Just back from game, thoughts

[Doomsday]

The UGLY:
1) Vjerk kicking off, its short and sometimes ugly. I was sitting about 5 yards from his sideline kicking net and told him about it, as did some other folks nearby.

Ahh yes nothing better then be heckled by your own fans.

 

[joseephuss]

dude look closer at carrs numbers, they are all in garbage time, the second half of blowouts.

That is not entirely true. Sure he has some big numbers in the 4th quarter. Except for TD passes, his first half numbers are better than his second half numbers. Same number of completion in the 1st half as the 2nd half on less attempts. More yards and less interceptions in the 1st half than the 2nd half. He has a very strong 1st quarter of the game and decent 2nd quarter. His 3rd quarter numbers stink and then he faces loose defenses in the 4th quarter to get his numbers back up. Not a great QB, nor a great offense, but Dallas did shut them down.

 

[ghst187]

If you were in the stadium you should have realized as I did that the game planwas for the ball to come out quick for us and under no circumstances was bledsoe to take chances, if need be throw the ball away and play another down.

That is what he did all day, jones ran well and the defense and the special teams kept the game in check with good field position until we finally wore there small defense down.

As far as the pass rush goes. Did you watch the game closely? We left both our safeties deep almost every play and never blitzed. We never came after carr because everything was coming out on the third or 5th step because they cant protect him any longer.

The whole game plan defensively yesterday was
A. Keep carr in the pocket and dont let him scramble
B. Keep moulds and johnson's catches in front of us, nothing big or deep.
C. Make them drive the whole field and wait for them to make mistakes.

On offense it was
A. Run the ball
B. Protect the ball, no risky passes
C. Run the ball.

There is no reason to dog our defense today, saying we didnt have a pass rush that is all well and good and there were a few times we did send ware and ellis but the ball was coming out underneath and fast so that is tough. The rest of the game ware and ellis were walking out and covering wr and containing carr in the pocket.

I saw and understood the gameplan. Roy was 20 yards back on almost every play. About half the defensive plays he didn't even move much because the play was far away from him. I figured that had to do a lot with Watkins getting scorched last week and Roy staying back to help deep.
Yes, I realized that we didn't blitz any.
HOWEVER, Ware and Ellis were sent after Carr on plenty of plays and I'm not saying they didn't play well but they didn't end up even sniffing him. Great defenses don't have to blitz to get pressure and a few sacks. We shouldn't have to either, esp with our DB roster. Ware should be able to beat his man at least 2-3x per game and hit or sack the QB. He wasn't getting doubled all that much that I noticed. Even if he was, I'd still expect him to get to the QB at least a few times per game. Same for Ellis.

As far as no risky passes.....?!?! gimme a break! All passes with Bledsoe are risky. Also, why didn't we run a screen or two then?
How risky is a fade to TO? not very. I don't think a fly route to a TO left one-on-one is all that risky either unless its underthrown. We called it and DB threw it to TG 2x despite TG getting doubled on one of them. That same play, and many others, TO was left one-on-one on the other side of the field. No way he can be covered like that. I remember thinking the Texans must be more concerned with stopping TG since we don't throw it to TO that much.

I understood the gameplan but I know the talent that we have on this team and I really feel that we should be getting more out of it. We should've been up 24-3 at half instead of down 3-6 to one of the worst teams in the league. Doesn't seem like we put players in positions to have maximum success...(see any passrusher post-Charles Haley). Doesn't seem like we can sack anyone without blitzing and usually max blitzing. Doesn't seem like we know how to use one of the most heavily weaponed passing offenses in the league. Doesn't seem like we're ready to play half the time. Doesn't seem like we are playing to our talent level. So its frustrating to see New Orleans play like a playoff caliber team with the garbage they have for talent, some of which are guys who couldn't even make our roster. And they beat the best team in our division a week after Philly beats us. I can't imagine what the NO staff would do with our talented roster. Heck Payton would have every player off of it if he could. And we all know he'd be starting Romo, who may not have the arm strength of DB but is much more mobile, exciting, and seems to have a better feel for where guys are supposed to be. Bledsoe would've gotten sacked on both plays that Romo threw. Some Houston guy was bearing down on Romo both times.
Anyway, maybe its BP and Payton who are the difference maybe its the coaching staffs, I don't know. But what I'm saying is that New Orleans and a few other teams are doing a lot more with a lot less. And also, they don't have to suffer through Bledsoe stinking game after game.

One other thing I forgot to mention.....
PENALTIES!!! We should not have so many penalties game after game. I don't know how many we finished with but I remember 3x facemask penalties on ONE DRIVE ALONE which allowed Houston to get a first and goal at about the 5. Fortunately we stuffed them and they kicked a FG.
Penalties however, are a direct reflection of coaching.

