Is Defensive Coordinator, Brian Stewart, our weakest link?

[AMERICAS_FAN]

Is Defensive Coordinator, Brian Stuart, our weakest link?
I would say so. I know Wade Phillips has his hands on the defensive scheme, but that's Stuart out there calling those soft zones on game-day.

It just seemed that many times when Philly needed a quick score or big-chunk of yardage, they got it. This happened much too often for my liking and it was because we were always playing in the wrong formation giving Philly's zone-offense the open-zones they seemed to always need.

It was quite reminiscent of how the Giants got big chunks of yards against our defense in last year's playoffs. So I'm starting to think that this has much less to do with the players and much more to do with the Defensive Coordinator responsible for still calling the wrong defensive sets.

In the end, it seems like since the playoffs there has been no adjustment in scheme.

Your thoughts?

 

[btcutter]

Another D coordinator issue????

Mike Zimmer and now Stewart??? Was it Campo before that???

Are we sure it the D coordinator???? Why isn't it the PLAYERS who isn't performing or perhaps our HEADCOACH??

 

[CrazyCowboy]

someone needs to take the heat.

 

[GimmeTheBall!]

Is Defensive Coordinator, Brian Stuart, our weakest link?
I would say so. I know Wade Phillips has his hands on the defensive scheme, but that's Stuart out there calling those soft zones on game-day.

It just seemed that many times when Philly needed a quick score or big-chunk of yardage, they got it. This happened much too often for my liking and it was because we were always playing in the wrong formation giving Philly's zone-offense the open-zones they seemed to always need.

It was quite reminiscent of how the Giants got big chunks of yards against our defense in last year's playoffs. So I'm starting to think that this has much less to do with the players and much more to do with the Defensive Coordinator responsible for still calling the wrong defensive sets.

In the end, it seems like since the playoffs there has been no adjustment in scheme.

Your thoughts?

Stew cannot make adjustments. And his soft zone is killing us, both in the opponents' passing and the ground games.
With all the points the defense is giving up, thank goodness for Jason Garrett's high-scoring offense!!!
Wade, save us from Stew.

 

[BigDinAZ]

Who are our options? I'll make the phone calls

 

[Doomsday]

Wade has to take the heat on the defensive side of the ball he is suppose to be a defensive guru.

The game plan on defense is way too soft in my opinion, I dont see how you can give up 5 and 6 yards without a fight and expect to be a good defensive team. If we are going to play our Safeties 20 yards back why are the corners also 10 yards back? My god are we that bad at covering the deep ball that we need to play that soft or get burned?

 

[CarlJohnson]

Stew cannot make adjustments. And his soft zone is killing us, both in the opponents' passing and the ground games.
Wade, get Stew out of there.

Cant make adjustments? I would think halftime adjustments is the reason the defense only gave up 7 pts in the second half. I think allof this defense bashing is a bit premature. Romo handed em 7, the refs handed em 7(pi call). And Romo's pick in our own territory didnt help the defense either. I initially thought we would play more man D and get more pressure on the qb too. But maybe pacman's rust and newmans injury, and jenkins and scandriks inexperience plays a role. Maybe we're not quite ready to come out of the soft zone yet. I dont know, but im not ready to throw the D and D coordinators under the bus yet. :bang2:

 

[theogt]

Cant make adjustments? I would think halftime adjustments is the reason the defense only gave up 7 pts in the second half.

Hello.

 

[Boysboy]

Cant make adjustments? I would think halftime adjustments is the reason the defense only gave up 7 pts in the second half. I think allof this defense bashing is a bit premature. Romo handed em 7, the refs handed em 7(pi call). And Romo's pick in our own territory didnt help the defense either. I initially thought we would play more man D and get more pressure on the qb too. But maybe pacman's rust and newmans injury, and jenkins and scandriks inexperience plays a role. Maybe we're not quite ready to come out of the soft zone yet. I dont know, but im not ready to throw the D and D coordinators under the bus yet. :bang2:

If you take out Romo's gift INT to Samuels, his fumble in the end zone, that opening kickoff out of bounds, and other mistakes early in the game, we would have cruised to a double digit win.

Pt being that forget about our D, in football, the momentum of the game can really change in a heartbeat. Once we let the Eagles back in the game with Romo's 2 costly mistakes, it all but gave them life, and BOOM, their offense came to life all of a sudden.

 

[Xy_Oldone]

Well we held Philly to two field goals. Then because of an interception they got the ball in our territory and might have only gotten another field goal if not for a bad PI call.

Then they got thier next touch down because of a fumble in the endzone.

I might be the only one here who thinks so but I do not think our defence did such a bad job. Just my opinion.

 

[Boysboy]

Well we held Philly to two field goals. Then because of an interception they got the ball in our territory and might have only gotten another field goal if not for a bad PI call.

Then they got thier next touch down because of a fumble in the endzone.

I might be the only one here who thinks so but I do not think our defence did such a bad job. Just my opinion.

Remember the second Buffalo Super Bowl-the Bills were controlling the tempo of that game throughout that first half. They kept our offense out of sync(only 2 FGs, one came as a result of a long KR), and their offense kept moving the chains, until...

Leon Lett stripped Thurman Thomas and the fumble was returned for a TD. From there, our offense just sprouted to life.

Yeah-sometimes we have to watch our mistakes b/c in this game b/c even one little one can really turn around the momentum in a big way.

 

[jobberone]

Good Lord. The D played like they asked them to do. And played with intensity and heart. Some of you think they can call Dial-a-sack.

