First-and-10 from the New England 38 (11:20, 1st quarter): Jeremiah Johnson took his first carry of the day for a gain of 25 yards into the Patriots’ red zone. Denver capitalized two plays later when Tim Tebow powered the ball into the end zone from 9-yards out to give Denver a 6-0 lead on its first possession of the game.
Third-and-9 from the New England 21 (9:04, 1st quarter): Tom Brady stayed patient on third down and found his tight end Aaron Hernandez open over the middle. The play resulted in a 46-yard gain and sustained the Patriots’ first drive of the game, which culminated in a Brady-to-Chad Ochocinco 33-yard touchdown pass two plays later.
First-and-10 from the Denver 23 (8:37, 2nd quarter): Ron Brace stripped Lance Ball after a 2-yard gain and Rob Ninkovich recovered the loose ball at the Broncos 19-yard line. New England turned the turnover into a 21-yard field goal from Stephen Gostkowski to reclaim the lead at 17-16.
First-and-10 from the Denver 46 (5:18, 2nd quarter): Mark Anderson broke into the Broncos backfield and strip-sacked Tebow, also managing to recover the fumble. New England converted that turnover into a Brady 1-yard rushing touchdown, extending their lead to 24-16.
3rd-and-7 from the Denver 45 (10:19, 3rd quarter): With the Patriots driving into Denver territory, Quinton Carter came on a safety blitz and sacked Brady for a four-yard loss, leading to a Patriots punt.
3rd-and-8 from the 50 (5:16, 3rd quarter): After Denver had strung together three first downs, Tebow was sacked on third down by Mark Anderson for a 10-yard loss. The Broncos were forced to punt, and the Patriots took advantage with a scoring drive that culminated in a 10-yard rushing touchdown by Danny Woodhead to push New England’s advantage to 34-16.
-Stuart Zaas
Tags: Key Plays, New England Patriots, Week 15
Turnovers and Penalties really hurt us! I’ve been saying it for weeks that we need to get the penalties under control. While they’re not “out” of control we’re committing necessary ones and key turning points.
I think Paxton was nervous playing against his old team or something? His snaps for the XP and FG were low for some reason, another momentum shifting point early in the game.
Why can we only play well for less than 1 QTR of the game? We played well in the 1st QTR and then checked out. I think Tebow didn’t do anything to help secure his future as the starting QB. He’s still missing a lot of reads and open WR and this coming against the 32nd ranked pass defense.
From that joke earlier apparently Brady had God over for a dinner party and convinced him to redecorate his Mansion in the Sky! LOL
*unecessary*
I think just like the Packers, we were brought back down to earth..and I gotta say it kind of hurts.
I agree in ur assesment sndvl
I also agree with whoever said Harris is a keeper. Kid plays big. I think he is playing better than most rookie cbs with the exception of psquared of course, cuz prince in NY aint doing to well. Funny how talent and drive go unnoticed.
But after watching last weeks game, if anyone thinks we need a QB in the first round they are misinformed. This d while playing above their talent level all year still lacks depth and great talent. We have to get a cb or dt in the first and second. Hell if there’s a safety worthy of the first round pick we might have to get him. All I know is defense needs the love.
Hope bunkley is good. One of those guys playing above expectation.
TRB
The entire team fell flat yesterday. After that initial fumble, it seemed to snowball from there and no one was in the game. We looked like a pee-wee team out there……….it was so painful and heart-wrenching to watch. Especially going from that extreme initial high of the first quarter to the extreme below basement low of the rest of the game. UGH!
We cannot afford to have that type of effort against buffalo or we’ll be in huge trouble.
Game impressions
Yuk!
I always say in order to be able to talk bad about something, you first must talk about the good, so let’s get that out of the way, it won’t take long, LOL.
The first quarter, that was a good one. Able to run the ball with ease, whether with McGahee, Ball or Jeremiah, as if there wasn’t even a D there, amazing!
Demaryius catching most of what was thrown at him.
Marcus Thomas playing well against the run.
One big DJ hit.
