots Defense Abuses Justin Herbert, Win 16-3

0:00All year long, it's been about Drake May and the explosive Pats offense. But tonight, the defense flipped the script and the Pats are moving on. This is Lockdown Patriots. You are Lockdown Patriots, your daily New England Patriots podcast. Part of the Lockdown Podcast Network, your team every day. Well, as I've been in, I'm your host, Nick Cattle's born and raised in New England, been covering the Pats for the past 16 years. Also, the co-host of the Greg Bedard Patriots podcast with Nick Cattle's and a sports radio veteran. Welcome to locked on Patriots. Part of the Lockdown Podcast Network. Now the number one sports podcast network, your team every day. And yes, I am coming to you from a hotel room in Providence, Rhode Island, after celebrating my brother's 50th birthday this weekend. It is almost midnight, but I couldn't care less.

1:00You couldn't care less because the Patriots have beaten the Los Angeles chargers and they have advanced in the NFL playoffs on tonight's show. Drake May was not the sharpest he has been, but he had plenty of plays in the chamber to get the W also. The defense showed up in the biggest game of the year with their best performance. But first, the Pats are on to the division round. Today's episode is brought to you by Fandall. Fandall is officially in playoff mode every game day during the NFL playoffs. Fandall is giving customers even more ways to get in on the action. Visit fandall.com to get started. Let's just absorb this here for a minute. This is the Patriots first playoff win since Tom Brady. Their first playoff win since 2018. You go back to the last time that you felt like the Patriots had a chance to win a playoff game and it was against Mike Vrables, Tennessee Titans, who beat the Patriots beat Tom Brady at Gillette Stadium.

2:01It has been a while since we have had this feeling of Patriots playoff win. The schedule, the schedule was weak, all the schedule talk. The Patriots aren't really a good football team. They played a bunch of tomato cans, yada, yada, yada, yada. I don't think it's a coincidence that Drake May had an audible tonight. Tomato juice. Forget about the tomato can't talk. Forget about the schedule talk. I've said this. The Patriots have done what good teams, if not great teams do. They have dominated bad football teams. That's what you do. Take advantage of bad football. And so we can put away the schedule talk because the Patriots went into tonight's game against the Chargers, one of the better teams in football. They're a playoff team against one of the better quarterbacks. The Chargers team that yes is banged up, a Chargers team that has an offensive line problems. But a Chargers team that won double digit games and won some pretty big time games against

3:01really, really good football teams this year. So throw away the schedule talk. See you later. Don't want to hear it ever again. And what we saw from the Patriots tonight was a team that faced adversity and was able to overcome adversity. This was not a perfect game. This was not easy. The Patriots didn't cruise through this game. I mean, this was a tight, tough, physical fist fight in a phone booth in the playoffs. The Chargers defensive line. We talked about them in the preview show. Their defensive line was a problem tonight. Their defensive line got after Drake May. Will Campbell, Jared Wilson at a tough night. Drake May was sacked, one, two, three, four, five times during tonight's game. Five sacks. Drake May got hit a number of times pretty hard. The Patriots lost a turnover battle. They were minus one and turnover differential, but they found a way to win.

4:06And that's what good teams do, not playing your best football, not playing your cleanest football, but finding a way to win in your biggest game of the season in all three phases. I know I'm going to sound like Bill Bella checked, but all three phases chipped in for this win tonight. That's what happened. You got contributions from all three phases. The defense will wax poetic about the defense. Trust me because the defense, as you saw in the thumbnail here in YouTube, the defense was freaking dominant tonight. I did not see that coming. I thought the defense would be good tonight against this matchup. I did not think this defense was going to be dominant. I did not think this defense was going to be shut down. The defense was incredible. The offense. Again, not a clean night, not a perfect night, certainly some issues that you need to fix as you move on here and play the winner of the Texans and Steelers on Monday night. But the offense came away with a much needed touchdown drive.

5:09When you absolutely had to have it, when you could feel that separation, when you could put all the pressure in the world on the chargers and you need a touchdown drive, you get the touchdown drive from Drake, man, you get the touchdown drive from your offense. So the defense was dominant. The offense moved the ball. They did just enough. They put 16 points up on the board and the special team, something that we always overlook and we shouldn't. We saw what happened with the Ravens against the Steelers and how the Ravens lost their opportunity to be in the playoffs this year because they're rookie kicker, Tyler loop, missed a field goal to win that game. Here we are talking about special teams and special teams was nearly flawless. Bryce Barringer had a nice punt during this game and pinned the chargers inside the 10 yard line. Didn't have to punt much. Andy Borragales, your rookie kicker was excellent tonight. They know issues there right and ends the first half with a field goal again.

