Studs and Duds first half of season

@Thor
Did You find anymore other places talking about our blitz %. I'm curious now. I don't think I got the names of the places I looked at , or the % exactly right. Because I didn't write them down, and I read quite a few. I was just going off of what I half a$$ remembered.

 

Roman Wilson is looking to change his name to Senquez Golson…

I had high hopes for this guy.

 

Maybe the Jets, Ravens and Browns but I don’t see the Giants having four.

what about the Chiefs and Minnesota? They don’t have the talent we have but they are dynamic at creating pressure and chaos. In fairness I don’t know what their rankings are in yards allowed or points.

 

unfortunately you are right. The way the game is today and how it is officiated, offenses are going to put up yards. I do however see opportunity for improvement in forcing more three and outs.

 

It would be interesting to get an accurate breakdown of how often we play each coverage. I know I always say we play two high soft zone but your right we do play man some but I don’t see it much. I know in the game against the Giants Collinsworth referenced we blitzed the least if any team in the nfl at 19% so I’m not sure who us correct on that.

 

I get what you mean by not counting the others. It us more if an expectation and pedigree thing with them. I do think Highsmith is nearly there and I think we are underutilizing our ILB’s talents.

 

There's a primer article for the Giants/Steelers game that notes the Steelers having the seventh-lowest blitz rate in the league (while still showing the fifth-fastest time to pressure), but it doesn't list the exact percentage, instead it links to a Next Gen stats page that's behind a paywall. Still, the seventh-lowest figure would fall in line with what PFR has.

There's another article from earlier in the season here that talks about the Steelers ranking 27th in blitz rate while still creating a lot of pressure on opposing QBs. Again, it doesn't list the actual percentage, but if they were 27th at the time it's likely they weren't above 20%.

 

The Steelers actually run a ton of Cover 3. The primer article I linked above touched on this as well when speaking to how predictable their formations are. Through the first seven games they operated in Cover 3 nearly half the time (47%), with Cover 1 being second (20%).

 

My question is ... how did Dan Moore level up and Broderick Jones become the old Dan Moore?

 

Gain yards yes but still not bad. So long as it does not translate to points who cares? I mean #2 defense in the league is a pretty good spot to be in . I don't expect absolute perfection from these guys. Just do enough so we can win games. Averaging 15 points a game is pretty damn good.

 

There a lot of people here who do not understand football very well

It’s the job of those who do to help teach

Although there is at least one challenged member who proudly proclaims he doesn’t need anyone to teach him sad very sad

Points are the only statistic that counts when the game is over

 

And S.T.D. Is correct on both points

 

I think it is a combination of the first law of thermodynamics along with entropy

 

I stand corrected. So we do alot of Cover 3 Zone. So it still is generally a more conservative look in that we are dropping our outside CB’s back in the deep 1/3 on the outside. In this look your asking alot of the ILB’s and slot cb to cover alot of ground underneath.The risk with this defense is yes you are technically cover the deep ball but if Minkah and the outside CB’s don’t communicate a savvy team can exploit you on deep seams and split the coverage. Every team has their preference on the coverage they like to play, however I would like to see us mix it up a little more just to throw off the opposing QB’s. Look at how many coverages the Chiefs run. In fairness to us we had alot of new players on defense this year so I am sure Tomliin wanted to simplify things until they got acclimated with each other. It appeared we did blitz more in the last game, which is something I think we are really going to need to implement more after the bye. In addition when we do blitz I would love to see us play more 2 Man coverage where you have the safeties playing two high zone and the outside CB’s are press man. I think that would fit our personnel really well and it allows some redundancy on the back end if our outside CB’s get beat. Most importantly though it should force the timing to be off on the routes with the QB who would be under duress by the five man blitz and he wouldn’t have a quick release unless it is an inside slot guy. You would think this type of coverage would create alot of turnovers or minimize gains. The risk of course is if you get beat on the outside.

I noticed the Browns play alot of man coverage and they have pretty good CB’s but what is interesting is the more you play man the riskier it can become because it truly can be feast or famine. We hit three or four massive chunk plays against them last year. Their defense does tend to give up alot of big plays. So I’m not wanting us to be that aggressive. I just want us to mix it up some more, not be so predictable and vanilla and blitz a little more. Would love to see us utilize that speed of the ILB’s more on the inside blitz.

 

I never said the defense was bad, I am saying they've played considerably worse the last 5 weeks than they did the first 3... and the fact that we have allowed bad offenses to move the ball on us with relative ease has me worried a bit about the defense for when we get to the part of our schedule where we face better offensive teams (7 of our last 9 against top 11 offenses). We've played 7 of our first 8 games against bottom 12 offenses in the league in PPG. These are teams that struggle to move the ball and struggle to score against anyone, not just us. We theoretically SHOULD have top tier statistics going against bottom tier offenses, right? I get that we are just going to be towards the top of the takeaways list because we have TJ Watt and what is likely the league's best pass rush, but we aren't going to get turnovers every game and we can't just lose the games we don't.

I don't expect us to be perfect either, but I do think there have been some occurrences that give valid reason for concern. That is all. We are going to find out a lot about our defense the next two games. Washington is the 3rd highest PPG offense in the league and Baltimore is 2nd. If we can stifle those teams, then I'll feel a lot better about the defense. If we give up 30+ PPG in both of them, then I think the concern will be is the defense good enough to win in the postseason when we will face the best teams the league has to offer. Only time will tell.

 

It kinda makes sense when teams say that we have a pretty "vanilla" scheme. We seem content sitting in Cover 3 primarily and hoping the pass rush gets home.

https://www.the33rdteam.com/breaking-down-nfl-man-zone-coverage-schemes/

This is an interesting link to a breakdown of the coverages and their usages from 2020-2023. It kinda gives you a feel for why teams employ certain strategies, and what typically works against them. Just figured it was worth a share here.

 

Are the Stars aligned for Samhain , or what. Someone actually said I was correct....not on one point, but both points. I will try not to let it go, and make me a pumpkin head. LoL

 

Thank You

 

Highsmith is close, and we hurt by not having him out there, because Hes good, but the man sees too much one on one matchups that he doesn't win that makes me say He shouldn't be on that list.

 

It won’t open for me.

 

I think some don't see that sometimes we will play zone on one side, and man on the other, and we also play a

I think also some people miss when we will have a combination coverage. We will play man on one side, and zone on the other, or when we do a cover two man under, and some People are just seeing the zones. Of course we do play a lot of zone....I'm not denying that.....we have since way before Mike Tomlin was here.

 

that’s the best argument ever! Well supported, down to earth, and clearly articulated. Good job!

only issue is that it stinks of arrogance… yet again…. You were doing so much better this season….

 

Just because you don’t understand doesn’t mean I don’t

I could explain it to you but I’m on vacation and just too lazy