One Mack truck style hit on Brady by Doom.
And a good play here and there by few and far between.
And I believe that’s it for the good stuff.
Now the bad stuff, take a seat, this is going to take a while.
Starting with the coaching, WHAT IN THE HECK WAS THAT!!! Horrible coaching on both sides of the ball, correction, on all three sides of the ball. Talks about Fox for coach of the year by guys like Coop and raidrhadr amongst others were obviously way premature. Once we fell behind the O basically abandoned the running game only to throw it over and over to one guy only, Demaryius, exactly how Fox and McCoy did it in Carolina with Steve Smith, it got to be so absurd that I only really remember one catch by Decker, one by my boy Willis when the game was basically over and absolutely zero, none, by TEs that I can recall. Why even bother calling those guys TEs, just call them what they are, extra O lineman! And the D, my gosh, did they really think they could do the job without throwing the kitchen sink at Brady pressure wise, obviously because pressure was nowhere to be seen basically all game, even I realize the Pats have a good O line but it was painfully obvious that Allen and Fox thought for some stupid reason that ours safeties were going to be able to cover, ARE YOU FREAKING KIDDING ME???? Then top it off with Cosby being allowed to make horrible decisions on returns the whole game and there you have it, an all around futile game plan to be able to get anything done against a semi-worthy opponent, brutal.
Talking about the safeties, the only good thing about Carter is the length of his hair which hides his name.
Harris struggled mightily called for two crucial holding penalties.
Moore made basically just one foot tackle and started celebrating Moreno style, give me a break Rahim!
As far as deep secondary coverage, Goodman was toast and Brady was way too smart to go to Bailey.
It’s lucky they only put up 41 on us, less that the Packers and Lions pasted on us.
Hernandez should send a real nice thank you card to our safeties for letting him break all his personal records, pathetic.
Ayers keeps making himself noticed for all the wrong reason committing a HUGE penalty that gave them momentum when the drive should of died.
On O, penalties took their toll too, the Oline getting flagged way too many times.
The fumbles by Ball and Tebow were obviously killers.
I wonder if Fox can sleep at night thinking he could go through the season with the stable of backs he assembled. Once again McGahee shows he is not 100% and wearing down and of course everyone knew Moreno couldn’t finish the season so now it’s down to Ball and Jeremiah, great, how in the world do you hope to compete in the playoffs with that, if we make it that is.
The end of the first half was as bad coaching as it gets, 48 seconds left on the clock, we get the ball back at our own 9, throw it twice in a row even so the Pats have only one time out left so they get the ball back at their 34 after a punt with 40 seconds left. Lucky for the coaches our D stops them for a punt, but too bad for the coaches they forget to tell Cosby to let the ball go untouched at the 5 on the punt return, so he turns it over and they have 3 seconds left and score a FG that feels like a ton of bricks. HORRIBLE.
Well, shaztah told me to take it easy on the team, so I’ll leave it at that, LOL.
In closing I’ll say that this was exactly the slap in the face that the entire team and all the Tebow disciples fan base needed, A WAKE UP CALL! We need to face that we are not that good, just a middle of the pack team trying to get better every week but at this point we have basically no business in the playoffs. The organization needs to let all that sink in for a while and hopefully draw whatever is necessary from it to get over this embarrassing performance, starting with the coaches, you guys can hopefully do a better job, give your team a better chance to compete.
Short week to turn it around though, what kind of Christmas will it be? That’s why we watch the games.
I have to disagree with you Brian. As the announcers, along with most of the analysts after the game yesterday, Tebow actually performed well. He improved on his reads, although he made some mistakes, which are expected. I have not, and still do not, expect him to hit the field and perform like a seasoned pro. What killed us yesterday was giving the Patriots 20 unanswered points over turnovers and penalties. There were a lot of stupid mistakes made in all areas of the team yesterday, and no one can deny that. They just have to buckle down and get to work so that these last games can be won. These last games are critical for us and all of them are good teams. So we have got to get to work and iron out the deficiencies that were so glaring yesterday. One other thing I saw was the arm tackling (or trying to) to strip the ball. They need to just plain tackle. Forget the strip tackle, especially against a team like the Patriots.
