AKC

I see players sometimes as physiological beneficiaries and others as victims- and Edwards definitely looks like victim to me. A big body like Ted Washington never had to work hard to play low- he had a natural center of gravity somewhere just above his hips. I'd say about the same place for PWilliams. Sam Adams is a little higher- maybe his stomach, but Edward's is nearly chest high- a killer against run blocking. Krumrie has no doubt worked for him to lower it, but there's a limit to how far you can drop a body's natural center and I don't ever see Edwards getting it low enough to be a run stuffer. He's just a big guy who used to be good in spot duty as a pass rusher, now playing out of position as a first down DT and being taken off the field on passing downs.

I'm not sure about that, but I am CONVINCED that you ought to check your PMs every now and then ;-)

Well don't go just yet! I asked you to name one single writer league-wide who predicted that our D would struggle, and specifically as I did- against the run?

Playing on skates is a good portrayal- I've been breaking down his play a lot for the past two years and it's my opinion that he simply has a physical liability he can't overcome in his high center of gravity. Could he play lower if he put an additonal 40 pounds on his legs? Yeah, a little, but now you'd likely detract from the one thing he is superior at in his straight-ahead speed. Krumrie might be good, but I believe he's been cursed with about half as much talent as the good NFL defenses have in the interior. I'd rather see Edwards go back to his natural spot in our passing packages, something that would also get Sam Adams some plays off. Adams is going to become a risk to injury if we keep using him on 95% of our D downs. And I don't think you want to imagine this defense without Big Sam!

Somebody shoved a copy of Bill's Digest in front of me during the game last week as if it were some grail, all I could do was cringe- recalling the days when guys like Smerlas wrote for Shout! and gave fairly unadulterated commentary. It's too bad the naitonal market for a Bill's weekly isn't big enough to support some less encumbered analysis and opinion.

We've played two other games, the first one is hard to use since Edwards never played a down in the second half. Using the second game, do you ascribe gap control failures to the yardage CWilliams ran predominantly in Edwards gap?

When the foundation is suspect the whole thing will eventually fail. One conclusion you might consider from the Atlanta game is that Sam Adams needed PWilliams a lot more than most assumed. BTW- You do yourself no justice suggesting you are anywhere but among the most thoughtful and accurate posters on the board. On this one, IMO, it's inevitable that you'll come around at some point since it doesn't appear the team has given themselves any other way to correct their mistake. Anderson may be a year out of being any more effective then Ron Weebles.

And yet the threshold for being a superior run stopper (like Pat Williams) is the ability to consistently hold your postition. From pre-season to the regular season Edwards is being knocked off balance, in most cases by one blocker, on more plays than he is holding it. Holding your ground on less than half of the running plays coming at you as a DT is simply a disaster in terms of a contemporary DT in this league. Williams drew 2 blockers on almost every rushing down and yet still effectively held his ground on most plays- Edwards is the virtual antithesis. His presence grants the offense one additonal blocker to send to the second line and kill our LBs while providing a failry reliable gap for opponents to run through.

Typically fans rely on reporters to make their arguments when they wouldn't themsleves understand the first thing to look for on film regarding things like line play. For instance, the ability for a DT to hold his ground and keep his balance. Anyone who does understand the primary skills you desire in an interior dlineman will immediately see the imperfections of Mr. Edwards without digging too deeply into the tape vault. Edwards is handicapped by a high center of gravity. His better skills with his feet are limited to north-north movement and he simply doesn't have good natural or learned lateral movement. All of this that film shows suggests he's more effective as a pass rusher than a run stopper, and viola! that's been proven true over his career. If you hit the newstands enough to "buff up" on your football, sometime around the second week of November, when we've dropped further down the board of rushing defenses league-wide, some writer will discover what's obvious already to those who study line play as their gauge of a team's potential. And then you'll finally have a security blanket that will allow you to acknowledge what is clearly happening to our run defense. Until then, keep reading- there's so much text and for some that's much easier to quote than actually forming your own opinion based upon play on the field. And by there way, where were you over the pre-season when I predicted that starting Ron Edwards in our first down offense would cost us 10 spots in team defense and end up getting our linebackers killed? I like that you appear unable to form your own arguments so you instead use media hacks; go ahead and name ONE of them who predicted the demise of our defense as I did?

You're welcome to hail the musings of Sal Maiorana as your primary source of "analysis", no need to insult those of us who have a little higher standards!

I watched the game glancingly (check your PMs), and I didn't tape it. I did catch some early running plays over the spot Edwards had just been moved from.

Adams has good balance, which makes him an effective interior player against the run, especially when he's playing with another DT with balance. Unfortunately Ron Edwards has poor balance and he's easy to move off the ball with a single blocker. Yeah, it's true Big Sam is seeing two full bodies on him this season because without his partner PW drawing doubles Sam will continue to get all the attetnion, but Edwards has the advantage of drawing a single blocker while somehow making it look as if our opponents are throwing 3 or 4 guys at him.

Exactly which "Bledsoe junk" from the article do you "disagree" with: A) Bledsoe has thrown for 850 yards, B) six touchdowns C) and a passer rating of 103.7

I'm guessing Mother Theresa's feet might dangle from a hockey cross bar-

Because of course, our defensive coordinator would IMMEDIATELY identify in the media a DT who gets spun like a top in run defense as a courtesy to our upcoming opponents ;-)

We end up 10-6 this season and I'll buy every registered poster on TSW an original pair of the Ruby Slippers.

