Deja vu

Patriots familiar with Martz-led offense

We’ve seen this somewhere before.

Even though this Sunday will mark just the second time in 10 years the Patriots will face the 49ers, the San Francisco offense is one New England is intimately familiar with — the 49ers offensive coordinator is Mike Martz, who favors a high-octane attack that can put points on the board quickly. As a head coach and offensive coordinator with the Rams, Lions and now the 49ers, Martz has faced the Patriots several times in recent years, including a 2006 game between the Patriots and Lions at Gillette Stadium where Martz was Detroit’s offensive coordinator.

“It’s Mike’s offense. It’s basically the same plays. As he always does, he tailors to the personnel he has,” said Patriots coach Bill Belichick. “It’s the same offense. He just utilizes his personnel to maximize them.”

“Obviously, we all know what Mike Martz can do,” said defensive lineman Richard Seymour. “We have some footage from ’06 that we can watch when we played Detroit here. We have some things that we can watch as far as the concepts they like to do.”

While Martz has frequently concocted offenses that give the rest of the league fits, Belichick has won three of the last four games he’s coached against a Martz-led offense. The reasons for Belichick’s success has be traced to a couple of things, including the fact that the Patriots have been able to disrupt the timing patterns of the opposition’s passing game. Just take a look at the film from Super Bowl XXXVI when Martz was head coach of the Rams: The Patriots spent much of that game using outside linebackers Mike Vrabel and Willie McGinest to try and interfere with the rhythm of running back Marshall Faulk, and NFL Films captured tons of footage of any and all New England defenders doing whatever it took to try and alter their timing patterns.

Mess with their timing patterns, and more often than not, you stop their passing game.

“You always have to disrupt the receivers as well as put pressure on the quarterback,” said veteran safety Rodney Harrison. “You have to give him some different looks with a physical, aggressive defense.”

Another way to slow down a Martz-led offense is with a superior pass rush. If those same timing patterns are disrupted, the quarterback is forced to hold on to the ball a little longer than he should, he’ll be trapped in the pocket, and be susceptible to big hits.  While the quarterback of a Martz’ offense is often at or near the top of the league in passing numbers, they are also near the top of the league in total sacks. Over the last two seasons with Martz at the controls of the Lions, Detroit quarterbacks were sacked 117 times (54 times in 2007 and 63 times in 2006), more than any team in the league.

“They throw a lot of down field routes. They throw deep in-cuts [and] deep comebacks. Sometimes they have a lot of receivers out, so occasionally their protection breaks down on that,” Belichick said. “But they attack the defense at all three levels, the short, intermediate and deep level. They do it every week on a consistent basis, so you have to be ready to defend it.

“Sometimes you get to him [quarterback] before they get it off, but a lot of times you don’t, and they hit a lot of 20, 25, 30 yard completions — a lot more than most teams do,” he added. “Overall, their pass protection hasn’t been bad. Like any line, it has broken down from time to time, but they have done a good job.”