How Did The New England Patriots React To Last Night’s Win?

Aug 15, 2014; Foxborough, MA, USA; New England Patriots quarterback Tom Brady (12) throws a pass during the pre-season game against the Philadelphia Eagles at Gillette Stadium. Mandatory Credit: David Butler II-USA TODAY Sports

Tom Brady Continued

QB: On the touchdown pass to Thompkins, is that on both you guys? Can that either go to the fade or is that faced off and you call? Or is that on both you guys and he’s got to read that?

TB: Yeah, we’re both reading it the same way, so I think a lot of it is us being on the same page and KT is a really instinctive player. He’s made a lot of those catches, especially in that corner of the end zone, over his first year here.

QB: Does he remind you a little bit of Deion Branch, kind of the backside X guy?

TB: Yeah a little different player than Deion, but KT has a lot of strengths, there’s no doubt about it. It’s just for any young player, it’s always just continuing to get better and make improvements. And that’s every veteran player, that’s everybody: we’re always trying to get better. So really just becoming dependable and consistent for the team is really what is really trying to be.

QB: Going back to the flags, does that make it hard to get into a flow? Especially for you guys who like to run that up-tempo offense, how hard is that when the game stops so much?

TB: Yeah, I think if they’re helping us, then I don’t have any problem with it. I think when we keep going backwards – that happened to us a few times. We really kind of got ourselves out of long-yardages situations on both drives that I was in there. You’re right, it’s hard to overcome first-and-25 or second-and-25 or second-and-20, whatever. And we found a way to do that tonight, but I don’t think you really want to exist in that, because it’s impossible to be a good offense doing that. The percentages are so slim if you look over the course of the league of teams that convert on second-and-20s. I think penalties are normally drive killers. There were a lot of drives tonight that we kind of got away with, but I don’t think that will last too long.

QB: Is it nice to see a lot of running backs contributing?

TB: Yeah, they’re all running hard and all finding ways to contribute, so they’ve all got opportunity and it’s great competition. It brings out the best in everybody. It’s only our second preseason game, we’ve still got two more to go and we’ve got a couple real strong weeks of practice we need. But every day it’s just closer and closer to the opener, so we’ve got to use every day the best way we can.

QB: Not that you want to throw an interception, but when you do is it almost a good thing to be able to get right back out there, knowing that you’re going to have a limited work load tonight?

TB: Yeah. Yeah, it it’s great being right back out on the field. I was just happy we were able to go down and score a touchdown. We had a good drive going there to start the game and we showed a little mental toughness getting the touchdown there on the second drive, so it was great.

QB: Quick observations on Ryan Mallett and Jimmy Garoppolo? How did you think that each of them did tonight?

TB: Yeah, they’re very talented players so it’s fun for me to watch them. I see how hard they work in practice, so for them to get the opportunity, they both did a great job. It’s about doing the best you can on every play. It’s making the right calls, making the right reads, making the right decisions. We can always do better. It’s certainly not a game of perfect, but it was good enough to win.