AKC Posted August 22, 2005 Posted August 22, 2005 I'll take a look at the game again as well looking at the DL though I think pre-season is far more useful for the purpose you put it to in the above post assessing an individual's play within our scheme rather than using it to try to figure out exactly how we will run and substitute to implement the scheme come regular season. Players are substituted in pre-season with an eye toward training and assessing players and not with a primary goal of running the scheme effectively so trying to assess how we will implement the scheme based on pre-season just does not fly. Regarding last year, I also think your description of how we used Phat Pat was not that straight-forward. Generally it is true he was in on 1st downs, running downs and in the goal line D. However, given that many second downs had a down and distance which made them more likely passing situations I think we saw him decreasingly being used as our D became more effective as the season went on. Particularly when Edwards registered a few sacks and confidence in him grew and Sam Adams began butching whenever he was sat and was having a Pro Bowl year, I felt that it began to be mostly a formality to call Phat Pat a starter. He apparently only took 58% the D snaps last year and it would be interesting to see when he played most since I would guess that actually he stacked up a lot of snaps early on when opponents were running more to kill clock and that he may well have been seeing less than 50% of the D snaps toward the end of the season when our opponents had to pass to get back in the game. 414729[/snapback] Pat's primary function last season was as a stopper on the most important downs for a defense- if you believe that first and ten are the most critical downs to establishing your defense, which I fully embrace. Putting your opponent in a second and 9 or 10 allows the D to take higher risk/reward chances on 2nd down, and has the same effect on 3rd. So in the area of importance, for my money Pat played the most important downs. We show no sign of having someone who can control a gap like PW did and I think sooner rather than later in the season this will hurt us dramatically. Anderson might develop- he surely has a lower center of gravity than Edwards and that will help him against the run, plus he has much better lateral movement. Edwards is a north south player with a very high center and once he's knocked off his balance he's cooked. And the bigger problem is he's very easily knocked off his balance. I don't see any bigger hole in our team and the nature of pre-season is hiding it effectively in our stats against the run- but the film, as they say, "don't lie". I'm cringing through this pre-season watching Edwards get Weebled on running plays with far too great a frequency.
AKC Posted August 22, 2005 Posted August 22, 2005 AKC, I saw the same thing you did re: Edwards in the GB game and I totally agree on your assessment of his play in that game , but I won't go as far as you and say unimpressive preseason because 1- he had a literal highlight reel in the Colts game. 2- He also played solid in the GB scrimmage, and 3- has looked good against our own line in camp. 414742[/snapback] Refresh my memory on the Indy game- I seem to recall a downfield tackle and a backfield tackle well into the life of both plays- I must be missing something as far as a high-light. I'll have to cue up that scrim with Green Bay again because I thought like in Saturday's game he was getting pushed off the ball with regularity-
Kelly the Dog Posted August 22, 2005 Posted August 22, 2005 Refresh my memory on the Indy game- I seem to recall a downfield tackle and a backfield tackle well into the life of both plays- I must be missing something as far as a high-light. I'll have to cue up that scrim with Green Bay again because I thought like in Saturday's game he was getting pushed off the ball with regularity- 414747[/snapback] I agree with you on this game. Against Green Bay, Edwards was getting pushed all over the field. I thought he played quite well against Indy.
/dev/null Posted August 22, 2005 Posted August 22, 2005 we're D MED!!!, but i've got great news... I just saved a ton on car insurance by switching to Geico Note: No auto insurance carriers were switched during production of this sarcastic post
34-78-83 Posted August 22, 2005 Posted August 22, 2005 Refresh my memory on the Indy game- I seem to recall a downfield tackle and a backfield tackle well into the life of both plays- I must be missing something as far as a high-light. I'll have to cue up that scrim with Green Bay again because I thought like in Saturday's game he was getting pushed off the ball with regularity- 414747[/snapback] There were three almost consecutive plays in which he .. 1- Blew up a run play in the backfield for a 2 yard loss. 2- Flushed the QB out to the right, destroying the play design and forcing an incompletion. 3- Persued latterally from a left side rush all the way over to the right to meet the ball carrier for a modest 2 yard gain. If you have the game broadcast these plays were all highlighted in slo-mo and discussed by Levy and Tasker. Making 3 great plays when you're only in the game for @ 10-15 is pretty impressive to me. BTW, Nobody in a Bill's uni was "pushed off the ball" in the Colts game. Not once.
Recommended Posts