This wasn’t quite as bad as the efforts against Miami, Houston and Jacksonville where the Dolphins, Texans and Jaguars rushed for 193, 192 and 171 yards respectively in Patriot losses.
But the defense’s ability to stop the run remains an eye sore. Tennessee’s Tony Pollard rushed for 128 yards on 28 carries in the Patriot’s 20-17 overtime loss to the Titans on Sunday. Pollard also had a 32-yard-scamper in there. The Titans, as a whole, amassed 167 yards on the ground.
That’s not winning football.
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“Defensively, again, leaky run defense,” Jerod Mayo said following the loss. “There were times where it goes back to fundamentals. We spend a lot of time talking about the X’s and O’s, but I think the tackling still needs to improve, that’s part of it … it’s too bad we let this one slip away.”
Once again, the Patriots couldn’t run the ball (they had 15 rush yards from their backs on 12 carries), and had trouble stopping the run.
Those are two areas Mayo would like to establish as part of their trademark for winning games. It just hasn’t happened.
“I’ve always felt that stopping the run, and running the ball starts with your attitude,” Mayo said. “It’s starts with your attitude, it starts with your mentality. We have to do better on both sides of the ball.”
Mayo did not say his team played soft, which was his take after the loss to the Jaguars in London. But bringing up attitude and mentality was a kinder way of saying the same thing.
Holding the Titans to 20 points isn’t outrageous, but the defense isn’t helping itself getting constantly gashed on the ground.
Said cornerback Christian Gonzalez: “I feel like we didn’t start fast, but we settled down … I feel like we played pretty good team defense, but we didn’t play good enough.”
