Let's go through the roster: On D Langford-I feel pretty confident, going into his 3rd year should be solid, but not spectacular Starks- Certainly will generate a pass rush up the middle, but can he hold his ground against the 600 Lbs of center/guard combos coming at him for 40 snaps a game Odrick- Talented, but a rookie and didn't really "flash" anything special in preseason Misi- Looked so great in preseason that that had him on the weakside for the last week. Again talented, but a rookie and not shown he could hold the edge consistently Dobbins-I doubt Crowder will be starting this week or in the near future. Something about undiagnosed injuries and Crowder's history does not smell good here. Dansby-Finally, a position I am not worried about. I think he will flourish under Nolan's inside blitz schemes Wake- Like Starks, good situationally, but I wonder how he will be in space and playing more than 10 snaps a game. Davis- I fell really good when they run bubble screens to his side. Less confident when they run go patterns to his side. I guess as good as you can feel with a young CB, who happens to get dinged up alot. Bell- Again solid, but not spectacular also with a n injury history and not much depth. Clemons- I feel like we will see alot of tackles after the catch as Clemons seems tentative and afraid of making a mistake back there Allen- Well you know Smith has fallen along way when Jason Allen is starting ahead of you. there is a reason that 3 coaching regimes could not find a place for him. Overall..too many question marks. Add a new scheme under Nolan and all our youth and I feel we make take a step back before we go forward with this D.
Our front 7 will be good at times and spectacular at other times. The hope is that when they are spectacular, they will be able to get enough pass rush to make up for our deficient secondary. Overall, I'd say a pretty overly cynical view of our defense, I'm not nearly as worried as you are.
Love our DL Like Our Lb's Really worried about the secondary.. But I do have a great deal of confidence in Mike Nolan who will need his scheme to create pressure. The best way to hide a poor secondary is to get to the QB quick, Pittsburgh has gotten by with very average CB's for years. If we sit back in coverage we will get eaten alive.
You could easily be talking about the Ravens' D. Or the Steelers. Or the Cowboys. Or the Vikings. Or the Packers. Or the 49ers. Just saying.
You forgot we were 24th in points scored and 30th in rushing yards per game and 26th in total yards for the offense in pre season
It would be difficult to be confident in Jason Allen as a starter right now, but I really like this quote from Sparano: "Sparano confirmed that Jason Allen has replaced Sean Smith in the starting lineup. Sparano said it was more a case of Allen winning the job than an indictment on Smith losing it. “From my time here, all I’ve heard about is, ‘When is Jason Allen going to turn the corner?’” Sparano said. “And maybe the guy has turned the corner. We should be happy about this, for Christ’s sake. This is a good problem, not a bad problem.” http://blogs.palmbeachpost.com/thed...t-his-team-plus-an-update-on-phillip-merling/
It all starts with Starks. If he can't clog the middle and draw double teams, then why would you worry about throwing on our suspect secondary when you could just run iut down our throat?
Without looking at anyone else's picks: 1. Yeremiah Bell- Never bet against this man. 2. Vontae Davis- I looked at him during preseason and I saw a man. 3. Karlos Dansby- Solid coverage guy. Not the best, but better than him won't add more wins. 4. Channing Crowder- The guy is a gamer. Tell him who to hit and he'll hit them. That's his job now, and that's what he does best. 5. Kendal Langford- The man is the quintessential lunch pail player. Plays excellent and aside from the earring incident, he's under the radar. 6. Randy Starks- He may not be the best NT, but he's a great player and a force. 7. Koa Misi/Jared Odrick combined- I can't say that either one will be starring but if looked at together I call them a great force. Honorable Mention Paul Soliai This guy got the message. He has improved to a quality player and if we can draft a top flight NT, I can see Starks going back to DE with him as the starter. Yes, you may have a DE orgasm if Starks goes back. Cameron Wake His run D has gotten Oh So Good. I love what he brings on the rush and I see him improving his game to the next level. I won't call him the answer just yet but he's close to me calling him that. Jury's Out with Mild Diarrhea Sean Smith I saw him in preseason. It made me want to kick his ***. It almost looked like he didn't take it seriously. I want to see him step it up. Chris Clemons Fast. I want to see better angles. If he can't intercept the pass I want to see his presence affect the throw. I also hope he isn't a Antonio Cromartie tackler. I want to see him being physical like Clarke, Rolle, or Atogwe would have been. Jason Allen Live God Damn you LIIIIVE!
Last year it was Starks, this year I think Langford will be the dominate force out there.... he's looking great
It has nothing to do with points given up. I don't even know how many we have given up.It's more how the players have looked in preseason.
How they "looked" in preseason games is more meaningless than how many points they gave up in preseason games.
If that were entirely true coaches wouldn't send players out in preseason game, nor assess players by seeing how they perform in them. "Real important game for guys on the bubble." coaches always say... making a lot of roster decisions based on players execution in these games. They also want to see their offense look efficient, and eliminate mistakes, etc. And for the defensive players to show good tenchique development, and that they understand and execute their scheme responsibilities (i.e. do you know where to be and when, so you don't blow coverages/lane and gap responsibilities). How they looked is actually MORE important than the stats or scores,since they are trying to practice execution. If they are executing like s**t, I don;t call that meaningless. The result, as in who wins or loses, is meaningless.
