Rankings...


bleacherreport.com/art...y-rankings

RaiderPride wrote:

Rankings... bleacherreport.com/art...y-rankings

Those rankings were made before last year, as Deon Grant is still listed to play in Seattle, Will Allen in Tampa, among others.

DakotaT wrote:

Packers_Finland wrote: DakotaT wrote: Far and away our worst starter on defense. An absolute liability in the passing game. I can't believe the love this guy gets from some of you. I guess it is just easier to pick on Jarrett Bush. I jumped out of my recliner when we drafted Burnett, and ala Nick Collins, I hope he starts game 1 of his rookie year and Bigby is relegated to a reserve. www.profootballfocus.c...numgames=1 According to this site, he was the 9th best safety in the league of players who played 25% of the snaps or more. I know that site is not the Holy Bible of football. But that, and the fact and I haven't seen him do many mistakes, except possibly in the Steelers last TD if he was supposed to have the zone where the catch was, makes me think that he isn't as bad as many on this site believe him to be. When you have to play ten yards deeper than you should be because you lack speed and quickness, you get taken advantage by good quarterbacks. He's John Lynch, post neck injury sporting some dreads. Today's game is won and lost with speed.

I agree about your points, as you can see from the first post I made in this thread. But I don't see how he lacks speed so much that it negates the fact that he's a solid player.

Packers_Finland wrote:

DakotaT wrote: Packers_Finland wrote: DakotaT wrote: Far and away our worst starter on defense. An absolute liability in the passing game. I can't believe the love this guy gets from some of you. I guess it is just easier to pick on Jarrett Bush. I jumped out of my recliner when we drafted Burnett, and ala Nick Collins, I hope he starts game 1 of his rookie year and Bigby is relegated to a reserve. www.profootballfocus.c...numgames=1 According to this site, he was the 9th best safety in the league of players who played 25% of the snaps or more. I know that site is not the Holy Bible of football. But that, and the fact and I haven't seen him do many mistakes, except possibly in the Steelers last TD if he was supposed to have the zone where the catch was, makes me think that he isn't as bad as many on this site believe him to be. When you have to play ten yards deeper than you should be because you lack speed and quickness, you get taken advantage by good quarterbacks. He's John Lynch, post neck injury sporting some dreads. Today's game is won and lost with speed. I agree about your points, as you can see from the first post I made in this thread. But I don't see how he lacks speed so much that it negates the fact that he's a solid player.

He can hit and tackle, and against mediocre quarterbacks, he looks like a pretty good player. But against top ten quarterbacks, I guarantee you, he is the weak spot they exploit.

I hate stats as an argument to determine a player's worth. Darren Sharper will go into the hall of fame because of his picks, but was he better than Leroy?

I think the biggest liability of Bigby's is his poor decision making in terms of angles, his instincts and from what I see pre-snap on the field is a common potato may have better communication skills...

I banged on it at the end of last season.. and I will bang on it again.. if Burnett can effectively communicate the needed adjustments upon the field pre-snap.. this defense will take off.. big time.

Bigby/Collins/Bush/ whomever.. not a damn one seemed to be able to assist in pre-snap reads and adjustments.. the missing link in my opinion on the back end of this defense.

Right off the bat, it will be interesting to see if Bigby or Burnett gets more reps in training camp. I wouldn't be surprised if the coaches split the reps about equally between the two and don't decide who starts until the last preseason game.

I hope Burnette is an upgrade, it would mean he is really good for a rook. That being said, when Bigby was out, we lost games, when he was not out, we were better.

The Vikings took advantage of the 3rd stringer who was in for Bigby when we lost in MN. It was one of the big reasons we lost. Along with the O-line and the dropped TD in the end zone on 4th down. Arrgh!

Bigby is at least a guy our other players can depend on to not screw up. He does make a great play now and then.

I am not a huge fan though. I would rather have a guy like LeRoy Butler than a big hitter like Bigby. Butler scared the other teams DCs, not their trainers.

DakotaT wrote:

He can hit and tackle, and against mediocre quarterbacks, he looks like a pretty good player. But against top ten quarterbacks, I guarantee you, he is the weak spot they exploit. I hate stats as an argument to determine a player's worth. Darren Sharper will go into the hall of fame because of his picks, but was he better than Leroy?

In defense of Sharper, the Saints won the SB with a mediocre D that just happened to get takeaways at the best possible times.

Like it or not, INTs matter. I'd trade two missed tackles for an INT. Maybe even three missed tackles for an INT. Heck, maybe even 4. Especially when you got a guy like Sharper or Woody who got 3 INTs returned for TDs last year. That's game changing. The Steelers won the SB a few years back by getting an INT returned for a TD.

Back to Bigby, it's easy to criticize, but how many SS's out there don't get lit up by elite QBs?

Packers_Finland wrote:

RaiderPride wrote: Rankings... bleacherreport.com/art...y-rankings Those rankings were made before last year, as Deon Grant is still listed to play in Seattle, Will Allen in Tampa, among others.

Thanks Fin.

My mistake.... I was not as observant as you when I did a search for Safty Rankings.

Greg C. wrote:

Right off the bat, it will be interesting to see if Bigby or Burnett gets more reps in training camp. I wouldn't be surprised if the coaches split the reps about equally between the two and don't decide who starts until the last preseason game.