Schneider,
People say we were brought down to earth but I don’t think we were that high up in the sky. We pulled out close games … Packers on the other hands always dominated by a large margin and was brought down to earth by a poor chiefs team. Maybe getting rid of Haley was the key … who knew. But we played a team that had 3 losses and no one really expected us to beat … and we coulda hung with them but we just beat ourselves … dont get me wrong they did their part … but I find it hard to give them all the credit … we were doing exactl what we wanted. Playing the way we like to play … run run run. We were pounding and gashign them. Green and Decker were sealing off the edges. We were playing bronco ball and wearing them down, then McGahee gets hurt, Ball Fumbles in our 20, Tebow fumbles option in our 20 and Quan fumbles punt … and it was just bad man. All I can hope is they learn from this. I don’t think they were over confident, after all it was the Brady Bunch. Game just got away from them. We will see how they respond … hopefully like the did against the lions. TRB
There is no way to sugarcoat this one because as I have been saying since I found out AP would be out for the Vkings game then same with Cutler and Forte for the Bears game, this one game was the only true test we would have left on our schedule to find out how we measured up, and everyone on the team knew it was THE test too, and they didn’t pass it, not by a mile, and the Pats are one dimentional, NO D, no significant running game, just a guy who can throw the ball better than most. And that’s why this loss will sting for a while.
Loooong ways to go, which comes as no surprise, the 6 wins in a row was the surprise.
Do we hold the tie-break over SD as well? That might play out large in the next two weeks…..I’ll be rooting for the lions again………they paid us a huge favor yesterday…..hope they can do it again.
The loss was coming but let me ask you all a question. Would you rather beat the Pats and lose the next 2? The way we played was if we thought our effort didn’t matter. Like the Pats was gonna give us the game. McCoy needs to learn a old football term. We all know the term. Heck Brady had his WR and TE doing that term. The term is HOT ROUTE. They were blitzing us with no type of outlet WR. I thought if a D is playing man to man. Your guy comes off you to blitz. That WR changes his route to be open soon. Go were the Defender vacated. We had nothing like that all day. People kept telling me about our TEs. All they do is block. No TE help yesterday. We run the same plays 7 times a game. How big is that so called play book?? People don’t wanna hear this but I will say it. If we going all in on Tebow. IF and that’s a big IF but If McD loses his job in STL. Then we should bring him back as OC. That’s the title his should of had here anyway. I know it sounds crazy and all. People gonna say Greatness what are you talking about. We how depleted the Pats were. A hobbled Willis McG should not have been back out there. Yeah Ball fumbled but got back on track. Johnson was showing he belonged. Quan shouldn’t be cut for that mistake tryna make a play. If he wanted the spotlight like some are saying, then I would cut him for tryna be on TV. The motto in the locker room is dare to be great. I know Elway wants the west coast O in here at denver. So I think McCoy is gonna be gone anyway. His playcalling is like a kid playing Madden that found a play that got him positive yards against his brother. He just keep doing it ova and ova and ova again. If you really watch the game you know what I’m talking about. The fumbles by Ball and Tebow were bad and can not happen. That 2nd qt is why we lost. Just like there D took some punches and kept playing. I think our D would have done the same. They the only team that can stop us if we stay positive. No other team can put that type of points up on us in the playoffs. To get to the SB this was a much needed loss. I rather be humbled now. Then to be humbled sitting home. To all the real Broncos fans not the skiptebowbandwagoniers. lol I saw the real from the fake with all these comments on this blog and others after the loss. So ya’ll can hop off. Real broncos fans were never on it. Tebow will get us were we wanna go and I believe that. He and the rest of the O needs some help from coaches. I’m telling yall we run the same plays every game. You can’t exc for 60 min with only 16 plays being called all game. Same runs just switch sides to run it on. Same pass plays just switching sides. That won’t work at all. IT’s funny how people was getting mad that Tebow got all the ame for the wins. Not the D and ST though. KC beat the Packers and no one say their D or ST. It was all Kyle that won the game. lol That’s bandwagoniers for ya!!!!!!!!!!
