from my perception, I don't necessarily place the blame for the poor play of our linebackers on moss's shoulders. sanders' scheme called for several different sets of responsibilities. corners covered man-on. safeties freelanced. d-line was committed to gap control AND pass rush (very stupid) while linebackers were in a read-think-react position, necessitated because of the gap-control responsibility of the d-line. d-line gap responsibility made it necessary for teh linebackers to also have gap-control responsibilities, taking away their ability to react... putting them half a step behind the play all the time in order to maintain their gap responsibilities. it's hard to do well if you're asked to do it while giving the other guy a head start. at this level of competition, that is asking too much. THAT was sanders' problem if you ask me. if you ask me, gap responsibilities were also the reason for his propensity to not blitz. that made our defense very rigid, very predictable, and set them up to fail. I don't care how cerebral an NFL player is. He is an animal and if ask him to think while he's playing, you're smothering his instincts....


wow, i'm worked up now. gotta cool off. lol

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I have no way to know if I should agree or disagree. I don't even know if Moss was the one dictating a Bates scheme. Sanders just as easily could have been "stuck" with it, no? More trying times...maybe I just need to know who it is? I know I am not alone with this feeling of pure trepidation...

Hmm... I'm reading what I wrote, and I'm coming off as very anti-Moss, which isn't what I intend. I'm more concerned that were aren't, in fact, being gutsy enough - then again, perhaps Moss has a completely different vision of this defense?

One thing, though: If (and it's a big "if", I know this) we do end up bringing in 2-3 studs on D via FA and the draft, perhaps it won't matter that we didn't shake the snow globe all to hell. As much as I don't like Sanders' version of this scheme, it worked fine when we had the horses to run it.

Deep breath. Wait and see. Repeat.

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ILTP, the implication, and the rumblings that i've heard are that several coaches were quite critical of Sanders' scheme and vocal in its shortcomings. From what I understand, Moss was the leader of this faction.

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yeah i guess i should have clarified that in my post.

but like dfosterf stated... who knows. all we know is rumors right now.

there could be no riff between coaches.

Moss could be the St Louis coach

We know nothing... i was just trying to defend Moss a little bit.

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All in all I like the move. It's clear that McCarthy has faith in our offense, any why not? It's been stellar. But defense was a huge problem. So even if we get a minor improvement over Sanders with a new DC a lot of our 6 points or less losses would turn into wins. That's huge.

Also, if you look at our roster we have players with specific strengths and weaknesses. Chillar in pass coverage, Poppinga in stopping the run. What we need is a creative coordinator like one of the Ryan brothers (I know they're not available) that will utilize these special talents, and create defensive packages for every specific game to take teams off guard. That's what playing defense in the NFL is about now. Throwing the offense off with different looks and playing to your strengths. Sanders didn't do that very well.

Thanks - I gathered that, but it never hurts to have more clarification. I guess the thing that's bugging me (and it's probably totally irrational) is that I didn't see Washington mentioned as one of the coaches that sided w/ Sanders, so his firing confuses me. I'm ready to accept that Moss might well have a line on how to make the base scheme more flexible and aggressive, but it sucks to lose a good CBs coach, especially as well as those guys showed this year.

But it's all conjecture and hand-wringing at this point, until we get some concrete news about what's really going to happen in '09. So what I really need to do is calm the hell down and let stuff play out, rather than getting freaked out prematurely. It's a goal.

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I am not anti-Moss, although I can see how some may completely believe that I am.. my point and only point, is scheme or not, the individual play of the linebackers themselves, each of singularly.. has not improved.

I find it convenient to dump that upon the scheme or the DC.. the simple fact, when looking at how these guys played in space, in traffic and the speed in which they react to plays, is more telling of poor individual coaching than scheme.

When in the final weeks, the few times Hawk had open lanes to the ball carrier.. he didn't attack.. there isn't a scheme out there that would cause Hawk to sit back in the hole and wait for the play to come to him..

There isn't a scheme in the world that would cause Poppinga to time after time over run a play in space and not be coached up on how to attack properly in open space and make a yard saving tackle.

There isn't a scheme issue when you see our linebackers time and time again losing one on one battles in the trenches.. that comes to coaching.. there isn't a scheme out there that won't put the backers in traffic and having to fight off blocks.. how can the scheme be held responsible for lack of fundamentals.

I realize that players aren't going to win every battle and sometimes the other team makes a play, but good grief we should win a share of them.

Moss may make a hell of a DC... and maybe he was holding back because he didn't agree with the scheme or whatnot.. but is that a reason for poor fundamental play from his group.

Packnic.. if he is the choice, I will back his play and see what happens, but if you suggest he was tanking it or giving it less than 100% and that is somehow deemed acceptable then I would be disappointed in him as a coach, teacher and leader for this defense.

A ton of the stuff I read about Moss is so positive and there are some really good comments that come his way.. I guess I expect the level of play from his position group to be more than it has shown to date.

There I broke my vow of silence big time on the backer talk and criticism of Moss.. my apologizes in advance.. I just don't see the production to match the praise.. and that just pisses me off to the ninth.. boy I get wound up tighter than a popcorn fart on this topic.. sorry again..

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I don't care what the level of "individual coaching" is, if you ask a player to "decide" what he's going to do during the play, he's going to fall behind. THAT is on the man who designs the scheme. HE is the one that asks them to play that way. Sanders asks his linebackers to think during the play. that doesn't work

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I am not anti-Moss, either. I know alot of people think highly of him, obviously...

Frankly, regardless of who gets that job, he is destined to succeed or fail dependent mostly on the improvement or lack of improvement of the defensive line. That utter failure just cost a bunch of coaches their jobs, and will do the exact same thing if there is a repeat of it...4-3, 3-4, wildcat d... what EVER---

That twinkie eating fat fu## has until the end of training camp. Period.

This is getting serious, young Mr. Harrell.