I think AJ has gotten bogged down and is not using his talent to be aggressive. When he was at Ohio St. he was on the offensive side of the LOS more than on his own when I watched him. He was all over the field.
It's about time Moss told him to cut it loose. Should have told him that 12 weeks ago.
I think this scheme tends to overload the LB's role and can see why they get caught up thinking too much.
"pack93z" wrote:
How really is this scheme more taxing on the backers?
Granted, they are asked to cover in man up more than most defenses, but we aren't a team of elaborate blitz packages or asking the backers to read the play then drop into a 15 yard zone... They play the backers about 3.5 yards off the line, Hawk dropped a little deeper Sunday.. so they aren't sucked up to far.. IMO.. 3 yards deep should be adequate to either attack the run or be able to properly adjust to a passing route.
Should we drop the Backers into a zone, potentially.. but they have to be able to take the correct angles and drop a player with a sure tackle.. something Hawk, Poppinga and Barnett struggled with all season.
If you are saying that we are asking to much of this group based on their skill sets.. that I completely agree with.. other than Chillar maybe, we don't have the speed or quickness to play a man up defense with these backers.. that falls on the coaching staff (Sanders and Moss) completely.. not putting your players in a position of strength to win their matchup.
The player in Hawk I watched Sunday.. was a playing playing on his heels, a beat late in reading the play and not sticking his nose into the fray.. ala Barnett.
So it is either the players skating not playing up to potential or the DC and LB coach not putting the players into a position to win based on their abilities.
Personally.. I think it is a combination of all the above.
"warhawk" wrote: