During his first tour through New England running the Patriots’ offense back in the good ol’ days, Bill O’Brien lived the LFG! Tom Brady-led life.
Last Sunday evening in Dallas, watching Mac Jones and the Patriots melt down in the 38-3 loss to the Cowboys, the first month of O’Brien’s second tenure as offensive coordinator hit rock bottom in WTF? fashion.
So what gives?
Wasn’t O’Brien supposed to be the transformational offseason savior for the New England offense?
Wasn’t the well-traveled, experienced offensive mind supposed to bring competency and productive stability to the Patriots’ attack in the wake of the utter dysfunction that was the Matt Patricia-led “experiment” that went so predictably and horribly wrong a year ago?
In the wake of a loss in which New England scored just three points while watching Jones turn the ball over three times – two leading directly to Dallas points – it must be time to start tossing O’Brien atop the blame pile. And that has certainly been the case this week as some in the border town outposts of Patriot Nation and dark corners of New England social media mentions have begun to question O’Brien’s value, status and capability just four games into what was supposed to be a welcomed return to his home state.
Not so fast my angry and reactionary frienemies!
Sure after the big time debacle in Big D, O’Brien admitted he could coach things better and that the play calls could be better. Probably some truth to that, whether he was feeding us what we wanted to hear or not.
And maybe there are what he called “glimpses” of what the Patriots offense can be, a unit that might actually be productive in an offensive sense rather than being offensive to watch.
But reality is that O’Brien is far from the biggest problem that the New England offense has right now and therefore it’s probably unfair to expect him to be the biggest part of the solution.
Let’s jump into our title town time travel machine and go down memory lane for a bit. Remember when O’Brien was building up his coaching resume with Brady and Co.?
When he called plays for Wes Welker and Randy Moss to combine for 200-plus catches for 2,500-plus yards and 17 touchdowns in 2009.
When his offensive line included mainstays like left tackle Matt Light, left guard Logan Mankins, center Dan Koppen and right guard Stephen Neal.
When he was in the early stages of creating one of the best but short-lived two-tight end attacks in football as Rob Gronkowski and Aaron Hernandez created mismatches on a down-by-down basis while Welker was still collecting 120 passes for 1,5000 yards.
Oh, yes, and Brady was pulling the trigger on every snap.
This isn’t to say that O’Brien, like Josh McDaniels or Charlie Weis before him, was asleep at the wheel or just rolling Duke each week.
But talent wins in the NFL. And it won back then.
Now, more than a decade later, O’Brien has an offensive line that’s fielded four different starting lineups over four games, and the talent involved is anything but rich.
Now, O’Brien’s projected best offensive player is averaging 2.7 yards per rushing attempt, Rhamondre Stevenson seemingly indecisive in his runs working behind said lackluster line.
Now, his supposed No. 1 wide receiver has 80 yards. Not in a game, but in four games, in which JuJu Smith-Schuster has produced 11 receptions and a 7.3-yard average.
Oh, and pulling it all together, is the third-year quarterback Jones. A guy who was a broken man a year ago under Patricia’s hefty influence and looked just as broken on Sunday in Dallas, playing the position to anything but his strengths, if it’s even obvious what those might even be 35 games into his NFL career.
I’m far from an NFL offensive coordinator. Never called a play above the middle school flag football level.
But from the outside looking in it sure seems like creating a game plan or coming up with successful plays on a down-by-down basis would be difficult when your offensive line is terrible, your receivers lack the ability to get open and make plays, your running back is failing to find positive yardage with any regularity and your quarterback is not only incapable of lifting those around him but is clearly being mentally and physically dragged down by it all.
Over the last two decades in New England, at Penn State, with Houston and at Alabama O’Brien has proven he can do his job.
Pretty much no one on his current Patriots’ offensive roster right now is showing they can do theirs.
And that, more than anything else, is currently preventing O’Brien from doing his.
If you think Bill O’Brien is the problem with the Patriots offense right now you clearly haven’t been paying attention.
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