Day after: Have we addressed our biggest weakness?
by ShyandObese on May 1, 2011 7:38 PM MDT
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The draft is done and our team has some new talent to play with. We can all agree that the defense was terrible last year right? Many of us our quick to assume that our defensive tackles were the main issue. I think that is a little misguided. Defensive Line is definitively a major issue. But it is not our greatest weakness per-say. I think we can agree that Bannan played solid, and J-Will had his moments. Thomas looked impressive at times. There weren't numerous bad players on the defensive line. Our biggest issue was, by far, lack of pass rush. Followed closely by missed tackles.
Our biggest liabilities last year were as follows:
1. Brain Dawkins
Let me start by saying he is a great person and WAS a great player. He slipped a lot this past year. Our greatest liability in our starting defensive formation. Can't cover Tight ends anymore and can't be trusted to make ANY tackles in the open field. He was a great liability for us. He personally turned a close game, one which we had momentum early, into a blowout. 11-22-10. San Diego California. Just one of the worst performance by a safety. I had flashbacks of Manuel and Mcree. If he is back on the team, and plays I will be watching him closely because that's where the offense coordinators will attack.
2. Mario Haggan
via photos.upi.com
10/24/10 Never Forget
Many MHR fans have this terrible habit of involving personal aspects of ones life in their evaluation to play football. People were so happy to see D.J. Williams slip up with the DUI and many want him off the team. Foolishness. Our worst Linebacker happens to be a great guy. Mario Haggan was responsible for a lot of the points you saw in the raiders games and the chargers games. He is the polar opposite to LB Mike Mohamed we just drafted. No field awareness. Falls for fakes, constantly out of position and lacks way to much speed in pursuit. He makes great plays (KC) but he completely misses other times. He is a backup and a great ST player. That's it.
One of the worst players in the NFL. He played bad even in the pre-season. Against 3rd string. He is just terrible.
3. Ryan Mcbean
Anybody who watches this guy could tell you. The thing is I thought he did well last year.
4. Nate Jones
Another versatile player who will play bad in multiple positions.
Now with these liabilities look at the players we got. We have a lot of help in places we struggled. Granted we needed new LB's anyway for the new scheme but still.
This is a Fan-Created Comment on MileHighReport.com. The opinion here is not necessarily shared by the editorial staff of MHR
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The Answer to the Poll:
D.J Williams.
Von Miller ran a 4.49 at his Pro Day.
by ShyandObese on May 1, 2011 7:47 PM MDT reply actions 1 recs
Wow.
"Nothing in the world can take the place of Persistence. Talent will not; nothing is more common than unsuccessful men with talent. Genius will not; unrewarded genius is almost a proverb. Education will not; the world is full of educated derelicts. Persistence and determination alone are omnipotent. The slogan 'Press On' has solved and always will solve the problems of the human race." - Calvin Coolidge
Nice Shy!!!!!
One thing is for sure, the athleticism of the Bronco D will be on full display – now we need to go acquire some immovable beef!!!!
"When Tim Tebow does pushups, he's not pushing himself up, he's pushing the world down."
"Gear down there big shifter This is the "No Bull" review man…" a total Lebowski-esque one liner from Sadaraine, whether he realizes it or not - comedic gold.
True I like some of the guys Im seeing in Free agency
and another “glass full” way to look at it is we will probably get much more production from a veteran defensive lineman than we would of a rookie.
Putting Dawk before jones, oline errors, bad rbs, zero dline ain’t right. Dude is NOT our worst player, not even close.
Out of our starting Line up he is easily the biggest liability.
Jones isn’t a starting safety. He is an average nickel corner or a terrible safety. Not in our starting lineup. Give me the names my dude I’m talking about individual players who consistently sucked.
Our worst player is Russ Hochstein a backup linemen. Our worst starting player is Brian Dawkins.
