Why haven't we seen a flea flicker?

[1billsfan]

or have Evans run a reverse off a McGahee end run?

 

or call QB bootlegs and draws?

 

or planned rollouts?

 

or have our best player stay in on 3rd downs?

 

These are just some of the questions I have this Friday. Yes, JP is taking his lumps. But can we see Tom Clements use just a little ingenuity to get JP on track? Malarkey and Clements need to get cracking because the blame does not entirely lay at JP's feet.

[Sound_n_Fury]

I think we need to see Peters in a Flea Flicker play...the D would fall down laughing and he'd score easily....

[CoachChuckDickerson]

I don't know the answer to all of 'em but I do know McGahee is not that good at picking up the blitz anf teams have been blitzing the snot out of JP on 3rd down.

 

Peters is a physical specimen but as a tight end he is slow and has average hands. That is why he wasn't drafted. Shane Conlan could of covered him.

[Kelly the Dog]

or have Evans run a reverse off a McGahee end run?

 

or call QB bootlegs and draws?

 

or planned rollouts?

 

or have our best player stay in on 3rd downs?

 

These are just some of the questions I have this Friday. Yes, JP is taking his lumps. But can we see Tom Clements use just a little ingenuity to get JP on track? Malarkey and Clements need to get cracking because the blame does not entirely lay at JP's feet.

459888[/snapback]

With the possible exception of the first one, even though Evans has already run a reverse, we have run all of those plays already and done all of those things, including Peters at TE where they threw him a pass last week down the field (although Losman was scrambling and threw it way over his head or to another receiver). We have run QB bootlegs and QB draws. Losman has run planned rollouts, several of them. Willis has been in on third down.

 

That said, I am not happy with the play- calling in the last two games either, and think they should use more of the plays you suggested, except perhaps, another reverse.

[bluv]

I don't know the answer to all of 'em but I do know McGahee is not that good at picking up the blitz anf teams have been blitzing the snot out of JP on 3rd down.

 

459952[/snapback]

 

You are wrong about Willis; you must have him mixed up with that back we shipped off to Tennessee! Willis is supposedly a 1000 times better blocker and receiver than he ever was and that is one of the main reasons why he was kept over that other RB as he was a liabilty in the passing game!

[todd]

Have you watched the games? I've seen plenty of planned rollouts. We've had reverses and fake reverses.

 

I agree with you about McGahee on 3rd down.

 

or have Evans run a reverse off a McGahee end run?

 

or call QB bootlegs and draws?

 

or planned rollouts?

 

or have our best player stay in on 3rd downs?

 

These are just some of the questions I have this Friday. Yes, JP is taking his lumps. But can we see Tom Clements use just a little ingenuity to get JP on track? Malarkey and Clements need to get cracking because the blame does not entirely lay at JP's feet.

459888[/snapback]

[Fake-Fat Sunny]

You are wrong about Willis; you must have him mixed up with that back we shipped off to Tennessee! Willis is supposedly a 1000 times better blocker and receiver than he ever was and that is one of the main  reasons why he was kept over that other RB as he was a liabilty in the passing game!

459963[/snapback]

 

 

There is no doubt that WM is a far better blocker that Henry was coming out of college if only because Henry was simply horrible at bliz pick-up as a rookie (any comparisons between where WM is on blitz pick-up skills and to what extent Henry went up (like any player) and down (like any player who has given up on his team) or whether he was always bad at blitz pick-up are simply irrelevant for assessing WM's skills in blitz pick-up.

 

I think some posters got all gooey in the pants about WM's skills as a bltiz pick-up guy last year as part of their overwhelming desire to trash Henry. WM proved to be a great back last year in productivity because:

 

1. He could take a lot more pounding that the conventional wisdom deemed he could after his injuries. He bulked a lot and showed great toughness and the ability to carry the rock over 30 times a game if necessary and to seem to gore stronger while the opposing D flagged.

 

2. He showed good speed after he muscled through the initial hits and gave the Bills a breakawy threat they never got from Henry who would run out of gas after 25-40 (at best if he ever got that far) yards and could be brought down from the rear.

