Originally Posted by htismaqe (Post 16587612)

McDuffie has played exactly one full game. The other guys are rookies. The defensive line is woefully understaffed.

To say he has the personnel is being disingenuous a bit.

Originally Posted by FAX (Post 16587353)

11ish.

What the hell happened to our screen game? IMHO, screens would have helped us a great deal against the Flaming Tacks. In fact, the Tacks have the kind of defense that would have a mental breakdown once you effectively attack them horizontally.

Since I blame him for all kinds of stuff, I blame EB.

FAX THE COMPLAINANT

Originally Posted by Pawnmower (Post 16587868)

well its kind of splitting hairs but mcduffie is a top pick. gay isnt a rookie and is now back. 2 years ago we had exactly 0 linebackers. Weve got good players at all 3 levels now


- clark, jones, maybe karlaftis improving (high pick)
-gay and bolton
- sneed & mcduffie (high pick)


I dont think its being disingenuous to say this is the deepest weve been at the 3 levels and this D has the most potential of any in the mahomes years...



So my expectations are high. If they dont achieve, theres 1 guy to blame.

Originally Posted by DRM08 (Post 16586289)

Points are the only thing that matter IMHO....

Originally Posted by Lzen (Post 16587992)

That's a pretty narrow viewpoint. I mean, sure, in the end points are all that matter. And I've seen that argument made over and over regarding the defense. While true, it ignores a lot of factors. Keeping the ball and driving and accumulating a lot of yards actually helps your own defense.

Still, like you, I would hope that we can figure out how to score 30 points consistently. And frankly, I think this team will get that figured out. We tend to forget that we have several new receivers this year. It takes time. This team struggled through a dry spell on offense in the middle of the season last year, too. The difference was that last year's struggle was worse, IMO. We'll get it figured out, IMO.

Originally Posted by DJ's left nut (Post 16585747)

I'm doing my standard re-watch thing and really, the broadcast is telling me some of the same things I saw at the stadium.

Brown was fine. Hell, I think Brown was actually pretty good. He got beat by Mario Edwards pretty badly on that overthrow to Kelce and had a hand in one of those sacks, but by and large, he played a strong game. I think Thuney was our best OL (unsurprisingly) but I think OBJ was right there behind him.

Wylie was bad but fellas - Trey Smith was worse.

The combined effect of those two guys has hurt us badly all year. Folks keep wanting to get Wylie out of there and yeah, I get it. But man, Trey Smith is doing nobody any favors and when the right side of the line is just collapsing on any given play, it makes things awfully tough.

I think it's probably time to give Smith a break. If he's healthy, then he's mentally ****ed up and could use a re-set. If he's hurt even coming off a bye week, then he needs some time to rest and get healthy. Allegretti is a competent blocker and right now I have little doubt that he'd be better than Smith is playing.

Wylie, again, isn't an 'on an island' guy - he absolutely has to have credible help to his left. He's not getting it even a little bit and the combined weight of those two guys struggling is snowballing rather than being greater than the sum of their parts.

Originally Posted by DJ's left nut (Post 16594521)

Dunno how many of you read Seth Keysor's stuff on Substack, but he did a breakdown of the running game last week.

And man, Trey Smith got ****ing wrecked.

It seemed that way from the stadium. It sure seemed that way from the couch a day or two later, and a breakdown of the film pretty much closed the book on it.

Trey Smith has been a MAJOR problem this year. As bad as Wylie and far more damaging than Orlando Brown. If there were no long-term developmental problems arising from it and I could swap out one guy on this OL for an above average stand-in, it would be Smith. He's done more damage to this team than Wylie has.

Originally Posted by DJ's left nut (Post 16594523)

I'll just take his quick cited 'issue' from several of the runs rather than try to re-post the article (I believe it's paywalled):

Run 1: Issue - Blocking failed; Smith with an assist from Brown.
Run 2: Issue - Penalty on Smith
Run 3: Issue - Smith gets beat on his pull
Run 9: Smith gets beat.
Run 10: Smith loses another pull
Run 11: Smith whiffs in space


15 charted runs - 6 of them came apart because Smith didn't get the job done. That's just !@#$ing awful.

I really think they need to sit him. We can't keep sending him out there to die like this.