All DT’s? The love for Vickerson is only because he made a handful of plays, sometimes. And he’s our best? Thomas has had multiple years and has played on multiple terrible d’s, terrible front 7’s, terrible dlines. Our DE’s weren’t good. If our LB’s were so good, why did we need huge upgrades?
I fully agree Dawk did not play at his Pro Bowl/possible HoF standard. I fully agree he’s aged. Calling him our worst before.. Haggan? Some of our oline? TE? I mean… tight end…
lol Tight ends were not a liability for us. They didnt cost us. Dawkins play did.
Thomas hasn’t been starting for “multiple years” and actually played pretty well last year. Bannan played solid. None of our DT’s were consistently a liability. We had some trouble with the bean and Fields no doubt but they didn’t cost us like Dawkins did. Haggan also did not cost us the same way Dawkins did. He made a lot of terrible mistakes but he made good ones mixed in as well. He was bad but not as bad especially when you consider that he was meant to be a backup.
In Vickerson’s limited role he did some things. But you have a serious misunderstanding that I’m starting to get. Our Defensive lineman are not “the best”. They just aren’t liabilities like Brian Dawkins. They didn’t do amazing things but they were solid. Our LB’s were bad, mostly backups. Hunter failed at setting the edge at times (SF game) but a lot of the times he was our only pass rush. Ayers was hurt half the season and Haggan sucked which is why I mentioned him.
Dawkins constantly played bad. Watch the Colts, Ravens, Niners, and please watch the Chargers and Rams games. He was attacked by Offensive coordinates. This is a player who has lost more than a step in coverage. Out of Our starting lineup, he is the biggest liability I’m afraid. Its very unfortunate but its the truth.
Bannan played "solid"?
On the worst run defense in the league, nobody on that D-line deserves “solid” grade. Some sucked all the time, some did OK occasionally. That’s it. Vickerson is a backup. Bannan was OK, not solid. It is impossible to have individual players with a solid game to combine to such a complete disaster.
Bannan was "OK" lol. To me thats the same thing as solid. Lets just say he did okay then. Vick did "OK". Dawkins still did terrible.
The fact is, at least on the defensive side of the ball we had a lot of injuries and issues that cost us. But was Bannan a liability? Did teams specifically attack him because of a weakness? Could he not do his job well enough to be a liability on the field? Ask the same thing about Vickerson.
The fact of the matter is, we probably had bad play from I think just about every defensive player on our team at one point (If you want to throw in Bailey’s play against Bowe in the end of the KC game but that was prevent in garbage time). But consistency is the key And here lies the problem. This wasn’t just a one game thing with these players. This was a consistent streak sub-par performance.
Our dline was consistently horrible, our oline couldn’t run block, our backs were terrible, our TE’s nonexistent, and you chose Dawk because when he messes up it’s a big play. Well, 12 seconds to throw, for the 25th time enemy running back is untouched 20 yards down the field, etc etc makes Dawk look bad. I feel Dawk refused you an autograph and you’ve got vendetta-juice flowing.
I screamed DAWK! whenever we needed a medic (to clean up all the problems) and when Dawk was healthy, DAWK would hawk in and save the day. Again, he’s lost something but you have iterated NO facts, other than ‘he sucks always’. Bah.
Bannan was by far the best d-lineman
Don’t be surprised when they bring him back to play 1 tech. He’s great at 2-gap. Vickerson will be his backup.
You also need a collective shame shout-out to the TEs, all three of which were horrible in 2010. Dan “stone hands” Graham, Rich “false start” Quinn and Dan “the only untalented” Gronkowski.
ConradA to me "You should actually watch a Broncos game from a critical point of view. Put away the orange and blue glasses for a game and watch." Maybe I'll try that sometime Conrad, but I'm not sure I'm ready for that just yet.
Each time you post a comment McG it's better than the last!! Kudos
The QB position is set!
by broncofaninIL on May 1, 2011 9:52 PM MDT up reply actions
It was a bad thing, not a good thing.
It’s wasn’t that we didn’t want to use our TEs. It was that we couldn’t use them because they sucked and would constantly fail us. And that was a HUGE problem for our 2010 offense.
