By Tom E. Curran
CSNNE.com
FOXBORO - I believe this is No. 757 on the list of things that would not occur in New England. Monday, during an interview with Michael Kay on ESPN Radio in New York, Rex Ryan was asked an interesting question. Kay related an off-air conversation with Jets linebacker after the Patriots' 45-3 win over New York in Week 13. Said Kay: "Bart Scott told me off the air, we know exactly what we did wrong and if we ever play them again we're gonna win because we know what we did wrong. Weshould have been funneling them toward the middle of the field and we weren't doing that. Is that something you guys have to do?" In response, Ryan said, "Yeah, weknow what we did wrong and give them credit - they executed their plan well.Youscorethree points against New England, you'renever gonna beat them."More important than the response, ummm, what about the question?So Bart Scott's flapping his gums and telling guys off-air what the problem was and what needs fixing? And then not only is Michael Kay relating it, but he's sharing said (presumably) off-the-recordor on background conversation with Rex Ryan. And Ryan's solid with that? It's apparent he is because he went ahead and answered it. So what exactly do the Patriots do with this intel? And how, exactly, do the Jets funnel an offense to the middle?For the Patriots, they ran the ball 236 times between left and right guard in 2010. They threw 149 total passes to the middle of the field. They are in the middle of the field a fair amount. If this means setting the edge and funneling players back to the middle of the field in the running game - as the Patriots do in their 3-4 - well, that's nice. But again, they're in there most of the game. We'll try and find out later in the week as we go along just what the funneling means (aside from what I used to do in college). But it still strikes me dumb that it was even out there, broached and discussed with a straight face. Guess that makes me a kool-aid consumer.
Tom E. Curran can be reached at tcurran@comcastsportsnet.com. Follow Tom on Twitter at http:twitter.comtomecurran