Something I've never quite understood

[perrykemp]

One of the mysteries of the NFL universe for me is this:

The odd randomness of D. Ware's (or any great pass rusher) sacks. You see him rip all-pro tackles for 2-3 sacks one week, and get stoned by back-up tackles the next week. When the matchup on paper completely favors Ware, it doesn't play out. When the matchup is even, he goes off.

I guess this happens with all great pass rushers or they'd all have 32 sacks a season.

I guess I <get it> but man, deep down, it just never seems to quite add up.

Anybody else afflicted with this inability to comprehend how/when/why sacks occur?

 

[Tabascocat]

My take is when Ware is facing someone who is good or great at their position, it is one-on-one usually. That lets Ware do his thing and get after the QB.

When facing scrubs, that team will add a lot of help to stymie Ware, sometimes taking 2 or 3 players which means someone else should step up and get pressure from the other side.

As for last sunday, Ware was in coverage quite a bit and I don't like seeing him there, he needs to rush at least 80% of the time.

 

[Future]

I think that, like pretty much everyone on this defense, he has trouble bringing it for 60 minutes every week.

 

[Wolfpack]

Well, because Ware faced a backup tackle AND a rookie QB, the Dallas brain trust thought it best to drop him in coverage more to confuse the said back up tackle and rookie QB.

Thats out coaching your opponent right there.

 

[Eskimo]

When playing against scrubs the other team will usually double team Ware and that pretty much nullifies 60% of our pass rush ability with just that one move.

It is so obvious that we need to add another pass rusher but so many people on this board just wanna give a $10M/yr contract for Spencer so he can stuff the run and set the edge.

We have the most 1-dimensional defense in the NFL. I can't believe we go into battle with only one weapon in the front 7 and wonder why our defense can't force turnovers or get off of the field.

Until we add another pass rusher we aren't going to accomplish much. We've had opportunities in FA but we just pass on them over and over again. We had chances to draft them but went after other priorities (WR, CB).

This past draft we had the opportunity to trade down and get an extra second so that we could get a CB, OLB pass rusher and an interior OL. This also would have freed up $9M of cap space so that we could pursue a DL pass rusher to add to our mix. Instead we kept Spencer and drafted Claiborne. Right now even though Claiborne looks very good that seems to have been a mistake as we don't have enough pass rush to compete. And for all that money spent on the run-stuffing Anthony Spencer we still couldn't stop Lynch.

 

[SilverStarCowboy]

The turnover/sack ratio appears to be quite low for Ware and Dallas over his career.

 

[AMERICAS_FAN]

The turnover/sack ratio appears to be quite low for Ware and Dallas over his career.

I HATE the 3-4 because your best pass rusher ends up dropping into coverage on half of the passing downs, where he would be actually rushing the passer in the 4-3 scheme. Under those circumstances Ware's numbers are pretty good. He doesn't need to change; the scheme does.

 

[BIGDen]

When playing against scrubs the other team will usually double team Ware and that pretty much nullifies 60% of our pass rush ability with just that one move.

It is so obvious that we need to add another pass rusher but so many people on this board just wanna give a $10M/yr contract for Spencer so he can stuff the run and set the edge.

We have the most 1-dimensional defense in the NFL. I can't believe we go into battle with only one weapon in the front 7 and wonder why our defense can't force turnovers or get off of the field.

Until we add another pass rusher we aren't going to accomplish much. We've had opportunities in FA but we just pass on them over and over again. We had chances to draft them but went after other priorities (WR, CB).

This past draft we had the opportunity to trade down and get an extra second so that we could get a CB, OLB pass rusher and an interior OL. This also would have freed up $9M of cap space so that we could pursue a DL pass rusher to add to our mix. Instead we kept Spencer and drafted Claiborne. Right now even though Claiborne looks very good that seems to have been a mistake as we don't have enough pass rush to compete. And for all that money spent on the run-stuffing Anthony Spencer we still couldn't stop Lynch.

I couldn't agree more. Keep up the great work. You save me a lot of typing.

 

[SultanOfSix]

I just think they don't call holding on Ware as much. It's as simple as that. If he was a Steeler, he'd have like 100 sacks a season.

 

[jobberone]

Hard to sack when the QB is getting the ball out quickly because D Ware is across the line.

 

[AdamJT13]

One of the mysteries of the NFL universe for me is this:

The odd randomness of D. Ware's (or any great pass rusher) sacks. You see him rip all-pro tackles for 2-3 sacks one week, and get stoned by back-up tackles the next week. When the matchup on paper completely favors Ware, it doesn't play out. When the matchup is even, he goes off.

I guess this happens with all great pass rushers or they'd all have 32 sacks a season.

I guess I <get it> but man, deep down, it just never seems to quite add up.

Anybody else afflicted with this inability to comprehend how/when/why sacks occur?

First of all, your perception is not always true. He has feasted on some backup tackles and been shut out by All-Pros.

Also, as dexternjack said, teams that have a question mark at left tackle will gameplan against Ware -- double teams, chips, rollouts away from Ware, etc.