Welcome to Denver Von Miller.
I don't recall using them any more in the 2009 offense
I don’t think it was a huge part of Mcdaniels scheme. And in the end whatever harm it did, it was minuscule compared to the above mentioned.
I disagree with your degree of statements
Graham wasn’t that bad. Gronk wasn’t that bad. But, Quinn is simply terrible. He can’t block as advertised and he certainly can’t separate. He is the epitome of McDaniels ego issues.
There are probably 1/2 a dozen [layers on this rost that won't be on the next.
McBean, Thomas and Bannan playing in wrong system? IMO, McBean isn’t a bad player, he is a servicable DE/DT…Will we try to retain him under Fox/Allen’s system? He might fit quite well with what they want to do, IDK…Thomas I think will be retained if he chooses to and his performance was better in 2010 than in 2009. I still think he is more fited to the 4/3 system than what he played the last 2 years. Bannan who started his NFL career on a 4/3 team (Buffalo) was picked up by the Ravens to be a roational player on 3/4. Logical reason why the Broncos picked him up in FA…Better suited for 4/3? Again, IDK. In the AFC West we need DTs who can disrupt the offensive line and stop the run because it is a run heavy conference as of late…They have to take on double teams and open up lanes for the DEs and LBs…We’ll see.
Yeah even in the wrong system 2 of those guys played alright.
McBean did really well in 09 and I had high hopes for him but he regressed a lot last year.
Thomas was good and Bannan was solid. Scheme was a big thing for many players (OL, DL, LB’s)
Dawk is a great leader
But not a great player, and while I agree that he should stick around, I don’t want him setting foot on the field on a passing down.
I am a bear of very little brains and big words bother me.
And I love the guy
And wouldn’t mind having him on the roster, but on passing downs, Moore and Hill are the prototypical Cover 2 tandem, and will do a great job shutting down any big play. Carter coming in to stack the box sometimes and we’ll be set.
I am a bear of very little brains and big words bother me.
Gotta agree with you
The missed tackles were infuriating.
You're killin me smalls ;)
Dawkins is a liability in coverage but an amazing asset in run support. He’s much better than you give him credit for, even today and next season. I agree with the other guys.
I hate to speak badly about a Bronco, but Mario Haggan had people, even up to a month ago, talking about how he was a great linebacker and that we’d keep him as a solid starting linebacker. I think some people need to walk around in pantyhose for that one. Haggan was a bad linebacker for a really bad defense. Adding on to that, he fits in this new system as a linebacker like a chicken fits back into the egg. It’s just an ugly thought.
Von. Doom. Pow!
Its funny you should say that when the picture up there completly disagrees with that statement
From a tackling standpoint he hasn’t lost much ability. Even if all he lost was speed that would be fine. The biggest thing is he lost his lateral movement and coordination. He’s getting stuck in the mud when 5-6 years ago he was already in mid flight taking someone’s head off. He lost a lot of his athleticism and no wonder, he is nearly 40 years old. He breaks down slow and can’t change direction as well as a safety should. One of the strong safeties main job is to cover the tight end. I don’t know if there was a safety in the NFL who did a worse job at this than Dawkins. Specifically, I’m talking about the SF, SD, and St. Louis games. Utterly abused.
Dawkins might be on the team next year. Who knows maybe he’ll take a pay cut or something. I guarantee you he won’t play anywhere near as much as he did this season. Dawkin’s is a prime case of bias. He was such a great player and we all want to believe he is weapon X and all that. Realistically, watch the games from a pure perspective. #20 is a liability. We will see soon enough how it plays out but its very clear how he did this past season.
Thanks for the scouting assesment
Did you really just use a single picture to suggest it shows that I’m wrong? -)
I could come back and give my own scouting assessment, but let’s be honest… I’m not a scout, and nobody cares.