*****IT’s funny how people was getting mad that Tebow got all the fame for the wins. Not the D and ST though. KC beat the Packers and no one say their D or ST. It was all Kyle that won the game though right?? lol That’s bandwagoniers for ya!!!!!!!!!!
Broncos 23 Patriots 41
Official score prediction contest week 15 results:
While a dozen of us had the loss pegged for this one, only really one guy predicted how bad it would be correctly and a handful had a better idea and they therefore racked up all the points, no points for drinking orange kool-aid this week though, LOL:
1st place:
WieminCA 24-38, only 4 total points off and very deserving of the 7 first place points bringing him up to a total of 6 points overall no thanks to his earlier WOS.
2nd place:
Pdp1408 24-34, 8 total points off and a nice 4 points for that making him the big winner of the week overall, taking him from 10th place to 4th with 11 points.
2 way tie for 3rd place:
BeastFromEast92 30-38, 10 total points off and earning his first 3 points of the season.
UKBroncos 23-31, also 10 total points off and his 3 points bring him up to 4 points overall.
5th place:
S.D.Bronco30 31-35, 14 total points off earning a single point and now minus 3 points overall due to an earlier WOS, shame, LOL.
Congrats to all the winners!
Now onto the Wall of Shame. A brand new blogger with a strange handle decided to pick us to beat Brady and his Pats by about 3 TDs!!!! And that will get you directly onto the Wall of Shame without the shred of a doubt, LOL. Elways Ghost 32-12, Brady 4 FGs!?!?!?!?! LMAO!
This is how we stand Top Twenty overall after 15 weeks:
1. oldsouthstander, 25 points
2. timmah, 14
3. thecladybunch, 12
4. Pdp1408, 11
5. killekod, 10
Tie for 6th. BroncoRoyaltyEst.1979, RabidOrange, Orange_Crusher , baylinorcrush, all with 9 points.
10. lonewolf7, 8 points
Tie for 11th. raidrhadr, broncosmex, MANDIEGO, alexanserg, denver0723, rayjr26, Denver15, Atwater4HOF, minidisaa, mikew007, all with 7 points.
WARNING!!!
Score predictions for the Bills game are now open and will be taken until FRIDAY midnight blog time since it‘s a Saturday game, no picks on Gameday, no exceptions.
Good luck to everyone!
I agree with some of your assessments, bay, but I don’t think it’s as bad as you make it out to be. Without those back to back to back turnovers in our own territory, this game has a MUCH different outcome. Sure some of our weaknesses were exposed – especially in the secondary – and I agree that some of the coaching wasn’t good. But we have a good team this year. The Pats are a great team. But I think we have the potential to become great…question is, how long will it take?
It was like … turn over turn over turn over and then they got the ball after the half … that was like 4 straight drives for them lol.
So ugly. lol
And people still think Tebows bad completion rate is cuz he is innaccurate … nope. Just doing what they tell him to … throw it away … don’t force it and turnover … cuz clearly when we turn over we lose as evidented by the first 5 games of the season and yesterday. I think he is progressing well enough. Just like all his wins didn’t seal his fate for 2012 … I dont think this killed his fate.
TRB
I find everyone to be over analyzing. In my opinion it’s simple. We turned the ball over three times on their half of the field. To add salt to the wound, it seemed everytime we stopped them on a big third down, we we’re called for a penalty, and on offense penalties vacated some critical plays in our favor. Turnovers and penalties, you won’t even beat the Colts with that formula. Ask Tennessee. I feel the same way about our team as I did on Saturday.
Mistakes killed us for sure. I still think we can beat these guys. They better hope we don’t see them in the playoffs. 3 turnovers effectively lost that game for us. Can we just forget about that 2nd qtr please?
Bay I still think Fox is COY. We will still win the division and that alone should get it for him based on where everyone (including me) thought we would finish.
