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Oh, brother: Rob Ryan's Saints defense presents Patriots with major challenge

FOXBORO -- If it’s not one Ryan, it’s the other.

While Rex gets more than his share of headlines in New England, brother Rob -- a linebackers coach for the Patriots from 2000 through 2003 who now is the defensive coordinator for the unbeaten Saints -- also has made life difficult for Tom Brady and the Patriots offense in the past.

In one 16-game stretch between the end of the 2010 season and the start of the 2011 season, the Patriots were held under 30 points on just three occasions, all three of which came at the hands of the Ryan Brothers. Rex and the Jets stymied New England in the 2010 divisional playoffs by a 28-21 count, and Rob -- as the defensive coordinator for the Browns and Cowboys -- limited the Patriots to 14 and 20 points as New England split those games.

While the Patriots have mixed in an occasional beat down of Rex (including the 45-3 rout late in the 2010 regular season, as well as the 49-19 butt-fumble blowout last Thanksgiving in New Jersey), for the most part, Rob’s defenses have been pretty stout of late against New England.
Patriots coach Bill Belichick said the Saints defense is far different from last year.

“I’d say last year they were a really heavy blitz and zone team and they gave up a lot of big plays,” Belichick said. “I would say this year under Rob, they haven’t given up very many big plays. I’d say one of the characteristics of their defense is that they play a lot of multiple defensive packages that vary from week to week, similar to what Rex does, or has done at New York, at times. They might play nickel, but one week it’s one version of nickel, and another week it’s another version of nickel. They’ll play dime and they’ll play seven DBs, but the players don’t necessarily all play in the same spots, they’ll move them around by game plan and by matchups and by the type of plays or calls that they want to run.

“You have to be ready for something different. The way they deploy can change quite a bit from a game-to-game matchup basis. They played a lot of 3-4 defense early in the preseason, and that’s certainly their base, similar to what he did in Dallas, but the actual number of snaps that they’ve played during the regular season this year has been a far lower percentage.”

To be fair, a Rob Ryan defense isn’t exactly kryptonite for New England -- one only needs to go back and watch the 2005 and 2008 games between the Patriots and Raiders when Rob was the defensive coordinator in Oakland to realize that. (New England won those games by a combined score of 79-46, with Matt Cassel leading the Patriots in the 2008 contest.) But his attacking style -- the fact that he clearly favors more man as opposed to zone -- and ability to recognize vulnerabilities manage to separate him from other defensive coordinators who are out there.

“He’s a great coach,” quarterback Tom Brady said of Rob. “We got to play against him when he was the linebackers coach here, and I always enjoy competing against a Rob Ryan-led defense. He has his guys always prepared and ready to play. He’s certainly a guy that studies the opponent’s offense and tries to figure out ways to stop what he will perceive that we do well.

“It’s not like he’s just going to let, or try not to let things happen that we’ve done well all season. He’s going to try to take those things away. That’s kind of the mark of what he does. He gets his matchups and he lets those guys attack the quarterback. They play with a lot of anticipation and a lot of confidence, and we’ve got to go out there and try to do the same.”
The last time the Patriots faced a Rob Ryan defense, it was Oct. 16, 2011. The Cowboys were able to dictate the tempo early, as Ryan brought pressure from multiple spots and waited until the last possible second to tip off who was rushing and who was dropping into coverage. As a result, Brady and the Patriots were rattled early -- the quarterback was sacked twice and picked off once before the end of the first quarter. But New England was able to make adjustments and push the pace -- the Patriots ended up running no-huddle on 52 percent of their plays, a season high, as the Cowboys struggled to keep up.

patriots - Oh, brother: Rob Ryan's Saints defense presents Patriots with major challenge - WEEI | Christopher Price

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