6:09So your rookie kicker showed up and kicked well and your special teams coverage was excellent. The Patriots special teams coverage was really good. Shout out to Jeremy Springer. They did a fantastic job all night long, even the little things like Marcus Jones calling for the fair catch and making it look like he's going to catch it and letting the ball bounce into the end zone to get the extra yards and a set up that touch back. The special teams was great. And that's how you win a playoff game, which frankly we can all agree with this was a pretty ugly football game, but that's how you win. That's how you win playoff football games. All three phases, your defense is dominant. Your offense does just enough comes up with a big drive scores that huge touchdown and your special teams is nails practically all night. And Mike Vrable talked about this from the very beginning. Mike Vrable knows what he's talking about folks. When he was asked on Monday, this past Monday, you go back to the beginning of the week

7:10and he was asked about the chargers and he was asked about this specific matchup. What did Vrable pound? Mike Vrable kept talking about physicality. He kept talking about winning in the trenches. He kept talking about fighting and how this game was going to test the physicality and the toughness of his football team. Mike Vrable knew exactly the type of game that we were going to see tonight. And once again, Mike Vrable had his team ready to play and the Patriots won that physical battle. Not every single snap. Again, Drake May got hit plenty of times. The left side of the offensive line has to be better. But the Patriots won the physical battle. They won it enough to win this game 16 to three. By the way, two penalties, only two penalties all night long on the Patriots. So they played mostly discipline football. It doesn't have to be pretty. It never has to be pretty. The only thing that matters on God's green earth when we talk about, especially in the

8:14post season, the only thing that matters is that you walk out with a victory and that's precisely what happened. The Patriots have gone. They have gone from a four and 13 football team to a team that is now going to host their second playoff game in this post season. I mean, how can you not smile about that? How can you not be excited about this football team? I mean, we're talking about a couple of wins away, a couple of wins away from a super bowl of parents. I thought this team would win nine games. I thought if everything fell perfectly from Mike Vrable and company, they would win 11 games, 14 and three regular season, walk into the playoffs tonight, take care of business. Now it's on to the next one. But before we get to the next one, we have to talk about that core, the defense of play call it because that core pulled off a play calling masterpiece in the defense, absolutely poured it on at Gillette Stadium.

9:16We're going to talk about that next. This is lockdown Patriots, part of the lockdown podcast network. Our team, every day, this episode is brought to you by prize picks, whether you're starting a new routine or jumping into player projections for the first time, trying something new can feel like a challenge. But with prize picks, it always feels good to be right with high pressure football matchups every weekend and elite hoops action almost every night. Things never slow down in prize picks, let you stay in control. Prize picks is a daily fantasy app that makes watching sports even more exciting by letting you build lineups based on player projections. No drafts, no waiting, just pick more or less and play your way. Getting started on prize picks is quick and simple. The app is super easy to navigate. You'll love the flexibility with options like flex play where you can still get paid even if one pick misses, download the prize picks at the day and use code lock down NFL to get $50 in lineups after you play your first $5 lineup. That's code lock down NFL to get $50 in lineups after your first $5 lineup.

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11:23It just feels good when in playoff games, right? It just feels good watching the Patriots win playoff games. You already live your team every day now, take it up a level, go add free, join the everyday or club today, get locked on Patriots, no interruptions, members only discord access and more. All for just five bucks a month, 50 bucks for the year. Go to lock down Patriots dot supercast.com or check the link in the show notes to learn more. And don't forget to help a brother out again. I'm chilling here in a hotel in Providence and boy, oh boy, we're going live. Forget it. We'll do it live. We're going live to talk about this Patriots win. Don't forget if you're watching on YouTube, whether live or on demand to click that thumbs up, hit that like button, help us all out here. More thumbs up means more eyeballs, how the algorithm works. Don't forget to like. Don't forget to comment. I want to see all of your comments on this win. How you feeling Patriots victorious 16 to three against the chargers. Don't forget to throw those comments in and don't forget to subscribe. All right.