I said it last night and I’ll say it again. We witnessed the Kobe Bryant effect in full force yesterday. In other words, there were penalties called on us at crucial times and of course NE can do no wrong. Oh they called some on them towards the end of the game when it didn’t matter to even up their numbers but what a sham.
Agreed with TRB and 3rd.
As for Tebow, two mistakes I saw, not protecting the ball when it was knocked out, and the 29 yard sack. Overall, however, he keeps improving.
Demaryious Thomas will be on SC tonight about 6ish or so Tune in.
We simply handed them 20 points. That won the game for them. You give Brady 20 points; you will not win the game. Simple.
Exactly greatest .. I as even on DP where people had the gull to say that Orton beat the packers and that tebow sucks and we shoulda kept orton all along … WHAT…. Did he even have a single passing TD. Did he do anything. It wasn’t like they out scored the packers … the d just stopped the packers on an off day. But nope its Orton. And the same peopel that had been sayign our D was the reason we win … well there u go. We need more D help. And you are right … I don’t pay enough attention to the plays called on offense … I dont pay attention to the formations to see if its the same plays over and over but wouldn’t shock me, while I credit McCoy for what he has done with the option and havign courage to try it … his play calling has always been suspect. IMO.
Im not as worried about this loss. Like I said … we have been winning cuz we take care of the ball. There is no way u give up the ball 3 times on your own 20 killing ur drives and giving them nothign less than 3 and expect to win. Agaisnt a HOF player. It doesn’t happen. And if we were to lose to the patriots, assuming we make the playoffs, rather lose to them now than later. We had the ability to take em on toe to toe, with that pathetic defense, the turnovers just killed us. Its not what we did in the win streak its what we DIDNT do … and thats turn it over.
TRB
killerkod, after doing my own tabulations it looks as if we win just one game, doesn’t matter which one, we own the tie breaker over the Chargers too because we would have either the best division record at 4-2 if we beat KC and even if we lose that one and end up 3-3 same as the Chargers, next tie breaker is win and loss record of common opponents and we beat both the Jets and Bears games which SD lost.
Sorry you guys are not hearing what you wanna hear, LOL.
DT on sports center should be interesting. I like him and hope he pans out but I have heard a few of the interviews with him and as some mentioned here a few days back, that kid is very inarticulate.
Now that the Packers lost, Harbaugh from the 49ers will probably get coach of the year and rightly so, sorry to disagree raidrhadr.
It’s not that I don’t want to hear it, it’s just that we disagree on our assessments of how bad the team is.
Receivers didn’t really drop passes so thats good. I agree with 3rd. feel the same way about this team. Hope they do about themselves.
thx for the info greatness.
Broncos Bouce back
As the everyone goes back to “… of course they won … bills suck, they cannot beat any real teams.” … everyone being the media and haters.
I know one things for sure Pats can’t make superbowl with that defense.
Demaryius had a very tough upbringing, not his fault.
Do the Bills have a potent passing attack?
thanks for the clarification bay………that’s what I was thinking as well but I wasn’t entirely sure.
To everyone out there blaming the loss on the turnovers. Yes they stung, but with the way our D was playing, even if Brady had to start on his own 20 every drive, he still would’ve put up those points on us. We simply could not contain them whatsoever.
Score Prediction:
Broncos 25
Bills 20
(No one pick anything close to what I pick, ive been way off every week but once this year lol)
TRB
Agreed killer, the D wasn’t stopping them. But I still think the turnovers are far and away the biggest game killer because had we not turned it over, we would have went toe to toe with them in what would have been a shootout, down to the wire, and based on earlier games this year like that it would’ve been a game we won.
That’s the whole reason for my concerns, repeat:
The Pats are one dimentional, NO D, no significant running game, just a guy who can throw the ball better than most.
If we can’t pass that test any better than that, everyone should rightfully be concerned, but I respect you guys wanting to drawn in that orange kool-aid of yours and therefore wanting to ignore any and all of my concerns, LOL.
