KatarHol":79rmgrah said:
The patriots defense allowed twice as many yards per attempt as the seahawks defense. So what exactly is the op's point.
The OP's point is that the Patriots continued to do the same thing throughout the game and the Seahawks refused to adjust to it. The OP is questioning that strategy.
Looking at yards per attempt couldn't be more deceptive.
The Patriots had no run game to speak of (57 total rushing yards), and successfully moved the ball up and down the field throwing short passes to one side. The Hawks refused to adjust and they just kept on doing it.
Meanwhile, 36% of Wilson's total passing yards came on two passes to Matthews (throw in the Kearse play-of-his-career/fluke and we're up to 50% of Wilson's total passing yards). Instead of just tolerating Matthews abusing Kyle Arrington, the Patriots adjusted and benched Arrington. Because of this adjustment Matthews was neutralized for the rest of the game, and as chance may have it, the guy they replaced Arrington with also ended up winning the game for them on the goal line.
Long story short on one hand you have one defense which didn't adjust and just sat back as the same thing happened over and over again throughout the game (and gave up a 10 point lead going into the fourt while doing so), and on the other hand you have a team that adjusted to what was happening and save for a big fluke play completely shut the Hawks passing game down and came out with the victory (they blanked the Hawks in the 4th quarter).
Dude, questioning the strategy of in-game adjustments (such as moving Sherman around after it was plainly obvious the Pats were going to just keep on doing what they were doing, and could do it with success) is FAR from irrelevant.
It's not as sexy as complaining about the strategy of running or passing on 2nd and 1 at the end, but IMO it's as or more important of a question if we're going to second guess about strategy.