12:23Let's talk about this defense because this defense tonight was absolutely unequivocally cooking cooking. It really was the perfect ending, wasn't it? The perfect ending to this football game for the Patriots defense was Milton Williams, dismissing, humiliating, charger sensor, Bradley Bozeman, I mean, just whoop, right by him, the sack, Justin Herbert. That really was the perfect ending for this defense and what they were able to accomplish on this Sunday night. Patriots defense had six sacks. Patriots defense had 20 plus pressures tonight. Just constantly in the face of Justin Herbert and we talked about this all late last week. We talked about it on the preview episode, the deep dive preview, the biggest weakness by far for the chargers was the offensive line. And if the Patriots were going to win this football game, if they were going to beat the

13:25chargers, they were going to have to get pressure on Justin Herbert. They were going to have to win that battle against the offensive line. And we talked about the chargers offensive line having trouble with certain blitz looks. We talked about the chargers defense having trouble against stunts and you saw all of that tonight. The Patriots defensive line, tons of stunts thrown at the chargers offensive line. Justin Herbert was running for his life all night long, blitzing just relentless blitzing from Zach core and Mike Vrable. Patriots defense had a heavy heavy blitz night had a significant pressure night and took Justin Herbert out of this game, almost from beginning to end. They made Justin Herbert's life miserable. And here's the perfect thing about this game from this defense on this night. Not only did you get pressure, not only did you smoke the chargers offensive line and dominate

14:28like you should have in the trenches, but you also saw some of the best coverage from the Patriots secondary that we have seen all year long. The Patriots coverage was absolutely terrific tonight. And they did something that they haven't done all the time, right? We've talked about when will the Patriots defense decide to deploy man coverage? When will they look at Christian and Zalas and Carlton Davis and say, take care of it fellas and Marcus Jones. And tonight you saw a decent amount of man coverage will get the numbers as the next couple of days roll by, but the Patriots secondary played a lot of man coverage. It felt like Christian and Zalas was outrageous. Hopefully he's okay. He left as we know late in this game with the head injury. We'll see what happens with the concussion protocol. But tonight Christian and Zalas, he was running routes for the chargers receivers. He literally was running the routes of the receivers. That tonight was second team all pro Christian and Zalas.

15:31That tonight, I don't know if the all pro voting went across his took took or not, but that was a motivated Christian and Zalas. He was absolutely terrific in coverage from what I saw. We'll see the film will watch at all 22 and I'll tell you whether or not he was as good as he looked in real time. But Christian and Zalas certainly looked like he was a dominant corner back tonight. Chris Collins were talked about it. Just talking about Christian and Zalas and how great he was. And Marcus Jones held his own with a couple of good plays and big plays. Carlton Davis had the one defensive pass in her parents call, but I thought he was good and he was physical and, you know, the thing that we shouldn't overlook as well. Because we want to talk about the idea of this secondary being solid and coverage and fantastic, which they were. But I don't want to overlook how physical the secondary was. Marcus Jones in the low red zone area, right? Comes up with that huge tackle of Justin Herbert.

16:32It's Marcus Jones and Justin Herbert, mono, mono, two bulls looking at each other. And Marcus Jones is all of like five, seven, a buck, 80 Justin Herbert's what six, five, two, 30. And it's Marcus Jones versus Justin Herbert one on one and Marcus Jones comes up with the huge tackle and stops Justin Herbert short of the end zone, gigantic play. Carlton Davis also had a couple of tackles in this game that were very, very physical showing up. I thought Craig Woodson was very physical in this game. It was great to see because Craig Woodson's been up and down. He had a tough game, I thought against Miami. But tonight he was ready to play and he was laying the bomb on this charger's offense, especially in the first quarter, quarter and a half. Craig Woodson's physicality jumped through the television screen watching this game. So again, Mike Rabel talked about the physicality, the Patriots were physical. They were physical up front. They were physical on the second level.

17:33They were physical from their cornerbacks, their defensive backs. Nothing came easy, nothing came easy for the charger's offense tonight. And the Patriots defense did a really good job situationally. I mean, think about it. Let's go back. Drake May throws that interception early in the game, right? Pass gets deflected. It gets batted up. Interception. The chargers have the ball at just about the 10 yard line. That's such a huge swing right there. Not only did Drake May turn it over, but the chargers have it set up perfectly. The chargers offense, they know they're not going to be able to consistently move the ball down the field 80, 90 yards, right? So a short field getting that turnover, having the ball to 10 yard line in the Patriots defense with that sudden change. You want to talk about the significant swing in the football game. Your defense is looking at a first in 10 and it really was just outside of first and goal. The chargers have a first in 10 from your 10 yard line, ish, and they just got a turnover from Drake May.