How they look to an armchair scout, is more meaningless than the points scored in a preseason game. Is what I was talking about. We've no idea what the coaches goals were for a given play or series or game.
I don't know what to think of our vanilla defense only rushing 3-4 every play. Any decent offense can and should rip that apart.
my biggest questions are J Allen at CB ... not that i had any confidence in Smith Ike / Misi at SOLB ... Wake at WOLB .... albeit, he is showing positive signs ... Clemons at S ... will make some mistakes, but will be good come next year
I forget we were dealing with professional scouts like yourself. Lighten up this is a FAN forum. I doubt Sparano is on here giving his opinion.
I think its hard to evaluate how someone plays when you don't really know what their assignment or responsibility is. As Dan Henning pointed out, they put Henne into situations they knew wouldn't necessarily be successful, just to see how he reacts. They use preseason to see how guys react in those situations.
Confident about everyone except Misi and Clemons. Those are two of the biggest question marks that immediately stick out for me. I think Odrick is going to impress a lot of people. I am confident that Jason Allen will perform and make game changing plays. Yes I said it. Game changing plays. INT's, forced fumbles, etc. He has a knack for getting to the ball. Not 100% if Starks can hold down NT, but I feel confident that between him, Solai and McDaniels that they can get it done.
I have confidence in: DL: Langford and Starks. To a lesser extent Odrick. Odrick won't be a play maker, but he does his job. I also felt good about Douglas and Grant as depth players before their inexplicable cuts. Soliai could move into the top category but it will take a few weeks of consistent play. LB: Dansby and Wake. Crowder would also be there if I knew he was healthy. I am also okay with Dobbins as long as Dansby is in there and Dobbin's coverage responsibilities are almost nil. DB: Bell. I think that it's possible that Davis, Smith and J. Allen and/or Sapp could be added to the list in a season or so, but that depends on their development.
Well, I don't have much confidence in the secondary. I won't be surprise if the other team is 3rd Down & 12 then throws for a successful 1st Down. But I'm a fan, so I need to put faith in the Fin defense.
We had some serious question marks after watching last preseason as well; question marks that turned out to be valid and carry into the season. I don't know how much I am actually confident about the defense; it seems many are willing to just write-off the poor performances by saying "well that's not what we're going to do in the regular season", "that's just the pre-season, we don't show anything", or "the regular starters weren't giving 100%, saving it for the season." I don't know if I buy into all that. We finished near dead-last in the league in rushing this preseason while we've had a revolving door at the o-line. I honestly think we'll have troubles there into the season. Is the o-line going to magically start blocking well for our runners once we play Buffalo? Is Henne going to become magically consistent once the season starts? Same with the defense; our secondary was borderline atrocious. I don't think they'll magically be stellar just because it's the regular season and no longer the preseason. I see other teams picking our secondary apart this year, honestly. I don't doubt we didn't show everything during the preseason, but come on - we couldn't even get it going a lot of the time. I think there is more truth in our play than many are willing to admit.
Kinda like when you stick your fingerup your girlfriend's arse while having sex with her. To see how she'll react. Like that.
I think the front seven will improve as the season goes along. What concerns me is the ability of this front seven to put pressure on the QB. I realize that the team showed only a very basic defense during the pre-season but if Nolan is going to be using a lot of blitz schemes to get pressure on the QB. This will mean there will be a lot of one on one coverage in the secondary. This is my real area of concern. The fact that Jason Allen is a starter on this defense is a very scary thought as far as I am concerned. I also am not fully convinced that Clemons is the safety which resolve the problems we have had at that position the last several years. Unless the secondary plays far better then I anticipate it will. I think the offense is going to have to score a lot of points in the games to even be competitive. It is really sad that after three years of Parcells running the front office. We are still not sure we have a long term answer at QB and a player many of us considered a first round bust is now a starter in the defensive secondary. As much as I want to see a playoff contending team in Miami. I have serious reservations regarding many of the players now on the Dolphins roster.
Not really, look at those secondarys and you dont see a team that HAS to get pressure to be succesfull... Dallas has a great secondary..
....Maybe...the guy has turned the corner . Maybe not. Kind of like Ripley's Believe It Or Not . I don't believe.
Dude what on earth are you talking about. None of the defenses you just mentioned have the question marks we do on D. In fact you just arguably mentioned some of the top tier defenses in the league going into this season. No comments about our Defense could at all be "just as easily talking about" these other units. This team's D is very young and very unproven in just about every area except for the front 3 lineman and our ILB. The rest are unproven and some are downright scary (see secondary).
Langford, Starks, Dansby agreed. Odrick is a rookie. Exactly how are you "real confident" about him again? Wake has shown great promise but he's still very unknown as an every down OLB and whether he has put any effort into working adding addtl. pass rush techniques to his arsenal. Davis has shown troubling lapses in coverage Bell has shown to be avg. in coverage. You mentioned just 3 out of 11 guys that have proven quality production at an NFL level. That's not promising. I'm not saying the sky is falling. The youth could step up and play admirably but they are hardly proven at this point.
I just can't wait to see what all the hype is about on sunday. If Nolan's defense looks flat and vanilla my prostate will fall through my taint.