Brady Talks Dolphins While Slater Talks Safety
By Gregory Hunt
It's a short week for the 6-0 New England Patriots as they prepare to meet the 3-3 Miami Dolphins Thursday night at Gillette Stadium. New England quarterback Tom Brady is concerned about the Dolphins' pass rush, while Patriots wide receiver/gunner Matthew Slater is wondering about the safety of playing two football games only four days apart.
Brady doesn't want to be one-dimensional.
In New England's 30-23 victory over the New York Jets at Gillette Stadium Sunday, Brady threw a whopping 54 passing attempts, but based on his comments during a press conference in Foxborough on Tuesday, he doesn't want a repeat performance Thursday night against the Miami Dolphins.
"We got to make sure we try to stay on track and execute well so that we keep things under control," said Brady. "You can't be one-dimensional against these guys. These guys are really a talented group."
Ever since Miami fired head coach Joe Philbin and defensive coordinator Kevin Coyle earlier this month, the Dolphins have won two games in a row. Under interim head coach Dan Campbell, the Dolphins have beaten the Tennessee Titans 38-10 and the Houston Texans 44-26. In those games, the Miami defense has accumulated 10 sacks.
"Whatever they've changed is really working," Brady said. "I think they're playing at an extremely high level. They've gotten out to some big leads, and that spells trouble against this defense. (Cameron) Wake and (Olivier) Vernon and (Ndamukong) Suh and (Earl) Mitchell and (Derrick) Shelby. They've got a whole group of pass rushers that really the last couple games have been performing really well."
The Dolphins are coming off of back-to-back 8-8 seasons, but they have shown occasional flashes of brilliance, such as when they defeated the Patriots 33-20 at Sun Life Stadium in Week One last year.
Slater questions the safety of Thursday games
With three less days to prepare, playing an NFL game on a Thursday night following a Sunday game can be challenging from a logistical standpoint, but Slater is going a step farther and wondering if playing on Thursday is also unsafe.
"I understand that we want to make this game available to our fans as often as possible," Slater said about Thursday night games. "But you talk about player safety and health, and it's hard for us to understand how that is catering toward our players' safety and health."
Slater played in Sunday's game against the Jets, but he was still nursing a knee injury he suffered the previous Sunday against the Indianapolis Colts. Getting a full week to recover can be helpful to players dealing with minor injuries, but the short turnaround to a Thursday game may force some players to either sit out the game or play through an injury that hasn't fully healed.
"Obviously, there's some great things that come along with the Thursday night games," added Slater. "But at the same time there's some challenges physically for the guys that are out there playing the game. I don't think that's any mystery."
Tight end Rob Gronkowski acknowledges those challenges, but he shrugs them off.
"It's all right. I can handle it. It's just once a year," said Gronkowski. "Definitely just have to treat your body more, be more physically on top of what you need to be, to rest and be ready for Thursday night."
During a radio interview on Monday, Brady also downplayed any concerns about Thursday night football .
"I don't think it's as tough as some people make it out to be, personally," said Brady. "Maybe I'm a quarterback, I'm different — I think if you're an interior offensive lineman you may feel differently about that. But it's also nice knowing if you win the game, on the back end of it you have a lot of extra days to prepare for the next opponent."
Gregory Hunt is a Boston native and a life-long fan of the Patriots, Red Sox, Bruins and Celtics. He's also particularly fond of lacrosse, IndyCar racing and women's college basketball. He currently works for Examiner.com where he serves as the Senior Manager of Content and Media Access. He also writes for Examiner.com as the New England Patriots Examiner. His work can be found on Examiner.com.