Yes killer kod … that may be true but seriously 3 turnovers on your 20 … thats insurmountable. The point is we woulda been with them blow for blow till the end if it wasn’t for the uncharacteristic turnovers. But credit to them. They did what they needed too. Thats like if the bears were to say “if it wasn’t for barbers fumble we woulda won the game” … turnovers are part of the game. I just don’t think this decides our fate.
Greatness, Quan had no business fielding that punt, half was done. Sure try to make a play, thats cool. Its one thing if he fielded it and didn’t get much, thats fine, but to fumble it is unacceptable. I want him gone because I would rather see royal back there since he doesn’t do much on offense anyway, that way we can bump up willis who has been catching. Other returners have done more on few returns in comparison to all of Quans returns.
TRB
Honestly it’s a test we pass had we protected the ball.
At least, a test we have a much better shot at passing.
Bay,
its not about drowning in orange kool aid … we just think you are reading too much into the loss but ur assesment is correct, we did lost to a team who is basically one man and his recievers (and a pretty good pass blockign oline). Which is terrible. I just think one point in the game determined it. Which was the slue of turnovers. I don’t think its an indictment on what this team can do. I think it was more of an isolated incident. And just a bad day. I don’t see Packers panicking cuz they lost to a trash team (granted packers are way better than us and are superbowl champs) but Im just talking mentality. Can’t get too down.
But hey, you better than anyone know how wrong i often am lol. TRB
I was reading people saying
“oh the broncos are exposed”
“Now defenses and teams know what to do to them”
“Tebow and the broncos are frauds”
“Their oldschool style of play can’t match up to this new passing age”
“Tebow got schooled by a real QB”
… statements like those that ive read in other places is what makes me believe peopel either didn’t watch the game, are hateres, or know nothing about football. Thier D and Team did nothing special IMO
What this game did do for me, is it confirmed that our biggest priority in the draft should be defense, defense, defense.
23 points agaisnt that D? Weren’t you some of the guys who said how we would score well into the high thirties because bad Os had put so many points up against the Pats? But see it however you chose too, it really doesn’t affect my way of assessing the game, it was an all around poor effort, that’s the game I saw and I believe in what I see.
I know he did bay, not picking on him or saying it was his fault, was just saying. He has over come a lot to get to where he is and I commend him for that. That is another reason I have such high hopes for him and have hated seeing him struggle with injury so much. He has struggled enough, it would be great to see him catch a break and for life to show him some great things too.
23 points that would have been 40 had the momentum not been interrupted by fumbles.
Bottom line is now we better find a way to win one of the last two games instead of talking SBs here, it would be helpful to the team to have things put in proper perspective pronto, and that’s exactly what I’m doing, this was not an isolated incident, this was a game where we got manhandled by a D less team.
Bay I suppose it will come down to who does better in the playoffs. Harbaugh is a seriously strong candidate for COY.
If, if, if, if, tough way to lead anyone’s life.
I think we got manhandled by our own mistakes, and were sealed in the hole we dug ourselves by a team that’s the best at capitalizing and working with short fields.
“The loss wasn’t enough to thwart a season, just like seven crazy wins shouldn’t be enough to define a legacy. It instead keeps this conversation moving forward; hopefully in a healthier manner that will partly neutralize the pro-Tebow supporters just as his previous success helped to partly neutralize some of his football skeptics.”
That quote says it all.
Got it from this article:
http://www.nfl.com/news/story/09000d5d82533f7d/article/tebows-day-not-ruined-by-highprofile-loss-to-patriots?module=HP11_headline_stack
Kinda a fluff piece and a “feel good” article but not bad.
TRB
Wow, thanks raidhadr, I finally said something that makes sense, sometimes I come on here and think absolutely zero folks see what is glaringly in front of my eyes. It’s like the entire world is an asylum and I’m the guardian, LOL.
TRB you know that we can just dismiss those statements as garbage and un-educated rants.
What about this:
The Pats have a better QB.
They have a better coach.
They win.
At least that was my thoughts and prediction going in.
Where did I go wrong?