As busy as he is he still found time to help me put this together.

with the pushout rule, but I think you are right.

Defenses will start catching up as the season goes on adn they have a chance to start reacting. It is like a macroscopic version of what happens in an individual game… offense initaites plays, defense reacts.

REC!!

along the lines of Shanny wanting his defense to play to get the ball back, ASAP. I’m sure it will come up on MHR radio tonight.

You bring up a name I really wanted to include as an adjustment, but couldn’t figure out how: Wesley Woodyard.

HT mentions that if we insist on playing Manuel out of position (and HT is here referring to using Manuel as a 4th LB despite his other skills) that we should just go 46 (which he doesn’t reccomend).

What if we just replaced Manuel with Woodyard every so often? Why not play him like a LB in a 4-4 set up, if we are going to use a 4-4 formation anyways? Great tackler, hard hitter and very fast… all he lacks is recognition, but after seeing how he always finds a way to get into a play (an ability I haven’t seen so explicitly on tape since I reviewed tape of Lynch last year) I’m hoping the coaching staff isn’t selling him too short on that aspect…

Getting a big dose of the youthful fire that has helped so much on offense could do wonders for this defense, even if nothing else changed…

I suck at polls. :)

One blitz in particular bothered me last game: DJ and (I think) Webster came in on a delayed blitz inside the LT and LG. A RGB had to pick them both up. We are talking two fast, heavy hitters, and the back can only get one of them. Sure sack right? Har. The RB clogs the lane a little and the LBs didn’t look like they knew who was supposed to get peeled of and who would get the glory. Result: little RB blocks 2 big LBs, and Phyllis completes a pass.

I think he gets activated for New Orleans, but primarily because they are a team that passes so well, and because their (alleged) rushing threat, bush, is a speedy outside the tackles kimd of player, where Moss’ speed might help.

But If Shanny and co. are buying into the wisdom presented above, the real test is whether he gets activated for KC the week after, as they are a team that is 20-1 or something ridiculous when LJ gets over 25 carries a game. (I assume KC is bound to realize that before too long, right?)

He was drafted higher than Moss, but I don’t remember him getting off the bench until about the 8th game. Due to the injury shortened season for Moss last year, he is still basically just a rookie. I prefer to give him time. Everyone needs to accept the fact that NFL LTs are very good, it is unusual for a rookie RDE to make much of an impact. Remember how long it took Hayward to grow into his body and make an impact.

we really SHOULD be able to tell what system Slowik is running. As HT pointed out to me, this “scheme” really seems to be a lack of scheme with wholly vanilla flavor.

Point 3) above is too true. Coaches are funny that way. regardless of all the little things that bother people, we won the game, and that can’t be argued with. I wouldn’t even try. And that carries right over into your point 4) which I highlighted in the article: we will NEVER take the SS out of the box. It didn’t even work last year, after the Bates scheme collapsed and we were doing a Man-base out defense, while getting gashed by the run right to the end.

But from what HT has lined out in his university posts over the last year or so has taught me that Shanny doesn’t have a safety up because he wants to, just because he HAS to…

I’m just not interested in talking about next season right now…I’m worried about this one!!!

and would only endorse a high quality free agent as part of an overall plan that included draft picks.

and we talked about it a little before coming to a conclusion that it probably wouldn’t make a difference. I am with you that overpursuit simply isn’t going to change: we’ve been talking about it for two years now. But the speed is an asset, and is why he is making plays and Niko isn’t.

After MHR radio last week I told Guru that I would advocate Niko over Webster on the principle of slowing down our defense, which goes well with taking the safety out of the box, and keeping plays in front of this defense. But that is probably a recipe for long, drawn out drives that eat up clock, wear everyone out and end up scoring and demoralizing everyone anyways… In the end I just couldn’t see what difference Niko would really make. But it is certainly a thought.

One other thing about keeping the safety in the box. It is almost typical of Shanny to endorse it, being the offensive minded coach that he is. For him, more weapons means more effectiveness. But when you have eight guys up on the line, the backers are going to need to pick through all that garbage to find their lanes and maintain them. And the more guys you stack up there, the more garbage you get. That aids the offense.

On this team right now our best “garbage players”, or guys who protect their legs and have good vision cutting through the stuff at the line, are: DJ, Winborn, Niko and Woodyard. Larsen and Webster are not very good at it, and the jury is out on Boss. For a 4-3 the minimum number of guys that should be good around the line is 3, or all of your starters. It is too important of a skill. Safeties are notoriously bad at picking through the trash, with SS usually being merely the less well rounded of the safety breed. There ARE good SS who are excellent around the LOS, like Lynch, and I believe we have one in Barrett. But usually, and I would guess this to be true of Manuel, they just tend to get caught up in the flow around the LOS if they try to play like a LB. This comes back to HT’s point of using players how they are supposed to be used, according to the positions they are good at.