Game planning for Michael Vick might very well be considered a critical measure of a DC's skills for a team considering head coaching prospects- If we truly were fielding at the opening whistle one of the "best defenses" in the NFL Sunday, we surely failed to convert that to effective containment of Mr. Vick. In fact he had his most productive passing day of the season against us while racking up a "respectable" 7.1 yards per carry when he ran the ball. Even ignoring Vick's carries, we allowed TJ Duckett and Warrick Dunn to run for over 170 yards? And to be beaten frequently by Brian Finneran doesn't look good either- we're hardly talking about Randy Moss or Terrell Owens here. I've seen the suggestion that "player failures" were the biggest part of the equation, but are we not fielding a veteran group, almost to a man the starting "#2" defense in the league last year? Far lesser defenses have fared better against Vick over the first 4 seasons of his career. Having had the benefit of that film of poor defenses containing Vick, will the excuse that our offense wasn't holding the ball long enough be enough for Jerry to get a pass on that game when this season ends, assuming he interviews for any head coaching vacancies? Or will the scheme we fielded on Sunday and the apparent lack of any meaningful adjustments to it be a major stumbling block for Gray in any quest for his own shot at the top job in coaching?

I'd think winning half our games and getting the young QB through the season in one piece, as the starter, would constitute a succesful season looking from this vantage point after 3 games.

Yeah, you're right. We'll surely end up #2 in rush defense this year again.

There's more to that than simply the OLine. Flutie may have been one of the alltime winners in the regular season, loser against quality D's in the playoffs guys for no fault of his own (but maybe his mom's ;-). It was just too easy to scheme for him. I'd ask you to look at the time the Pats gave Mudslide down the stretch Sunday- they're hardly playing with marquis linemen yet their scheme held it together long enough- once again- for by far the best player on their roster to kick another 3 point game winner.

The running offense the Bills would like to run benefits big time by having players who can or will hustle to make blocks well outside their line spot. I don't remember Jennings more than 6 yards on any play in his career with us away from his LT spot. Gandy gets across the line completely in addition to up the field on other plays. He's a superior run blocker to JJ and but nowhere near as good in pass blocking. Gandy has given up a (1) sack this season Jonas is still clean. The big oney at LT is in Pass Pro, not run blocking.

It seems clear to me- 1) He figured he could build a power running team around OLs with better run skills and lesser pass pro skills. 2) He also figured that with a QB who can play in a moving pocket offense he could mask the OLs pass pro deficiencies with play action plus the mobility of the QB. 3) Making these two work required he be right on the point he misjudged more than any other- that the D would give him the ball back regularly and never be run over. But he failed to properly assess his talent in the interior of his DLine and when 3 doesn't work 2 is shot and 1 even becomes more difficult because in many games you'll be left throwing down the stretch. And that's what will happen the rest of the season because we simply don't have the help on this roster to stop teams from running over our RDT spot. Hell, we don't even have the depth you'd like to play an effective 3-4 in the interior of our DLine.

I'd call Jennings a wash regardless of stats because we're looking for a rushing O and he's an awful run blocker. Gandy makes up for his liability against some edge rushers in pass blocking ability versus Jonas by his ability in running plays to get in space and engage opponents, something Jonas was terrible at. Now as far as comparing Edwards and PW by stats, it's a false measure for run stoppers on the DLine. The measure is all in the film- does the DT hold his territory, forcing the runner to move laterally (losing momentum) and allow the linebackers to make the easier play? Does the DT attract at least 1.5 blockers on every play and reduce the ability for the offense to send blockers to the second level, again protecting your linebackers? The answer for PW in both these cases is YES and the answer for Ron Edwards is NO. So regardless of some tackles Edwards might have made 8 yards downfield, a place you'll rarely find a decent run-stopper making tackles, you can't with any credibility compare two completely different defensive tackles. Watch ONE Vikes game and tell me how many times PW is knocked off balance- in fact watch ALL the Vikes games this year and then watch a single Bills game, keying on Edwards. Edwards will be knocked off balance more in one game than PW is likely to be over the complete season. And you can't run stuff when you're off-balance, it's that simple.

The problem as I saw it was that bringing the 5th or 6th man took away our ability to cover their backs slipping to the sides of the field or give any help on top with the WRs. This left us in single coverage and consequently forced our cover guys to play behind their assignments. This allowed all the passes Vick completed of 5 yards or less to behind the LOS that were killing us. In their first drive they had a 3rd and 14 that went 21 yards on a 2 yard pass plus an earlier behind the LOS first down pass going for 8 yards. It kept happening all day long and our insistence on blitzing kept allowing Vick to throw this garbage on us and eventually beat us to death by our taking advantage of a scheme we refused to adjust. Dropping the extra rushers back into coverage could have allowed our dbs to jump routes and make Atlanta pay for throwing that kind of crap; we couldn't take those risks because we had too many committed to rush.

If you don't mind confirming for me just in case I missed something- The offensive players are responsible for listening to the offensive coaches and executing their strategy, and when the players don't listen it's the offensive coaches fault. The defensive players are responsible for listening to and executing the defensive coaches strategy, and when the players don't listen it's their own fault.