18:35Your defense comes up with a stop. They give up no points. Then the Patriots offense takes over at the two Patriots offense moves down and gets a field goal. You went from turning the ball over, looking at almost guaranteed points for the chargers to not giving up any points and somehow some way going on that long drive and getting points yourself. That is such a huge swing in this football game. The situational football, the low red zone defense stepped up a number of times. Christian Ellis, I thought was great spying Justin Herbert tonight. He was fast. He was decisive. Several good tackles. Yes, he had one of the two penalties on the face mask. He missed tackle. He blew a tackle, got into the hole, grabbed the face mask, but overall, Christian Ellis was really good as the spy on Justin Herbert, the Rams, the Rams, the chargers, chargers just couldn't run the football.

19:35The only guy that could run the football for the chargers offense was Justin Herbert. And a lot of times that's because he was running for his life because coverage was great. And he had nowhere to go. And he was like, I'm just going to run and try to pick up a first down. The chargers had 87 rushing yards in this game. Herbert had 57 of the 87. Kamani Vidal had 11 carries for 31 yards, less than three yards per carry. Amari and Hampton tried to go. He was hurt. He couldn't go. And Justin Herbert finished 19 of 31 for a buck 59. The Patriots defense gave up only 3.5 yards per play. That is out freaking standing. That is other worldly 3.5 yards per play against an NFL offense. I couldn't care less what NFL offense you're facing. I couldn't care less about the offensive line problems. To give up only 3.5 yards per play in a playoff game is outstanding. It's unreal. The chargers were one for 10 on 3rd down. The Patriots defense won this football game tonight.

20:38All year long, it's been about Drake May, who I think is the MVP of the league in the offense, helping the defense, sometimes carrying the defense. All year long, it's been about the offense, the offense, the offense in Drake May. And then you get to the playoffs and you get into a physical battle in the defense. When's this game for you? I mean, just can't say enough about it. Is that core, Mike Vrable? It's great stuff. All right, now let's get to the quarterback. Drake May comes up in the biggest moments and the offense does just enough. That's Nexus' Lockdown Patriots part of the Lockdown podcast network. Your team every day. The wild car round is here and Fandall is officially in playoff mode. Every game day during the NFL playoffs, Fandall is giving customers even more ways to get in on the action because right now every NFL playoff game day, Fandall users get a profit boost pack waiting for them inside the app.

21:38Each game day, you'll see a pack loaded with multiple profit boosts. You can apply to the bets you like most. Open your profit boost pack first thing on game day and see what boosts you want to apply. The boosts give you more juice on the bets you already like. Instead of forcing you to bet something new, the boosts let you lean into your game day instincts, whether you're backing momentum, defense, quarterback play or coaching. You make your picks, then apply your profit boosts to go after even bigger payouts while the playoffs get rolling. So visit Fandall, again, visit Fandall, an official sports book partner of the NFL and grab your profit boost pack every NFL playoff game day. This was a fist fight online. I talked about it a little bit earlier. This was not a pretty game. This was not an offensive display, but Drake May did what he has done an awful lot this year. He gets past some of his roughest plays. He's not necessarily sharp for stretches in this game, but then he gets hot.

22:42And in the second half, he got hot. At one point, NBC showed the graphic. He was 11 for 14. I think they said 173 yards in a touchdown in the second half. He got going and he didn't need to be great. And the offense did not need to be great again, because of the defense defense of performance. But what I loved about this game was when you absolutely needed it, when you absolutely needed a drive from Drake, man, the offense, they gave you a drive. They gave you the touchdown drive when you absolutely had to have it. When you felt like if the Patriots put six on the board, this game just feels like it kept me over. Can they put together this drive? Can they get the six points? Can they find a way? Can they get that touchdown? And that's exactly what happened exactly what happened. The third offensive possession of the second half in the fourth quarter, second and seven shotgun formation, Jack West over for nine yards, Jack West over for nine yards.