Manuel may be an example of “too many cooks spoil the soup.” There is no doubt in my mind that he could be much more effective playing aggressive “over” coverage in the backfield, but that doesn’t mean the defense would be more effective, unless some other things changed as well. Bottom line is SS in the box ain’t gonna change.

It doesn’t make sense that the Broncos have an unstoppable offense and a swiss cheese pass defense. Until that is fixed, we may see more events such as the one last Sunday against San Diego: first half is ours, second half is theirs, and we may win, and we may not.

I remember when Elway-led teams got us to the SBs, but the parties ended at halftime.

even if hte Broncos don’t incorporate complex stunts, they still seem to need the “coordinating” aspect under their belts. I think it has to do with the speed they are being allowed to play at. The young guys are the hope, in my opinion, and they need to get ont he field together.

If our offense keeps doing what it is doing, and if we can establish a run to force teams to play aggressively on offense, I think the young guys will necessarily get an opportunity to make an impact, making Moss’ and Williams contributions over the next couple of weeks key.

By the end of the season, opponents should be coming into games scared and desperate before the first snap, just like NE’s opponents last year. That benefits our young D-line immensely.

I just copied what you said in my comment up above, regarding “slowing it down”. I think that the key element of the concept of “slowing” down the defense is that the front seven is responsible for the majority of hte pass rush.

To be honest I think we need a little bit more talent to make it a reality.

we didn’t trade foxy because he was worse than Paymah, but because he was better. Denver valued a roster spot more than they valued CB depth, which can certainly be qestioned, but we musn’t lose sight of the fact that several players were wating int he wings (torain, Marshall, Nalen) and that they needed to be planned for ahead of time.

No one could have anticipated Seattles’s receiver woes. I think if we had known that Colbert would be a sought after commoditie two weeks into the season we never would have traded foxy.

our defensive scheme will be playing out the thread of a storyline right up into the bye week, with a lot of our opponents getting their questions answered only AFTER we have disposed of them. While I am interested in our personnel performance up until the bye, i think after the bye we will start imposing our will on defense, and writing chapters to the 2008 saga that will have opponents on the edge of their seats…

We’re all here to help increase each others football knowledge. If you ever have some insight, or a question, you’re at the right place.

Thanks for signing on!

…“and with the greatest fans” part, lol.

But seriously, I am in awe of these guys.

And now it’s time for me to ask my weekly stupid question. Have I missed something again? What’s with the “buzz” stuff?

And first! Horseshit? I’m amazed (chuckling as he walks aways…)

The problem I have is that if you are saying yes Moss is a huge liability in the run game, then that to me constitutes a bust, I mean, who would not only use a 1st rounder and trade up for someone who can only come in on passing downs? To me, if you are picking a guy in the 1st round and 2nd round, they better be able to be more than a situational player.

I commented to you above, but I take particular notice of your reference to a “one year wonder”.

Whenver a player shows up like that, scouts pore over tehir development looking for signs that the player is on an upswing or may have been in a dominant system or on a team that supported them, in an effort to explain what is an odd phenomenon: playesrs who show up out of nowhere, like Moss.

But Gators fans will point out that he was brought in to be a true starting freshamn, and that he was about to do that whn his highschool pelvic injury got worsened, leading to a chain of events that set him back physically, developmentally, and intellectually (football wise) in a a way that would have ended many aspirants hopes for eventual success. The fact that he did what he did at the end of his career with florida (approx 20 solid games, a short span for most scouts to judge) is more a testament, then detraction. To extrapolate that success, he came in on a TERRIBLE dline last year and broke his leg. Back to square one. That he hasn’t folded completely should not be overlooked.

What scouts keyed on for moss was his speed and athleticism. They knew he would be a project, (making him a questionable first) but they also knew that he was only going to get better.

But we are in complete agreement that there is no time like the present to put him under the lights, turn up the pressure, and see how well he can work with the rest of the dline to start rattling some QBs…

sounds like moss is a pissed of mfer. Good for him.

Now go out and make me sound smart, Moss…

now is his chance to shine. I would be happy with him getting a sack, but be more happier if he was harassing Brees all day long and caused some picks. He can sound as mad as he wants, its another thing to prove it

We’re glad you’re here!

Agree that we need a solid front four if our DBs are going to excel. Let’s hope the team figures something out!

We all agree that we must figure out how to get pressure…easier said than done I guess!

I tend to agree with that. The problem is, I have zero faith in the coaching ability of whoever is in charge of the defensive line(too lazy to look up right now and i cant remembe to boot). The Giants coaches probably make far more use out of their talent on the line than we do…

Putting Moss in as a pass-rush DT was discussed several times on this site during training camp. I guess Slowick doesnt believe us! The consensu here was that DOOM is improving his run-stopping ability significantly and should remain in for more snaps. Time will tell. Thanks for the post and once again,welcome.

after brady taunted him flailing his arms after a play, like “bring it on”. lynch made him his pet female dog for the rest of the contest. safety blitzing, baby

I seem to have (perhaps) fallen for a head fake from Slowik though. We’ve heard quotes about returning to a Broncos style defense, and Slowik has a reputation for being aggressive (though we haven’t seen it in Denver). We have the make-up for a good Show Blitz system right now (less for a Zone Blitz as I had though possible going into the season), but as the article states, we really aren’t running anything with a purpose as far as I can tell. I am unable to see a unifying philosophy on defense that would make it easy to categorize. That may just be my failure to appreciate what Slowik is doing; after all, I’ve never coached at th college or pro level.

