Some observations
 

A few observations from the game:

Priest Holmes is da man. Yes, we already knew this. But now Priest is even more da man. He's like the six million dollar man. He had bursts of speed that I haven't seen from him in years. The 30 yard run was great, but what really impressed me were those 8 and 9 yard bursts up the middle, the little runs that looked like nothing at first but became good gains. I'm excpecting a big game out of him.

5-yard chuck rule? What 5-yard chuck rule? We all thought that the new enforcements would help Tony G immensely. Well, it did jack squat. Gonzo got rapedall day, as usual. Everytime there was a flag on a play intended for him, I would think "Finally!" But soon finally would turn to "aw $#!+", because the penalties all on him! Maybe I'm overreacting, but it seems like a defense can't shut down Tony that easily without doing something illegal.

The defense... still sucks. I was a Gunther guy. I'll admit it. Now it's only one game, but the D really didn't look much better than last year. They'll still get the turnovers, but they gave up the big play way too much. Vonnie Holliday bit on the bootleg every freakin' time. As John Madden say, "On that play there were about eleven bites!". So by that count, there were about 132 bites in this game. The linebackers were actually one of the brighter parts of the D. Fooj did very well from what I saw, and of course Monty Beisel made a great interception. There were some promising stops and turnovers, so I wouldn't panic. Yet.

Lawerence Tynes! MY MAN! "The Flying Scotsman", as I've decided to like to call him, has skills. He hit a 50-yarder that Mort would have thrown his back out attempting, and almost hit a 58 yarder that Mort would have had a heart attack just thinking about. It was Denver, yes, so the air is thinner, but I thik Tynes will certainly be a huge improvement.

Wide Recivers are a concern. Ay ay ay. This isn't good. You can't rely on Priest and Tony G to carry the whole team. Morton, Kennison, and Hall need to step up and make catches. Dear lord, please bring Keenan McCardell unto us!

The season ain't over As JBret pointed out: Bills 31, Patriots 0. The season is certainly not over. We never do well in Denver, so this is not a harbinger of doom by any means. Actually, I think that this loss may actually be a good thing. They don't have the pressure that they had last year during their winning streak. The D showed some promise at some points. This loss will fuel them the rest of the season, and I expect no less than 11-5 and a divison crown.

Good observations Arrowheaded Wolf. Here's mine. It's a tad long, but hope you guys find something out of it.

What is the difference between saying their defense is terrible and our defense is terrible?

I watched the game too you know, we couldn't stop them from running and they couldn't stop us from running.

They had a better completion percentage, mostly because we had to continually bring up safeties for blitzes and run support but only 2 more completions for 60 yards. We had 2 sacks to their 1, 2 interceptions to thier 1 and 3 fumbles with one recovery to their 0.

Their defense is supposed to be rock solid yet I see NOTHING at all to indicate that it was anything above and beyond ours.

Speaking of us stopping them because of bonehead plays, what about Green running backwards 23 yards on that one sack and a good ways when he threw that interception? If that wasn't boneheaded I don't know what was.

Point is that our offense didn't play as well as they should have, our special teams were all but nonexistant and our defense played as good if not better than I expected for the first time out at a tough opposing rivals house in a new more aggressive scheme with a new coordinator.

Do we need to get better?

Hell yes, but so does the Denver squad compared to last night.

Should we worry about it right now? No, because not only will it do absolutely no good at all other than frustrate everyone but it was one game! The first game.

If they look the same 3 games from now I would say it would be safe to be concerned a bit.

Good obs. No worries. Broncos got run over by Priest, so I think both D's looked bad.

Geez, I actually give serious observations about football and nobody cares.

I'm gonna go cry now.

I'm glad you're crying.

Does that help?

:deevee:

FWIW.

I thought overall our defense played pretty much better than last year towards the end of the year anyway. The main part of the defense that bothered me wasnt scheme I don't think, and that was Vonnie Holliday repeatedly getting punked on the fakes bootlegs. There were two occasions that Midget Griffen lined up as if to run without his mouthpiece and when the faked to him the Fake bootlegged around with nothing but green in front of him. On both those plays I yelled PASS!. Clearly being 1000 miles from KC and what another 500 or so from Denver I can assume they didnt hear me. My problem with that is everyone on the defense should have seen that and read it the same as I and not fallen into that same trap, but yet they did.

The bootlegs are what killed us because from that play they were able to set up the rest of the crap. Anyway, I am confident the Defense will be were it needs to be and we will be fine.

One other observation I have is that we did not have nealy the amount of motion as we normaly do. I am beginning to believe that we will be playing with a completely differant scheme most of the rest of the year. The only reason I can think of for not having as much motion was because of being so loud at Investco. Either that or we were trying to show them something differant.

I'm not sure we need McCardell, but the WR's getting seperation was a bit concerning. Gonzo getting any seperation is a concern for me as well. I started a thread the other day about using the play action pass more to help the WR's (and Gonzo) get some seperation. Unfortunately, I have only been able to go through most of the first quarter on my tape of the game.

Through that bit of the game, Green had attempted 7 passes. 3 of those 7 had a play fake involved. The long completion to Kennison, the 2nd and goal from the 2 that was incomplete to Gonzo, and the 23 yard sack of Green play (not sure if that goes down as an actual pass attempt, but it was going to be a passing play, so I threw it in anyway).
On the last two, the play fake was horrible. Neither one would have faked out a jr. high player, much less a NFL player.

The other 4 pass plays were straight drop back pass plays by Green, and every receiver was blanketed.

I know it is just my opinion, but I wish we would really develop a good play action passing game. With Holmes in the backfield, it would have to be honored to the max. I know it would require a bit of a switch in philosophy, but....

Yeah, it was pretty sad how the WRs could not get ANY seperation all night. But McCardell would be an upgrade. He was a Pro Bowler last year!

Yes, the Denver D could not stop our run game, but they could stop our passing game. I would have to say that Morton and Kennison were not ready to play after considerable injury time on the bench. The fact they were able to be blanketed by man coverage was a very bad sign. I am still puzzled why Richard Smith did not get more into the game.

Kennison had 6 catches for 101 yards. He was DEFINITELY ready to play. Morton probably was not but 3 for 30 ain't bad considering the time he missed.

Our passing game sucked because we couldnt get the ball to Tony G OR Priest. Pretty simple.

Note that after game 1, 3 of the league's top defensive teams are ranked BELOW us in total defense.

I seriously doubt that our defense will finish higher than the Patriots, Eagles, Cowbys, or Benglas...

http://www.nfl.com/stats/teamsort/NF...r?sort_col_1=4

I disagree.
Our passing game sucked because our WRs are average, at best.
Defenses don't have to respect them as real threats, and therefore are able to concentrate on Tony and Priest.

Almost every completion to a WR was a perfectly thrown pass to a blanketed receiver.

If we don't get someone on the field that defenses have to worry about at WR, then the Donkey defensive plan will be the blueprint against the Chiefs for the rest of the season.

We had the same players as last year when we were the second best passing offense in the entire NFL. The only thing that changed is that the Broncos have enough talent to shut down Tony G and Priest without devoting 3 or 4 defenders. Then Trent Green has a shitty game and you get Sunday night's result.

You're also basing your entire opinion on ONE GAME? The Chiefs had worse passing games last season.

WRs are below average IMO. Priest and Tony can't do it all, and Dante can only do so much. Plus, we want Dante returning kicks as much as possible. We need good #1 and #2 WRs.