23:45Second and six, you have the K Sean booty route where Camhart jumps the route and tries to come up with the pick, Camhart misses, K Sean booty turns that into a chunk play. First and 10 Drake, may eight yards scramble. Second and two, I form, I formation with a Ramon Dre Stevenson, 12 yard run. And then first and 10, six offensive lineman, under center, play action, great play call by Josh McDaniels, great job by Travion Henderson. We've talked about all year long that his past protection, Travion Henderson steps up in the past protection, takes care of the assignment. Drake may has just enough time, great pocket manipulation slides to his left and throws a perfect football right over the extended hands just over the fingertips of Derwin James for the touchdown to Hunter Henry game set match. That made it 16 to three. So just when you needed it, when you needed that touchdown, you're up nine to three

24:50still a one possession game plenty of time for the charges to get the football back and somehow find a way to win this game. And at times it felt like they could, right? You had the fumble which turned into a 17 yard run. Then the officials, the crew misses a fall start, which turns into another big play, the scramble and you're going, my goodness, is this just going to happen? Is it, is this how it's going to unfold? But when you absolutely needed it, when you needed a touchdown drive to put this game away, Drake may had the touchdown drive, Drake may had the throw to Hunter Henry to find Peter. And that's what it's all about. And there were a number of big plays in this game that helped the offense get to the 16 points. How about Kyle Williams? We might forget about this now because of the excitement of the win and because it happened hours ago. But what about Kyle Williams on a fourth and four? Fourth and four Kyle Williams gets open runs a great route keeps his feet in towards the sideline. Drake may shows trust in the rookie receiver.

25:51Fourth and four playoff game. And he throws it to Kyle Williams. Kyle Williams comes down with the catch huge play for the rookie. I mean, Kyle Williams has 10 or 11 catches this year. It feels like every single one is huge. Efton Chisholm on the same drive. Second and 18. Drake may hits Efton Chisholm for 20 yards. You're two rookie receivers in a post season game showing up making plays. Those two catches led to a field goal. Drake may 37 yards scramble towards the end of the half led to your second field goal of the first half. So just big place. And we talked about Justin Herbert. You know, being the rushing offense for the chargers. Meanwhile, Drake may had seven carries for 69 yards, including that 37 yards scramble. I just talked about which led to point single hint. He led the three points before half time. And Drake may was dealing with pressure a lot of the night.

26:55The left side again wasn't good. The left side of the offensive line. The two rookies had a rough night. But Drake may found a way to survive. He had two turnovers. The interception. The fumble was a bad one. He got hit as soon as he got hit. He should have just held on with two hands and went down. But he tried to make a play in fumble. He'll learn from it. But Drake may again, facing adversity against a really tough defense. Did just enough to help you win this football game. Let's talk about the running backs. Ramondrey Stevens and 10 carries for 53 yards. I thought Ramondrey would get 15 to 20 carries tonight. Somewhat surprised. The only had 10. But 10 carries for 53 yards. So over five yards of carry. Travian Henderson had a quiet night for the most part. He had nine carries for 27 yards. And the vast majority of those 27 yards came on the last running play of the night. Which ended the game. Getting that first down. Only 19 carries from Ramondrey Stevenson and Travian Henderson. That's less than I anticipated.

27:56I thought the Patriots might run the football 25 to 30 times tonight. Of course, you could also look at Drake May. He added seven carries. One of those was a design run. That was nice to see on a third down. Little, little fake option pitched there. And Drake May keeps it and gets the first down. Not as much jumbo packages. I thought we would see. I thought we'd see a ton of six offensive lineman. I don't think we saw that a lot tonight. Ramondrey Stevenson was your leading receiver. Three catches for 75 yards. Man, oh, man. He's been great. Keishan Booty. Four catches 66 yards. Patriots four of 11 on third down. They were zero for three in the red zone. That has to get better moving forward. But again, you're playing against a very good defense. The Chargers defense is no joke as we saw. And it shot out to Andy Borragales, who stepped up big, rookie kicker made all the kicks. Got the job done. He got the job done. All right, that wraps up this edition of Lockdown Patriots. Thank you for making us your first listen. And for being in every day. Reach out to me on Twitter at Nick C Radio.

28:59Don't forget to throw a comment in on the YouTube channel. Hit that like button. Give us a thumbs up. Don't forget to subscribe. And if you're looking for a gift for someone, make it easy. Ask for the every day or club. Add free episodes of this show. Exclusive discord server access. And more subscriptions can be gifted through Lockdown Patriots. Supercast.com. Enjoy this one tonight. We will be back all week long. Talk about the next team up. Texans are Steelers. See you soon.