Why is the defense much better the past 2 games?

Clove

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I think it's a combination of removing dead weight, and guys getting used to the new scheme. Gregory is a huge upgrade to what we had, he can actually play the 3-4 OLB position. And Tank has been a beast lately, he's becoming an animal again. BTW, Gallimore is my new addiction.
 

G2

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I guess I mistook your omission of Smith's huge penalty as you trying to absolve him of blame. If I misunderstood your intentions, I apologize.
No problem. Smith is a joke. No reason he should be a captain, screw up on plays on top of his penalties and them go look "his defense" in the eye and call defensive plays.
 

TheMarathonContinues

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No problem. Smith is a joke. No reason he should be a captain, screw up on plays on top of his penalties and them go look "his defense" in the eye and call defensive plays.
You know I like Jaylon the person. The football player is frustrating but I'm not gonna attack him personally. But the biggest cringe is watching your defense overachieve and the only one holding them back with stupidity is the captain. I wish no ill intent on him but I really hope he sees some form of disciplinary action. Sure he's a great guy but he's not leading by example.
 

jrumann59

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Sure the defense looked a little better. But that wasn't the case in the 4th quarter. I understand some players were injured, but that's when you adjust your scheme to fit. We didn't do that. Nolan ran the same defensive formation regardless. And Ben R. picked us apart.
Also, I'm getting sick and tired of all of these undisciplined and stupid penalties that spoon feeds the opposing offense. Go ahead and blame the refs for LVE, Gregory etc....handing over 1st downs.
Diggs foot injury really made it easy for Ben to pick on S. Smith
 

Ranched

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It's obvious the entire team is improving. It takes time. This team will be much better next season.
 

G2

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You know I like Jaylon the person. The football player is frustrating but I'm not gonna attack him personally. But the biggest cringe is watching your defense overachieve and the only one holding them back with stupidity is the captain. I wish no ill intent on him but I really hope he sees some form of disciplinary action. Sure he's a great guy but he's not leading by example.
I honestly love the guy, but he looks lost too often. The roughing the passing penalty, in my opinion, was pretty ticky-tack. The pass interference penalty was just a numb-skull play by Smith.
 

G2

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Diggs foot injury really made it easy for Ben to pick on S. Smith
My point was he could literally pick a side to throw to based on the coverage. One safety works on occasion, not over and over.
 

RonnieT24

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I honestly love the guy, but he looks lost too often. The roughing the passing penalty, in my opinion, was pretty ticky-tack. The pass interference penalty was just a numb-skull play by Smith.

It wasn't PI it was illegal contact. And if you watch it again the dude ran right at him and Jaylon just instinctively put his hands up and pushed him .. He could keep his hands up, stand there and let the receiver run over him but even that doesn't guarantee the refs don't flag him.
 

jrumann59

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I honestly love the guy, but he looks lost too often. The roughing the passing penalty, in my opinion, was pretty ticky-tack. The pass interference penalty was just a numb-skull play by Smith.
if he would have blocked him into a diffrent direction instead of knocking him down I do not think that gets called. IT is one of those calls I think the NFL does not want teams to level other receivers within 5 yards of the ball even though technically its allowed.
 

gjkoeppen

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The defense has been much better the past 2 games.

It coincides with these 3 playing a high percentage of the snaps.

CB Brown

DE Gregory

LB Vander Esch


Also: Woods, Hamilton & Ankou replacing Poe's snaps on run downs. (just 1 game for Ankou)




I think this certainly plays into it but I also think something Romo started to say last night but got cut off because the play was starting is part of it too. Romo started to say that the Cowboys weren't running the same defense as and that was as far as he got. I think what he was going to say it wasn't the same defense as what they had been playing. I think the past couple of weeks Nolan finally caught on that calling all those strange different alignments to try to fool the offense on what the defense was going to do wasn't working and went to an alignment that better fit the players he had.
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G2

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It wasn't PI it was illegal contact. And if you watch it again the dude ran right at him and Jaylon just instinctively put his hands up and pushed him .. He could keep his hands up, stand there and let the receiver run over him but even that doesn't guarantee the refs don't flag him.
It was Smiths fault he got penalized. He was a step behind as usual.
 

Stash

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No problem. Smith is a joke. No reason he should be a captain, screw up on plays on top of his penalties and them go look "his defense" in the eye and call defensive plays.

Agreed. And again, my apologies for my earlier misunderstanding.
 

robjay04

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The problem I have with Poe is the people playing Poe. No one said you had to play Poe! Evaluation is ongoing

Probably the owner meddling again.

For reasons that we don’t discuss here, Jerry might’ve felt obligated to not demote him or abruptly cut him to avoid bad press. Once it was clear that his release was based on his ability, he was gone.
 

rnr_honeybadger

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at least they try to make something happen in the return game, right? (why was that so hard?)
Greg has taken the kicking to something better than a 50/50 proposition.

ST was an after thought here after Parcells departed. When was the last time we had two returns like that? I know one of them was negated by that block in the back but the block only happened towards the end of the run. The second run was an absolute beauty the kid hit the hole and just took off.
 

kskboys

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I think it's a combination of removing dead weight, and guys getting used to the new scheme. Gregory is a huge upgrade to what we had, he can actually play the 3-4 OLB position. And Tank has been a beast lately, he's becoming an animal again. BTW, Gallimore is my new addiction.
Tank was always a beast. What you're seeing is that he now has some talent around him so the other team can't negate him.

No one is great alone in football.
 

Fredbeard

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Because we played 2 teams in the bottom ten of the league and got away with 2 huge PI’s and a face mask on a critical 4th and 1. I wouldn’t read too much into it.
True. I think the steelers had the league's sixteenth ranked rushing offense prior to yesterday's game. Hopefully , the defense improves but it is too soon to tell
 

starfan1

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You forgot to mention Jaylon Smith's foolish swat at Rothlesberger's head which turned a fourth down and punt into a fresh set of downs. On the drive where the Steelers ultimately took the game-winning lead.
ya I know that was the right call but so ticky tack (and stupid) and when i watched them let New Orleans do it to Brady and not call it and it seemed more egregious I was thinking to myself that's so 2020
 
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