 

3. He developed a tremendous stiff arm and the ability to not only punish but even injurre DBs who hit him at the end of a run.

 

However, WM showed nothing as far as I could see last year in terms of blitz pick-up and I would welcome folks citing specific plays or game situations where this was the case rather than saying that of course any knowledgable watcher could see it.

 

One of the big falsehoods laid out regarding last year was that the drop in Bledsoe's sack numbers could somehow be attributed to WM's skills at blitz pick-up.

 

The sack numbers dropped certainly, but from my review of the games it was:

 

1. Better blocking by the 04 OL than the horrid 03 OL.

2. The speed and outside running threat WM presented which stopped blitzers from selling out to the blitz to sack DB and instead make sure the outside runs were covered.

3. Better playcalling by TC than Kevin Killdrive which recognized you had to use Bledsoe at least on occaision on the delayed draw to force blitzers not to sell out on the rush.

 

I saw no specific plays last year that showed any WM blityz pick-up skills and we saw two (2) specific plays against Tampa where WM's b;itz pick-up work was horrible and to my mind were a big part of costing us 2 points which we never recovered from.

 

A. On 1st and 10 from our 1 WM had the nlitz pick-up on Squiers who blew past our OL on this risky 1st down pass call. WM ended up being little more than a speed bump in Squires way who though he did not get the sack, was engaged so ineefectively by WM going down to cut him that Squiers was able to jump up and block JP's pass which fortunately fell to the ground rather than being INTed in our enzone.

 

B. On 3rd and 6, WM canno get full blame for the safety as a good D play call by TB overloaded the rush to JPs right and WM had to choose between 2 blitzers. he probably correctly took the inside guy, but again failed to engage the blitzer at all (it appears he whiffed completely) and the blitzer was delayed going around the futilely diving WM but he was a factor in the play as 2 other blitzers were hard after JP and the WM delayed blitzer simply dropped off in the flat taking that outlet pass opportunity away from JP who eventrually ran out of the back of the endzone hanging onto the ball.

 

I think WM is a great runner, an asset to the Bills, and clearly was a far better choice as the Bills RB than TH, but WM's skills at blitz pick-up appear to me to be just as bad as any young players and no one has been able to site specific plays pr tangiable evidence to cite blitz pick-up as being one of the better features of WMs game.

[smokinandjokin]

2. He showed good speed after he muscled through the initial hits and gave the Bills a breakawy threat they never got from Henry who would run out of gas after 25-40 (at best if he ever got that far) yards and could be brought down from the rear.

 

460102[/snapback]

 

21 is certainly a breakaway threat, but...

 

Still waiting for that breakaway run. Nice one for a TD on a semi-trick play in Seattle last year when DB did a good job faking the sneak. Also had a nice run against Rams at home that probably would have been a TD if Lee Evans didn't hold. But other than that, he is most definitely not the UMiami RB that he was. I think the Bills masses are ready to explode when Willis takes a designed 4-yard run off-tackle, bursts through the line and goes 78 yards for a TD. Hopefully this weekend....

[stuckincincy]

I think WM is a great runner, an asset to the Bills, and clearly was a far better choice as the Bills RB than TH, but WM's skills at blitz pick-up appear to me to be just as bad as any young players and no one has been able to site specific plays pr tangiable evidence to cite blitz pick-up as being one of the better features of WMs game.

460102[/snapback]

 

 

It takes some time.

 

Here's an excerpt from today's Cincy Enquirer - a 10 year vet commenting on RB Rudi Johnson:

 

"He knows now, how demanding it is to be an NFL running back," right tackle Willie Anderson said. "He couldn't play early because he could never pick up the complicated blitz schemes.

 

"The coaches can trust him now to stick his head in there when the linebacker blitzes. He has earned a lot of respect from his teammates. You can count on him to do the dirty work besides just getting the glory running with the ball."

 

http://news.enquirer.com/apps/pbcs.dllarti.../509300425/1066