Trent Green just kept talking and talking during Patriots-Dolphins.
Too bad he said very little.
The ex-quarterback was on the call Sunday alongside veteran play-by-play man Kevin Harlan, and overall, they were relatively inoffensive — at least by NFL broadcast standards. Harlan describes the action well and Green offers boilerplate analysis.
The issue is, Green’s forgettable commentary comes in long soliloquies. Why be succinct when you can prattle on?
Green’s verbosity was on display during one of the most consequential sequences of the first half. On a 3rd-and-1, Dolphins linebacker Elandon Roberts pushed through the Patriots’ offensive line and brought down Mac Jones at his ankles. It was a good football play, but yet, Roberts was flagged for roughing the passer.
When it came time for Green to offer his thoughts, he failed to articulate whether he actually believed the call was justified.
“You can see Roberts comes through. Watch as he goes low on Mac Jones and tackles him around the knees,” Green said during the replay. “He’s saying he was falling to the ground and that’s all he could get to. He has a good argument for that, because as he ran through the block, his momentum was taking him down, but the rule went into place years ago, and part of the reason for the rule was Tom Brady when he was New England’s quarterback—protecting the knees …”
Then Harlan cut him off, because it was time for the next play.
On multiple occasions, Green attempted to dissect defensive coverages, only to offer nothing but word salad. Take his analysis following a third-quarter incompletion from Jones to Kendrick Bourne, for example: “They do go man-to-man and they go through this exchange where they shift defenders. [Jason] McCourty was in the middle of the field, and he switched with — he was actually robbing, sitting in the middle of the field — but then there was a crossing route, and he jumped him. So a good job of communication in that secondary, passing it off as man-to-man, so everyone looks covered.”
Everybody got that?
Some Dolphins fans on Twitter were exasperated with Green’s seeming lack of knowledge about their team, especially when he said wideout Preston Williams was the fastest person on Miami.
Apparently Green has never seen Jakeem Grant run. By the way, it’s important to establish the run. Not sure if you knew that.
There were some other errors as well: Green said the infamous “Wildcat game” happened a couple of years ago (it was in 2008) and affirmed clipping was only installed as a penalty in recent years for player safety reasons (the dangerous practice has been banned in leagues across the country for over 100 years). Towards the end of the broadcast, Green mentioned how the game was a shootout — like we all expected.
The Patriots and Dolphins scored 33 points combined.
I’m sure there were some other missteps, but honestly, I forget. I only remember words. Lots and lots of words.