Originally posted by lamontb:Originally posted by OnTheClock:In this hypothetical scenario, Wilks was just fired during the bye week, and you are the new defensive coordinator. We just opened the practice windows for Darrell Luter & Samuel Womack. Outside of those potential additions, all you have to work with is the rest of the current roster.
What changes do you make that get us back on track to being a dominant defense again?
I'll start with mine:
1) Whenever Young or Bosa sub out, I move Armstead to the edge. It's always a challenge for him to play with great leverage inside and he would be much better at setting the edge than anyone else not named Chase Young or Nick Bosa. Who takes his spot inside? I address that in point #2. I really don't think this makes much of a difference. We need AA to play better in the middle point blank.
2) I increase the snaps of Kevin Givens. He actually has performed fairly well when given an opportunity lately and I think is underrated. Ok with more snaps but he's not a run stuffer and will get pushed around on the inside. this will make the run defense worse in my opinion. what happened to ty mcgill or kalia davis? This is really on KS and JL for not having a run stuffer on the roster.
3) Play Womack outside and Lenoir inside in nickel situations. Womack is supposedly better in press than in zone. If he falters, at that point we need to consider trying Ji'Ayir Brown in a Jimmie Ward type of role in the slot. Either way, Oliver must go to the bench. He's been exposed as a weakness that teams can way too easily attack repeatedly. i'm cool with this, Womack and Luter are question marks and it's time to see what they have. Maybe Womack is better at nickel and Lenior stays on the outside. Luter is an outside CB. I don't see Brown playing the slot. Just get Oliver off the field.
4) Throw the 5-man fronts into the trash can and never use them again. It has value and isn't that big of a deal or problem. It's not like it's something they use a lot or as a base defense. If that was true I'd agree. They need to run more stunts. DR was great at having unbalanced d line set with different guys stunting and twisting. more a gap blitzes and safety blitzes. Stop telegraphing CB slot blitz.
5) STOP playing off-man on short to medium distance. For the life of me I cannot understand why you'd offer a 7-yard cushion on 2nd or 3rd and 2 to go. Regardless of distance, our guys do not have the foot speed/quickness to break on the ball fast enough, especially with such massive cushions. Agreed.
I would add that dude has to stop being so extremely vanilla. Can we see an adjustment before half time? Need to put Huf in the box more on 1st downs to stop teams from picking up 5/6 yards running the ball up the gut. At times our linebackers are dropping so deep in there zones that they are just leaving too much space in the middle of the field. I dont' see any hunger or fire from the players. where is the leadership? Where is the fight drive and want too. That's on the players. Find a spark and get back on track. Even with a terrible DC these guys should be playing much better and not making a lot of bad mistakes.
The biggest issue with the 5-man fronts is them being used as a pass-rushing set. If it's a surefire run situation, then sure. But I never want to see this formation come out on third down. It's been discussed quite a bit how this setup hampers the ability of every guy out there to utilize their pass rush creativity due to the lack of space. As someone else mentioned, we'd be far better off going with more odd fronts to create some isolation and stunt opportunities.
To one of your points, I agree that we should consider bringing up McGill or seeing what Kalia Davis can do inside. Perhaps we'll see him this week if Kinlaw is out hurt.
[ Edited by OnTheClock on Nov 7, 2023 at 10:21 AM ]
