Miami Dolphins' defense will focus on Chargers' Tomlinson | MiamiHerald.com The mission is clear for the Dolphins defense. ''When you're playing the San Diego Chargers you're going to think about three or four guys, but the No. 1 guy better be No. 21,'' Dolphins nose tackle Jason Ferguson said.
Well, of course they'll also pressure Rivers. I think what he was trying to say was that stopping LT is where it all starts. Shut down the running game and then go after the QB. SD's rushing attack is not what it's been. LT is avg less than 4 ypc. Fins defense is allowing 3.3 ypc. Miami Dolphins Stats
Agreed, I would really like to see our D come up with at least 2 sacks this week and a lot of hurried ups.
I'm awfully anxious to see this game. I want to know if we're the Keystone Kops (the team that showed up...sort of.....to play AZ) or the machine that hammered NE into submission. I'm truly hoping the difference between those 2 weeks was simply a matter of everyone finally getting it. As long as we don't look like Laurel, Hardy and their 9 brothers then this is a winnable game for us.
I think they all should play disiplined football, stay in their lanes,do their assignments and let their athletic ability make the play, you start focusing on one player then you will be suseptible to misdirection, deception and playaction, which is our achilles heel.
We must bombard Rivers, Contain LT and his bad toe, clamp down on Sproles at RB, and returner, and we need to control the clock with our running game. Chad has played well against the Chargers in the past. Right now Sproles is more elusive then LT with his toe.
If we focus on Tomlinson, Rivers will pick us apart. Frankly and sadly, I don't think our D can stop San Diego's offense, not with the DBs we have back there. Our best hope is to try to establish the running game and control the clock, keep the ball out of Rivers' hands.
If AZ gave us trouble, we can expect the same from SD. We should be very scared. Seriously. We got a bone thrown our way with Cassel. But River will not be rattled, and will not hesitate to destroy us.
Iam usually scared of teams for certain reasons, whether we dont match up well with them, their quarterback,etc...for some reason the chargers do not scare me. Rivers is the kind of qb we can match up well against.
what we need is joey porter to run his mouth. guaranteed victory right there. someone call him. "Tomlinson's big toe is hurt. What do you do with a RB who has a hurt toe? You treat him like a RB with a hurt toe. You throw the kitchen sink at him. That's what we're going to do."
I don't know about that DJ. If we don't pressure Rivers, he will pick us apart. I actually think that we will have to focus more on Rivers than Tomlinson. As late again mentioned earlier in this thread, our rush defense is pretty good right now while our secondary is poor. They spread the ball around in the passing game and with our lack of talent at the Defensive Back spots, it could spell trouble for us (assuming we are not able to pressure Rivers). The big key for us on offense is to pound the ball, to keep the San Diego offense on the sidelines. Kill the clock and just run it down their throats. Its a weakness of theirs and we have to take advantage of that.
Rivers is considered elite because no one matches up well with him. He's one of the ones that nobody wants to face. He has more confidence than Tom Brady. And his surrounding weapons the elite of the elite. They have 6 players on offense other than Rivers, that must be accounted for in the gameplan on defense. We are gonna need a huge day from our offense, combined with stellar performance from our DBs. I think we're going to end up with a lot of penalties on defense. It's going to be really tough to stop these guys by just playing 100%. Our players are going to be tempted to hold and make illegal contact. This is where our defense tells us how far they can take us.
Yea, if we can't get to Rivers, we're in deep trouble because even if Allen can hang onto Chambers, no one else can cover Vincent Jackson (worst case is if Allen is matched up with Jackson who can use his size to bully him ala Fitz).
Agreed bro. We need to take care of Gates, and Sproles as well. Rivers is very key to our success on Sunday. We must bring pressure all day.
Gish, i personally don't believe rivers is elite, does he have elite weapons...mos def. but his skill set does not match up well with defenses without elite skill position players at his side. I think the key is pressure, if you get pressure, he does'nt get a chance to set his feet, and he needs to set his feet to get anything on the ball, also is not mobile, which is good for us, is not a master with the ball in his hands in terms of playaction and misdirection which also is good for us. we'll see but i think we match up pretty well.
I don't think so, I consider Rivers elite or borderline elite. He's having a tremendous season so far with LT and Gates gimpy.
Most people would rate him there. The only ones who don't are those that kneel at the arm strength altar.
And Rivers' arm isn't that bad itself. He can make the throws he needs to ala Peyton Manning. There's a reason Dan Marino was really high on this guy when he scouted him as Dolphins VP.
Rivers was an exciting prospect. I remember pushing for us to draft him with our early 2nd round pick that year and saying he was worth our 1st (at that time all "experts" and draft boards had him as a late 2nd rounder) and just getting lambasted. Eventually, of course as more of the NFL GM opinions came to light he moved up out of our range. The bulk of the critics focused on the fact that he didn't have that "canon" arm. But most NFL people know that the most important skills a QB needs is football intelligence, accuracy and a quick release. Obviously you need a certain amount of arm strength to play in the NFL but that amount is far less than 'canon'. Even Peyton's and Brady's draft profiles described them as having good but not great arms (many on Brady were less kind and really questioned his arm strength). That hasn't stopped them from being considered elite by most people.
I had him as our 1st round pick in a pre-postseason mock but got laughed at because people thought he wasn't worth more than a 2nd. Then people on FH noticed Dan Marino was being sent to his workouts and suddenly it didn't seem so laughable then.
We need to execute, put pressure on Rivers, stop the run, control the clock, run the ball well, keep their D from stacking the box with some 15-25 yard passes from Chad to any dolphin who can catch it. do most of those things well enough, we win the game.
He doesn't have Fitz's speed but he's bigger and he knows how to use his body against a smaller defender like Allen. I only mentioned Fitz because you saw in the Arizona game how even though Allen kept pace, he couldn't get to the ball because Fitz's larger body shielded him away from it and Allen got manhandled.