In basketball coach-speak, they are refered to as, simply, "The Bigs". In Belichick-speak, they are called Tight Ends.
Amid all of the grumbling and blank stares from Patriots faithful, the "Zen Master" has transformed New England's high octane passing game to that of an old-school "Elbows and assholes" Utah Jazz-type team - a plodding, methodical, immovable force. Those Jazz teams struck fear into opponents. They took on all comers, played their opponent's game simply to show them that they could do it better. When they were finished toying with their prey, they would flex their muscles and blow out the other team with sheer brute force.
Those teams were coached by legendary tough-guy Jerry Sloan, and they played to his no-nonsense personality, sometimes taking the village bully routine over the line in order to make a point (Isiah Thomas, meet Karl Malone's elbow...). They were as smash-mouth as you'll ever see from a basketball team. The NBA had seen nothing like them before, and has not since.
Hell, Belichick has enough depth for the Tight End position to field his own basketball team: Rob "The Mailman" Gronkowski, Aaron "Reignman" Hernandez, Daniel "Big Dog" Fells and Michael "Uh oh" Hoomanawanui, all being fed the rock by Tom "Tommy Gun" Brady...
...you could even throw Wes "The Worm" Welker, Brandon "Iceman" Lloyd and Julien "Muggsy" Edelman into the mix for a change of pace...
Basketball rarely translates to football, however. What is being physical on the basketball court would be a Shorts and Shells practice to the Patriots, but the attitude remains the same. Bill Belichick obviously subscribes to the "Tough Guy / No Nonsense" approach that Sloan and his teams embodied - which means get big, tough players, coach them up and then send them out onto the field with hearts full of hate and brains filled with malicious intent...
Make no mistake, this is an offense that will rely heavily on the Bigs, and with this collection of size, athletisism and talent along with a decided nasty streak, defensive coordinators will struggle to come up with a scheme to stop them.
Even Jerry Gray. The Titans' defensive coordinator employs a base 4-3. That's it. a 4-3. On special occasions he will go into a sub package on third down to make things a bit more fun for his players, but it happens so seldom that when it does the Titans' beat writers fly into their "Breaking News" mode...
You would figure that Tennessee's defense would be easy to game plan for, and it is, but the alignment and the player rotation is so efficient and fundimentally sound that they can line up with confidence and say, "This is it, try to get past us."
Generally, with such a basic, seldom changing base, one would think that it would be easy to manipulate the defense, for the offense to take advantage of the limits of the base - but that's what can make the Titans defense so frustrating. They rotate players in and out without going into sub packages, which makes them one of the few defenses that can counter the Patriots no-huddle offense.
But as it will be with all Patriots opponents this season, it's not going to be a matter of the Titans' defense getting beaten, it's a matter of how slow and painful the beating will be.
The Patriots offense can attack from virtually any angle. The infastructure of New England's offense is so fluid, they can create major mismatches on any given play with a simple glance from Brady to his recievers. Most teams audible to take advantage of a potential mismatch in the secondary or to change the line protection package. The Patriots audible to cause the most damage possible.
One AFC General Manager went so far as to claim, "It doesn't matter what package you are in, the Patriots have the ability to make you feel like you're in the wrong one, every time." So with a little backwards thinking, the Titans defense has an advantage over most other team's units due to the simplicity of their approach.
There are just too many weapons for the personnel in this defense to account for. The feeling is that the Titans will use a lot of zone coverages and hope that the pass rush can get to Brady - because if they can't, all of these recievers are capable of winning the position battle, whether it's sitting down in the zone or going over the top of it...
Last season, the Titans ranked an abysmal 31st in the NFL in sacks with a meager 28, but things could be looking up for the line. A 4-3 Defense requires plenty of agility and aggressiveness, and Tennessee currently has a young group of Greyhounds ready to contribute. Picking up Kamerion Wembley in free agency has given some veteran leadership to the youth of the front four. He teams with 2010 1st round draft pick Derrick Morgan as the defensive ends, while the tackle positions are filled with stud run stoppers Jurrel Casey and Sen'Derrick Marks.
But with the Patriots pass-first philosophy, expect to see Casey and Marks rotated out frequently with athletic and undersized 2nd year man Mike Martin and designated pass rusher Karl Klug, who led the team with 7 sacks in his part-time role.
The majority of the Tennessee pressure should come up the middle, or with linebacker Akeem Ayers coming off the edge. The Patriots should be able to counter the pressure with the short passing game as the linebackers and safeties don't match up well with the Patriots' Bigs, not due to lack of talent but more because the 11 allotted players just aren't enough to stop this offense. Tennessee is overmatched even before the opening kickoff.
No sense in going into stats and numbers and projections and protracted trends. The players are going to line up and play to the whistle on both sides - but at the end of the day, the Patriots are just too much for the Titans to handle. And there's no shame in that - it's true for just about every other team in the league.
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