 

[joseephuss]

I saw and understood the gameplan. Roy was 20 yards back on almost every play. About half the defensive plays he didn't even move much because the play was far away from him. I figured that had to do a lot with Watkins getting scorched last week and Roy staying back to help deep.
Yes, I realized that we didn't blitz any.
HOWEVER, Ware and Ellis were sent after Carr on plenty of plays and I'm not saying they didn't play well but they didn't end up even sniffing him. Great defenses don't have to blitz to get pressure and a few sacks. We shouldn't have to either, esp with our DB roster. Ware should be able to beat his man at least 2-3x per game and hit or sack the QB. He wasn't getting doubled all that much that I noticed. Even if he was, I'd still expect him to get to the QB at least a few times per game. Same for Ellis.

As far as no risky passes.....?!?! gimme a break! All passes with Bledsoe are risky. Also, why didn't we run a screen or two then?
How risky is a fade to TO? not very. I don't think a fly route to a TO left one-on-one is all that risky either unless its underthrown. We called it and DB threw it to TG 2x despite TG getting doubled on one of them. That same play, and many others, TO was left one-on-one on the other side of the field. No way he can be covered like that. I remember thinking the Texans must be more concerned with stopping TG since we don't throw it to TO that much.

I understood the gameplan but I know the talent that we have on this team and I really feel that we should be getting more out of it. We should've been up 24-3 at half instead of down 3-6 to one of the worst teams in the league. Doesn't seem like we put players in positions to have maximum success...(see any passrusher post-Charles Haley). Doesn't seem like we can sack anyone without blitzing and usually max blitzing. Doesn't seem like we know how to use one of the most heavily weaponed passing offenses in the league. Doesn't seem like we're ready to play half the time. Doesn't seem like we are playing to our talent level. So its frustrating to see New Orleans play like a playoff caliber team with the garbage they have for talent, some of which are guys who couldn't even make our roster. And they beat the best team in our division a week after Philly beats us. I can't imagine what the NO staff would do with our talented roster. Heck Payton would have every player off of it if he could. And we all know he'd be starting Romo, who may not have the arm strength of DB but is much more mobile, exciting, and seems to have a better feel for where guys are supposed to be. Bledsoe would've gotten sacked on both plays that Romo threw. Some Houston guy was bearing down on Romo both times.
Anyway, maybe its BP and Payton who are the difference maybe its the coaching staffs, I don't know. But what I'm saying is that New Orleans and a few other teams are doing a lot more with a lot less. And also, they don't have to suffer through Bledsoe stinking game after game.

One other thing I forgot to mention.....
PENALTIES!!! We should not have so many penalties game after game. I don't know how many we finished with but I remember 3x facemask penalties on ONE DRIVE ALONE which allowed Houston to get a first and goal at about the 5. Fortunately we stuffed them and they kicked a FG.
Penalties however, are a direct reflection of coaching.

You are saying that Ellis and Ware should be winning their match ups and creating pressure on the QB, but at the same time you are saying it is because of the schemes. Which is it? Are the pass rushers not good enough to just beat their blockers or are they not put in the right position by the coaches?

I don't think Dallas runs elaborate blitz packages. At least not compared to Philly or New England who are just great at it. Those teams have been running those schemes for years and have had plenty of reps. Parcells has always said he likes to see his defense win its one on one match ups. He used to have a Lawrence Taylor who was very good at doing that. Made the rest of the defense look great and even simple blitzes successful because he alone could pressure the QB.

 

[Stautner]

You are saying that Ellis and Ware should be winning their match ups and creating pressure on the QB, but at the same time you are saying it is because of the schemes. Which is it? Are the pass rushers not good enough to just beat their blockers or are they not put in the right position by the coaches?

I don't think Dallas runs elaborate blitz packages. At least not compared to Philly or New England who are just great at it. Those teams have been running those schemes for years and have had plenty of reps. Parcells has always said he likes to see his defense win its one on one match ups. He used to have a Lawrence Taylor who was very good at doing that. Made the rest of the defense look great and even simple blitzes successful because he alone could pressure the QB.

Good points about winning the one on one matchups.

The fact is that if we are going to be a good pass rushing team we can't only succeed when blitzing.

Quality pass rushers find ways to get to the QB at times even when we don't blitz.

Besides, as I've said many times, blitzes are meant as a supplement to the pass rush, not to be the ONLY source of it.

A quality pass rush starts with quality pass rushers, not the scheme. The scheme is only meant to help those guys, otherwise it is only covering a deficiency in pass rushing personnel.

 

[ghst187]

I'm saying that we didn't blitz much and it looks like our plan was to play soft, stop the run, and let our defense play everything straight and keep everything in front of them. We didn't blitz much, if at all.
I'm saying that our gameplan probably mitigated us getting pressure on Carr
BUTTTTTTTTTTTTTT
that Ware and Ellis should have still, IMO, gotten to Carr at least once each. They didn't touch him the entire game.