I think it's time for Mitchell to get back in the game.

That was basically out of necessity over lack of quality depth.

If they had a decent option to log his snaps back in '15, no way he'd of seen the field for at least a month.

We just disagree. I have seen no sign of Sutton using scheme to do anything other than play more and more "bend". Sutton will never have enough talent to run the scheme he wants to because no team can put that much talent into the defense without destroying their team. We should have grabbed Wade Phillips when Denver let him go.

I don't think this defense needs as much talent as you think, nor were our previous defenses (counting injuries) nearly as talented as you think. Right now, in most of the games we played, let's point to one execution problem. 50/50 balls. If our DBs were AVERAGE at defending these, we'd be looking at NE, Philly, SD, Denver, Washington, Oakland, Houston and saying... "hmm... our defense played pretty well." And that's considering that our talent has some pretty big gaps.

Yes, there are some annoying nuances to the scheme here and there. No, that doesn't solve for how we defend power offenses like Pitt or Dallas. But the base dime scheme isn't nearly as flawed as we make it out to be. If we executed the basics we'd be getting much better results right now.

He might be hurt. Maybe they rushed him back for week one. You never know with injuries in the NFL. They try to play through things. Look at Luck.

Truth

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Never go full Herm, Andy starts going full Herm it won’t be pretty.

If this happens I’m calling Buehler for ideas.

Just don't go full Pee Roy

Berry was a huge loss this year because Sorenson isn't nearly as good as Abdullah was.

Losing Houston wasn't nearly as devastating because Hali was still a force.

I know two things.

You win on offense on the shoulders of the QB.

You win on defense by getting after the QB.

The dime package in the first 3 games wasn't nearly as effective as you make it sound.

Our offense put points on the board, putting pressure on the opponent's offense to do the same.

Last 4-5 weeks, not so much, and the dime package proved to be what it is.

A recipe for giving up big plays and points.

All day long.

But we're in a league where offenses are built around getting rid of the ball lightning fast. Offenses spread out and sprint to the line. Other teams are getting murdered by quick hits & checkdowns. Brady and Brees built HOF careers around spotting the blitz and immediately hitting the hot route. I remember a stat earlier in the year that all of Carr's success was built around him getting rid of the ball in less than 2.5 seconds. Getting to the QB is important, but it's not as important as it used to be.

There's something to be said for how we've frustrated Rivers, and how we frustrated Brady & Wentz in the second half because we've taken away their safety valves. We've seen that this approach this year for some reason has been flawed. I'm ok with that. Because it forces us to try things to fix it. We've identified plenty of solutions in this thread that don't require an overhaul. Fixing 50/50 balls and running base 3-4 against power offenses is the most obvious. Those 2 are huge fixes. We can shadow the #1 WR more, press more, and fix our atrocious 3rd and long prevent. Those are ways we'd significantly improve our defense without adding immediate pressure. The way Cousins and Carr and Wentz chucked up jump balls to contested receivers, we should be #1 in the league in turnovers.

I'd like to see more QB pressure too. Perhaps that means sending more. Perhaps it means using Houston more as a pass rusher. I really don't love 3-man rush most of the time. But I don't think immediate pass rush is nearly as important as it's blown out to be here. We've had successful defenses in the past and I think the signature mark is that even good QBs are really frustrated that they have their safety valves taken away. That's not a bad concept to build around. Maybe. Can this team turn into top 5 with a different scheme? Maybe. But I do feel like significant improvements in execution and some small tweaks will also significantly boost our D.

Almost all the teams in the top 10 in sacks are also top 10 in points allowed and yards.

Pressure wins.

Period.

Almost all the top offenses are in the top 10 in sacks allowed. Of course I like pressure and getting to the QB. But the most dangerous offenses in the NFL right now have QBs who are either impossible to get to or are dangerous as hell scrambling out of the pocket. If we're talking about the playoff road, that's not going to be enough. We're giving QBs too much time to throw. But realize the more you tilt toward pass rush, the more you take away from some of the interesting things we do in coverages. We have to tilt that balance, not completely flip it upside down. At least not at this point in the season. We can dial up lots of different blitz schemes but what difference does it make if Brady and Brees get rid of the ball within 2 seconds?

You don't necessarily do that against Brady and Brees. Problem is Sutton can't tell the difference and does not adjust. Treating every QB like Brady and Brees is not working.

We are not doing anything "interesting" in pass coverage...unless you count playing 20 yards off of the ball on 3rd and 15.

Playing dime against pitt was beyond stupid. We adjusted against Oakland with a bigger lineup and with more four man rush. We adjusted to Dallas by going base 3-4 which actually neutralized zeke. Like I said, against power lineups, yes we have to figure that out and we havent landed on that yet.

What is the main reason it didn't work against Philly, Washington, and Oakland? Again, it was that jump ball that we defend so shitty. Not talking about wide open deep balls. I'm talking contested jump balls, sometimes where we have two DBs in the area tripping over their feet. So against majority of the teams we've played, has it been scheme or execution? I don't know. Lets fix the execution first and see where that takes us. As I've said before, we played good D against SD, Denver, and Houston. With all the contested 50/50s in those 3 games, average execution knocks a few of those down and probably picks 1 or 2 of those off.

And that's off to suggest we run the same coverages every time. In prevent and pond yardage yes we moronically run the same dumb set and that needs to stop. But on other downs there's plenty of variety of coverages.