And finally, as you noted, it's not that easy to get sacks. But Ware does it better than anyone else in the league. People expect him to get at least one every week, but those are impossible expectations -- although he has gotten at least one in more than 60 percent of his games, which I believe is the highest percentage in NFL history.

 

[Muhast]

Well, because Ware faced a backup tackle AND a rookie QB, the Dallas brain trust thought it best to drop him in coverage more to confuse the said back up tackle and rookie QB.

Thats out coaching your opponent right there.

Bingo. He was in coverage far more often than usual.

Also, would it kill us to try rushing Ware from somewhere besides just the edge? Clay Matthews and other pass rushers run stunts to free them up, we seem to just rush Ware from one side or the other and call it a day. Which is amazing considering how amazing he's been for us. I'd love to see us try some stunts with him

 

[Aven8]

We play the 4-3. Yes we don't call it that, but thats what it is. Ware is a DE the majority of the time, and Liss, Brent, and Hatcher are the line with him,and Spenc, Lee, and Carter are the LB's. Take a good look. It's really what we are.

Unless we are rushing three for the love of god...

 

[cowboyzz11]

We have the most 1-dimensional defense in the NFL.

I think you better tell that to the FAT RYAN

 

[CowboyMike]

In the case of the Seahawks, they did three things.

1. They schemed to force Ware and/or Spencer into coverage on almost every play. Despite what people think, it was not a choice to not rush them and keep them in coverage. The Seahawks simply used motion and personnel to dictate that one of our OLBs drop into coverage. Is that something that we should adjusted to and fixed? Yes. That's where we screwed up. But the plan wasn't to have Ware dropping into coverage all the time, it was just forced on us.

2. The Seahawks used max protect almost exclusively on passing downs. That means they kept 8 people blocking our 4-7 guys rushing and only sent two receivers out into a pattern. No matter how good you are, you're not going to get to the quarterback very often against an 8 man protection. What hurt us here, I think, was the loss of Church early in the game and then Sensy later on. Losing them really screwed up our secondary and our corners starred playing off because they didn't have as much trust or help over the top. Usually max protect would have been a feeding fest for our improved secondary, but injuries did us in.

3. This applies more to what happens generally vs just in the case of the Seahawks. When a team has a backup tackle in, they generally have an extra blocker to double team or chip on their side. This is what limits the pass rusher. This is where your other pass rushers can usually take advantage elsewhere, and the Cowboys haven't had the best success at that. Although, we did have success doing it against the Giants by moving Ware around, and although he didn't have any sacks, Spencer did cause havoc with the opportunities he had.

 

[hairic]

I have him pass rushing 16 times.

[youtube]7g5zU9J8JrU[/youtube]

The refs missed the OT false start which is what he wastes time pointing at on the first play.

I might figure out the time between snap and release/sack/scramble later. A lot of those throws look like they come out within 2.5 seconds.

 

[SilverStarCowboy]

When Bill Parcells said that DeMarcus Ware could never be a 4/3 Defensive End in the NFL, you knew he was really a Used Carpet Salesman.

 

[The Natural]

2. The Seahawks used max protect almost exclusively on passing downs. That means they kept 8 people blocking our 4-7 guys rushing and only sent two receivers out into a pattern. No matter how good you are, you're not going to get to the quarterback very often against an 8 man protection. What hurt us here, I think, was the loss of Church early in the game and then Sensy later on. Losing them really screwed up our secondary and our corners starred playing off because they didn't have as much trust or help over the top. Usually max protect would have been a feeding fest for our improved secondary, but injuries did us in.
.

Time out. Rob was blitzing 3 guys on every passing play. So what you're telling me is 2 receivers beat the remaining 8 guys in coverage?

 

[CowboyMike]

Time out. Rob was blitzing 3 guys on every passing play. So what you're telling me is 2 receivers beat the remaining 8 guys in coverage?

Yeah, pretty much. I've read a lot of reports talking about how the Seahawks were using max protect a lot. If you read the rest of what I said, I do think the loss of our safeties severely impacted our secondary play. Plus, if what you're saying is true about Rob blitzing 3 guys on every passing play, that means he had the standard 3 man line rush plus the 3 blitzers, leaving 5 guys in coverage, not 8. There's a difference between blitzing and using a standard pass rush. Blitzing means you send extra guys. If you mean we were just rushing 3 on every passing play (which is not blitzing), well, that's not true. You just need to see the video posted above to know we were rushing more than 3.

Look at the film. Without Church, our CBs were playing off a lot, and we were in a soft zone a lot more than we were against the Giants. We were leaving the middle of the field and the underneath routes open. Most of Wilson's passes were completed in front of our guys and then poor tackling resulted in tons of YAC.

 

[CowboyMike]

Here it is from Rafael Vela:

"The Moose speaks the truth. Special teams lead let Russell Wilson hand the ball off on 1st downs. When he did throw on 1sts, he was behind 7 and 8 man protections. Seattle's big bomb special pass was run from a 3 TE formation."