The first half for the most part we played to contain McNabb and limit Westbrook. Guys had to stay in their lanes. They could not just rush the passer whatever it takes. You cannot do that with McNabb.

To the coaches credit they changed up some in the second half. Guess what? Although McNabb started that run around and complete a pass in 10 seconds stuff and running for yardage, they got some sacks and put some pressure on him. Enough to force some bad passes and win the game.

McNabb is a huge problem and he's one reason why Philly has a great team. Just like Romo makes or breaks this team.

Not saying the D can't improve. Hey, were playing one CB who was out a year. I don't care how good an athlete you are AJ is having problems getting his groove back although he's made great and fast growth. He's also in a new system getting used to new teammates. Even playing on a different field makes a difference. Jenkins is a rookie. Takes time. Newman is still hurt. He's so good he can do fairly well hurt but he's not 100%. And our safeties are not world beaters despite Pro Bowl elections. Hamlin is not a Brian Dawkins (yeah they play different types of safeties but pass defense is pass defense). You get the idea. The soft defense is exactly what was needed with those guys on the field. Right now. Let them all get more comfortable and well before we start playing it tighter.

We have a world class D.

Calling for Stewart's head or anyone else's is just ridiculous after two games esp two wins.

 

[NextGenBoys]

Just curious, with all this talk of soft zones, has anyone ever seen a hard zone?

There's ALWAYS going to be soft spots in zone coverage. Deal with it. Good QB's find the soft spots. When you blitz like we do, there are going to be more soft spots in response to less players in coverage.

With that being said, if we played man, there is going to be less, if any safety help. So we're going to be playing alot of one on one, and while we do have athletic players, one on one is always favorable to the offense.

So while I do wish we would mix it up more with man to man, we need to stop whining about all this soft zone crap. You cant have it both ways. You want to blitz? Fine, but if the rush doesnt get there and the QB is decent enough, he will find the soft spot in the zone and make the pass. It isn't on Stewart, Phillips, or the players. It's football. It's a chess match. You're not going to have a perfect play call every time. Deal with it.

 

[jobberone]

Just curious, with all this talk of soft zones, has anyone ever seen a hard zone?

There's ALWAYS going to be soft spots in zone coverage. Deal with it. Good QB's find the soft spots. When you blitz like we do, there are going to be more soft spots in response to less players in coverage.

With that being said, if we played man, there is going to be less, if any safety help. So we're going to be playing alot of one on one, and while we do have athletic players, one on one is always favorable to the offense.

So while I do wish we would mix it up more with man to man, we need to stop whining about all this soft zone crap. You cant have it both ways. You want to blitz? Fine, but if the rush doesnt get there and the QB is decent enough, he will find the soft spot in the zone and make the pass. It isn't on Stewart, Phillips, or the players. It's football. It's a chess match. You're not going to have a perfect play call every time. Deal with it.

Thank you.

 

[Don Corleone]

So we had a sub-par 1st half on defense on Monday night. Big deal!

We played one of the best QBs to lace 'em up over the past decade. When you play a good team, you will give up yards and points. Nextgen said it best, it is a chess match.

We aren't the Baltimore Ravens of 2000 with a shutdown defense. The Ravens of 2000 weren't lucky enough to have our style of offense though. The regular season is 16 games long. Let's see how this goes before we indict the defense.

 

[theogt]

So we had a sub-par 1st half on defense on Monday night. Big deal!

We played one of the best QBs to lace 'em up over the past decade. When you play a good team, you will give up yards and points. Nextgen said it best, it is a chess match.

We aren't the Baltimore Ravens of 2000 with a shutdown defense. The Ravens of 2000 weren't lucky enough to have our style of offense though. The regular season is 16 games long. Let's see how this goes before we indict the defense.

Actually, it was just the one quarter. The other 7 quarters we've played this season have been pretty dominant.

 

[Don Corleone]

Actually, it was just the one quarter. The other 7 quarters we've played this season have been pretty dominant.

True, and we made our share of mistakes on special teams and offense to keep the score close (opening kickoff going out of bounds, Romo's INT, Romo's endzone fumble).

People too often react to the final score and say, "Wow, our defense must suck if we only won by 4 points in a high scoring game."

We've had far worse defensive performances against McNabb and the Eagles over the years. Me personally, I'll take this defensive performance against what was a fired up Eagles team.

We adjusted well in the 2nd half, and it showed. How many times did we complain about the lack of defensive adjustments at the half when Parcells and Zimmer were at the helm? Too many to count based on my recollection.

 

[nrobi316]

I totally agree with you. Something just isn't right. Why trade and draft these supposedly dynamic cornerbacks if they are scared of getting beat deep. All these pro bowlers on the defense and we are playing this soft zone crap. Someone needs to explain themselves.

 

[ConstantReboot]

This defense needs to be fixed talk is getting out of hand. I for one think that our defense did pretty well. They could of course do better but I don't see why people are all up in arms on how this game means doom for our defense and that we need to do something fast to fix it.

We had 4 sacks against one of the best and biggest lines in football. We could have had more if it weren't for McNabb escaping. McNabb is built like a fullback so his pretty tough to take down.

Next for most of the game we limited their passing to short, dump off passes. Except that bomb to Jackson I think we help the long ball in check forcing McNabb to throw short.

We were getting pretty good pressure with just 3 or even a 4 man rush. There wasn't many openings for McNabb to go to so he mainly went with alot of dump offs.

Lastly, we adjusted. Come on stop with the bashing on Stuart. He adjusted at half time and did pretty well. Especially those two last possessions that the Eagles had. Our defense actually stopped a good offense from scoring.

 

[nrobi316]

Welcome to forum.