One thing will say about the prevent defense. It is often maligned, but misunderstood. Coyer’s problem (in my mind), wasn’t so much a reliance on prevents, but on failing to adjust the scheme over the course of the season. Once teams latched on, they were able to make tweaks in their own approach, but Coyer was unable to.

The prevent is not a fan favorite because it can lead to scoring. But it does have an important role when timed properly. It is also not truly a “bend don’t break” system, even though they have some things in common.

Bend Don’t Break is a game long philosophy, and not a true system. It is kind of an umbrella philopsophy that systems fall under. I myself believe in it. It holds that the pass rush should generate from the front four, that the LBs should be freed to assign to a man or zone (instead of frequent blitzes), and that the longer the offense takes to score, the more chances they have to make a mistake (like a turnover or a failure on third down). The over arching philosophy is that a team must never give up the big play, instead, keeping the offense to small gains. It is one reason that I hate the idea of keeping a safety in the box (more on that in an upcoming story by Styg and myslef).

This gets misunderstod a lot though. A lot of fans jump to the conclusion that this means the defensive coordinator is advocating small gains. Not true! He wants the offense to fail, to not score, to 3 and out. But his prime objective is to keep the offense from scoring a major play.

The “prevent” is an entirely different animal. It is like the “2 Minute Drill”. It is not a system at all. It is a program of plays and formations that is designed to prevent an opponents score in the last minute or so of a game, with the knowledge that the time left on the clock will hurt the opponent more than the yards gained. It is a very misunderstood tactic. If you are seeing a “prevent” in the third quarter, you aren’t seeing a “prevent”. A prevent is purely meant to prevent a big play that leads to a TD, because (most likely) the team on defense believes that they can run down the clock to either prevent a score, or prevent enough time to allow an onside kick to have any effect. It is also used to drain time outs from the offense, in case they might get the ball back. A true prevent defense is a rare thing.

Even the famous quote “Prevent defenses don’t win games” is taken out of context. The quote seems to disparage the concept of a prevent defense, but that’s not the real meaning. The idea behind the quote is that prevent defenses shouldn’t be used to win a game. A team should use what has worked for them throughout the game. A prevent should only be used under the correct circumstances.

I’ve not actually seen Manuel make many tackles around the LOS in the same way that Lynch did. I’ve been questioning whether we need him down there too, I don’t think we do. I see Engleberger making a lot of tackles and DJ’s usually where we need him. It’s not like we’re getting gashed up like last year…epitomised by Webster/Winborn giving MacFadden his “Welcome to the NFL” shot. That was awesome.

we would not only be vulnerable to the run, but we would be vulnerable to:

1) limited offensive opportunities, due to the other team wearing down the clock.
2) exhausted defensive players, due to the other team wearing us down with their backs

But one must ask: Lots of teams rely on just their front seven to get it done, so why not us? Are we that much worse up front than most teams? i don’t think we are and I think the coaches are being overly conservative. But they are getting us W’s, so I am certainly not questioning their decision.

His speed and quickness might also help prevent big gains on screen passes, draws, etc. when the defense is laying back and trying to prevent, um, big gains.

I had to laugh at that, it is just so true. I had a thought about holding out Moss. Both weeks he was held out, we activated an extra DT, Clemons in week 1 and Shaw in week 2. Now we activate an outside pass rush. While it may be run vs. pass, it may also be known vs. unknown. However it still reflects poorly on Moss.

Another thing it indicates is that the coaches were hoping that they had more depth at DT, which is a sign that they aren’t real happy with the production, or that they see something that worries them.

Perhaps I am just rationalizing the Shaw activation. Was he really one of the most apropos 45 for the San Diego game??

Then a Safety. :)

then I have to agree with you. Otherwise, the Broncos just must focus on pass rush until they have that right. The LBs and safeties are good enough, IMO. The DLs are not, at least in the form of pass rushers.

but he over pursued on the two big kick off returns. I am always watchin for Woodyard. ;)

by Super7. One possiblity is that he might get thrown in as the 4th LB instead of misusing the safety there.

He is a tough player to get on the field, but I am in total agreement that they really need to get creative, and find a way.

He could be the Royal of the defense.

The site contributers do a great job, but the members (through their observations and questions) provide the real meat for the impact of the articles. For instance, you can learn a little bit from my reloading season “MHR University” articles, but you can learn much more from reading the comments.