There are some interesting 1-on-1 match-ups going on in this game that might just settle the final score.
Clifton versus Peppers is one of the most important ones. If Clifton has a good day, he obviously won't shut down Peppers, but he's capable of containing him. Something that'd be a huge plus for us, as he carries that 4-man rush.
Our WRs against their secondary is an intersting one, as well. Those safeties are beatable. Easily. The corners, not so much. They play a lot of cover 2 and I reckon that, when the CB lets him go, Jennings might just fly by those safeties one or two times.
And as good as the Bears CBs have played, they're not deep enough to consistently cover a 4 or 5 man wide set. Hope to see some of that today.
On defense it's going to be interesting to see how we contain that speed at the WR position. We usually have Shields on the guy with blazing speed, but they have two WRs who fall into that category. I think we'll see a lot of Shields on Hester. I vividly remember a shot of Knox absolutely blazing right by Woodson, so I reckon we might play a bit with deep safety help. You have to respect that speed.
Secondly, the pass rush. Walden looked great against the Eagles and Bears, but not so much against Atlanta. If there's ever a time he has to step up his play, it's today. We have to take advantage of some average tackle play by the Bears. Especially since Cutler likes to either hold on to the ball or throw an ill-advised pass.
There's no doubt in my mind that Matthews will handle Webb again. Let's hope that the officiating crew actually calls some holds this time.
Packers @ Bears 24 - 14
"zombieslayer" wrote:
Wow. Only 3 points off. Maybe there is some truth to this entire world being a figment of Rockmolder's imagination.
Hey, stop making me punch myself Rock. That hurts.
"Rockmolder" wrote:
I could've said 21 - 14, but I had to keep up appearences, obviously.
Clifton vs Peppers - We won that one most of the day. Lang got his behind whooped, but Clifton held his own as much as you can expect against Peppers.
Safety play - Jennings got in between the safeties and corners 2 times on the first drive, with Nelson doing the same one or two plays after that.
CB Depth - Noticed how they couldn't cover Nelson as our 3rd/4th receiver? Their CB group was, indeed, not deep enough to cover that 4/5 man set. Saw a lot of that yesterday.
Our defense - The long plays we gave up to Knox?... He got behind our CB and the safety help didn't arrive soon enough. Apart from that, though, we shut down that speed. Had a CB/S problem on Bennett's TD, as well, although he isn't exactly known for his speed, so I won't rack that one up to my clairvoyancy.
The pass rush - We got there with 3. Walden didn't exactly step up his play, but Jenkins did. Together with Raji's amazingly high level of play and Matthews' All-pro play, they got some amazing pressure with just the 3 of them.
Lastly, the officials - What'd I say about the holding calls? Raji and Jenkins spend the 2 minute warning complaining to the refs about getting held just about every single play. And with good reason.
I'm going bigheaded on you people. I love me some me.