So instead of just saying I think your ideas on Dawk are wack (smiley face)… I did a quick lookup of some numbers to better illustrate my point. Here are some quick hits…
1. In the 11 games Dawkins started last year, we gave up about 4.0-YPC. In the five games he didn’t start, we gave up 5.7 YPC. With Dawkins starting, we ranked about 10th in YPC. Without him, we ranked 32nd – and it wasn’t even close, we would have ranked 107th had there been 107 teams.
2. We gave up 123 yards per game with Dawkins starting. We gave up 223 yards per game without him starting.
3. The Broncos gave up 185 rushing yards, or more, in four of the five games in which Dawkins didn’t start.
4. The Raiders averaged 156 rushing yards per game last year; They averaged 296 rushing yards against us, but just 135 yards against other opponents. The Broncos single handedly made the Raiders a top-five rushing team. Brian Dawkins didn’t start against the Raiders.
5. Jamal Charles was held to 41 yards in the game Brian Dawkins started; he racked up about three times that amount in the game Dawkins didn’t start.
6. Guys like TIm Hightower had career days (148 yards) against the Broncos with Dawkins out, while guys like Sproles and Chris Johnson produced embarassing numbers with him in (14 and 53 yards respectively).
Brian Dawkins is still a truly great asset to this team. His deficiencies in coverage are much the same as Elvis Dumervil’s deficiencies in run support – each man is good enough at one thing that we’re willing to deal with the other thing. Dawkins shouldn’t be put in coverage situations where possible, but he should remain a Bronco. And I’m glad about that.
Von. Doom. Pow!
This is funny. You skewed the stats to show your own opinion.
Brian Dawkins is a great asset on this team…as a leader not a player.
I hope you don’t truly believe that if we had Brian Dawkins our run defense would be good. Like I stated consistently throughout this post, injuries and scheme hurt us more than any player did. That being said out of our starting line up, Brian Dawkins is the biggest liability.
Guys like Darren sproles produced embarrassing numbers his entire season. This is very sneaky dude. He had trouble getting yards not because of Dawkins, but because his backup Mike Tolbert was to busy getting 111 yards on the ground and another 42 through the air (most he had all year). In addition to that they had another half back Ryan Mathews, gain 120 yards on us through the ground (most he had all year). What about Crayton, 117 yards (most all year) or Jacoby Jones 115 yards (most all year). I could add frank gore and Dwayne Bowe but I regress.
You bring up games like KC where we were up 35-0 before the half. It would be hard to find anyone who played bad in those games.
The fact of the matter is Brian Dawkins has lost athletic ability. He still has the love of the fans, and is a wonderful person and leader. We will see soon enough how it plays out but like I said, I will be surprised if he plays more than he did this past year. My guess is he will be asked for a pay cut and stay on the team.
Well maybe I eschewed the wording a little
Maybe I shouldn’t have mentioned Sproles as if he were important. That was probably a mistake that took away from the point.
Brian Dawkins was sorely missed while he was out, though. Four of five games with him out, we gave up 185 yards or more. That’s insane. That says it’s not just the Raiders having career games that eschewed the statistics, it was nearly every game. 123 yards with him in versus 223 yards with him out? THat’s also insane.
And again, I’m not using these stats to form an opinion, I’m just using them to support the opinion I already had. Brian Dawkins is an asset to this team.
At the end of the day, one of us will be right. If he’s the liability you see him as… he won’t return. If he’s the asset I say he is… he will return. Now we can twist that and make qualifying statements to help save face, but at the end of the day, the team isn’t going to pay him, even at a discounted rate, to start for this team… if he’s not the best player to do so. I say he is. For one more year, I say we need his run-thump. We shall see..
Von. Doom. Pow!
Haggan played well enough
that he should have some trade value when the market opens. We could send him to a 3-4 team for a 5th or 6th I bet. Based on the way the Broncos drafted this year extra lates could be great.
I still like him as a special teamer or in a backup role. But if we can get a 5th for him that would be excellent.
Jeremy Beal, a player we just drafted reminds me a bit of haggan.
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