That makes sense. Should be a good battle.

Burnett beating out Bigby would be a nice upgrade. So would Bulaga and Lang legitimitely beating out Cliffy and Tausch be nice upgrades. Always hate to see Packers like that go but it's always positive for the team. Not only does the young player provide an upgrade, but you also then have a dependable veteran backup. In addition it means we drafted well and the young players are good now, with a bright future because the current starters are still playing at a good level.

zombieslayer wrote:

Back to Bigby, it's easy to criticize, but how many SS's out there don't get lit up by elite QBs?

Exactly. Any Bigby haters want to answer this question?

All I know is what has frustrated me most about Bigby the last two seasons is his availability. It's hard to argue that when Bigby wasn't playing or too hurt to play well our defense suffered. If Morgan can be an upgrade, then fine, so be it. I'll take an upgrade at any position on the team. So far that kid hasn't played a game, so until then, I'm glad Bigby signed.

Atari was okay. We don't NEED an upgrade from Atari, we need an upgrade from Atari's replacements far more. We suffered far more when Atari was out than when he was in.

If we keep Atari healthy and have BETTER player backing him up, our defense will be that much better.

Zero2Cool wrote:

Atari was okay. We don't NEED an upgrade from Atari, we need an upgrade from Atari's replacements far more. We suffered far more when Atari was out than when he was in. If we keep Atari healthy and have BETTER player backing him up, our defense will be that much better.

That's it in a nutshell. If Burnett beats out Bigby for the starting job, all the better, but I wouldn't count on it. Either way we're way better off at safety this year than last.

Packers_Finland wrote:

Atari Bigby is horribly underrated. He still might be our worst defensive starter though. His biggest weakness in my opinion is positioning.

This seemed really confusing to me but then i tried to make a counter argument for it and couldn't. I guess you could point to Jones as the "worst starter" on defense but you have a very valid point.

earthquake wrote:

Packers_Finland wrote: Atari Bigby is horribly underrated. He still might be our worst defensive starter though. His biggest weakness in my opinion is positioning. This seemed really confusing to me but then i tried to make a counter argument for it and couldn't. I guess you could point to Jones as the "worst starter" on defense but you have a very valid point.

Worst starter on a very well stocked defense. Someone has to be that guy. Even in the Pro Bowl, someone has to be the worst starter on the defense.

pack93z wrote:

I banged on it at the end of last season.. and I will bang on it again.. if Burnett can effectively communicate the needed adjustments upon the field pre-snap.. this defense will take off.. big time. Bigby/Collins/Bush/ whomever.. not a damn one seemed to be able to assist in pre-snap reads and adjustments.. the missing link in my opinion on the back end of this defense.

I agree with you that we could use better communication, but honestly after watching the Cardinals playoff loss for the 3rd time since it happened, I wonder if it is better Safety pre-snap communication we need. Put differently, I wonder if a safety is really going to make that much of a difference.

Mose of the bunch WR formations the Cards ran saw mis-matches on LBs. That is, when a CB covering the WR passed off an assignment to the player in another zone, it ended up being a LB.

After watching it again, I didn't feel a total lack of communication breakdown with our Safties was the main issue... it felt more like the entire defence was playing in a system foreign to them. That is, when it came to make adjustments and switch off players to different ones, it felt like our players were playing the 3-4 zone for the first time in their lives. They could not make heads or tails of what to do.

Now that may indicate that the level of familiarity with the 3-4 our team had was novice, and the Cards exploited it.

However, I wonder if what the Cardinals did is just exploit a flaw in the zone 3-4 scheme. I recently saw a replay of the Steelers / Cards Superbowl. Interestingly, throughout the game, but especially in the second half when the Cards got back into the game, they were using the exact same thing that gave the Packers D problems: bunch formations and having their WRs cross routes.

The Steelers, in turn, also had problems stopping this. Quite simply, the Cardinal WRs were too talented for LBs to handle one-on-one. They got match-up advantages, and then they exploited. Now the Steelers have been running a zone 3-4 for a while, so you'd think they'd be well versed in it. Yet there they were, being exploited in much the same manner the Packers were last season.

Perhaps a new SS with better communication skills will make such performances rarer. But after watching the Superbowl and seeing the Steelers D being cut up.... I can't help but think there is a flaw in the Defensive scheme we run, and it is inevitable it will be exploited from time to time.

Great stuff aadp. You get another clappy hands point for that post.

Seems like more nickle and dime with man coverage would be the solution to that at first glance. Easier said than done though, I'm sure.

I am not a Bigby 'hater'.. I just watch him take poor angles in both pursuit and coverage.. lack ball skills and instincts.. and is part of the backend communication issue that plagues us when teams stack or put in presnap movement.. the games we struggled in more so than not in coverage was stacked and movement sets.. part of that is our physical play in coverage.. but a good part of that is lack of presnap adjustments.. which like it or not comes from the safety spots.. a weakness in my opinion upon this club.

Collins has greater range, instincts and ball skills than Bigby.. but I hold them both equally accountable for the lack of adjustments and communication in the secondary.. so if Burnett can bring some help in that area.. I am all for it.. from reports.. smart effective communicator.. sounds like a fit to me.