sven233

What a call.... What a catch. Man, he drops the easy ones sometimes, but he comes through with the tough ones once in a while.

I know our defense is missing a lot of guys right now, but man......they are just really bad. Allen has to score again.

Groin injury

Spector on St Brown..... Not an ideal matchup.

I mean, you see how bad our defense is and how easy the Lions are moving the ball. Just makes it even more strange for them to try that onside kick there. This game changed with Williams went out earlier. We obviously had a plan with him on defense and the defense was playing well with him on the field. Now we lose Milano and Bishop on top of all the other injuries and our whole scheme and plan has seemed to have gone out the window.

Wow.....what a strange call to do that at this point of the game. Obviously Campbell knows how bad our special teams are and figured it was worth the risk. But hey, I do appreciate Hollins for not scoring there so Allen can add a TD to his MVP case.

Allen may have to score 2 more TDs to win this game....

Whelp, so much for keeping everything underneath. Swiss cheese defense is back.

Everything underneath. They are going to get yards. Just make them burn the clock while they do it.

Had them beat and now it's not over..... There is no way you can let that happen. LBs were just a hair shallow to not be able to knock that down.

Typical.....

Bishop has had learning moments in this game for sure, but he's been solid for the most part. Valuable reps for the future, though.

When Daboll was here, we ran a push pass play almost every other week. It was almost unstoppable. He leaves and, unfortunately, that play disappeared out of the playbook for whatever reason. I wish they would bring it back. They have the talent to run it.

Nice....

Spencer Brown is a dog out there.....

4 down territory. This is the kill shot. Gotta take it.

Awesome......refs got it right for a change.

CHALLENGE THIS!!! THAT IS A FUMBLE!!!

I don't blame McDermott for not going for that one, although I would have been fine if he did. A 3 score lead would have been huge there. Detroit is so good on offense, I don't think field position matters all that much. Would not be surprised at all if they go 97 yards here.

The offense has been very good so far today and there isn't a lot to criticize, but man, I wish the WRs were making a few more plays. They've made a few for sure, but the backs have been the story of the game. Believe me, I am not complaining and I want to keep with what's working, but I'm hoping to see a play or two from them on this drive.

Oliver heard the noise this week for sure..... He's been a beast out there today.

Was busy with a few things during the 1st half. It was eventful for sure, but the main takeaway I have is that it was absolutely criminal not to just call the tush push twice from inside the 2. The coaches overthought it and it cost them big, especially with Bass returning to his bad self. Not only did that kick cost them points there, but I think that is the main reason why they didn't try the long one at the end of the half. The offense has been good overall, but they are going to probably need at least 3 more TDs to have a chance to win this game. The defense started strong, but the Lions have figured it out. Gotta be a lot better.

Just covered this in another post, but for the most part, I like the philosophy we have on defense. Do I wish things would get changed up once in a while during games? Absolutely. But, fundamentally, the system is fine. HOWEVER, the problem is this philosophy relies on your defensive line being a terror. You have to get constant pressure with 4 guys and you have to be able to hold up against the run. Right now, our DL does neither of those things well. We have pretty good players on our defensive line. But we don't have 1 absolute game wrecker when you should probably have 2 at least to run the system we want to run. We are also too light up front which creates problems stopping the run. So, yeah.....we need a lot of talent added to this defensive line to make this system work to its optimal level. We need a terror off the edge and a couple of big behemoths anchors up front that can clog the middle of the line. The thing is against great QBs, this is even more important. You can get away with having an average defensive line and playing this system against your standard QBs and average offensive lines. But in the Playoffs, you play the greats. And the greats can all make every throw on the field when given the time. We just saw this last week with Stafford. When you never touch him, or even breathe on him for that matter, he made every throw to perfection and the WRs made tough catches. But, if just once our DL could have affected him and made his life less than perfect in the pocket, maybe one or 2 of those throws are off just that fraction of an inch and aren't completed. It would help if McDermott changed things up once in a while and showed different looks, but that isn't who he is. So, it's going to be on Beane to go get a couple of game wreckers up front that can affect the QB consistently and not just once in a while. It would be great to get a couple of DTs that can push the pocket and clog up running lanes at times as well to make it easier on the LBs to make plays.

The thing is, every week we see defenses throw multiple looks at teams. Just look at what the Chiefs have done the last several years with Spags. He changes things up on almost on almost every series and in every situation. Even this year with them not having the same talent they have had over the past several years, for the most part, they are great. Up until the Bengals lost all of their talent on defense this year, they did the same things. The 49ers, before all of their devastating injuries, did a lot of exotic scheming at times. Most of the top defenses change things during games. And I'm not saying McDermott never changes anything ever. I am saying he very rarely changes anything DURING games. There have been multiple games this year where RBs aren't even being touched until they are 7 yards past the LOS yet he never adjusts during the game. You cherry picking a couple games here and there from years ago doesn't show that he adapts to in game situations. The fact is, when TJ is healthy, he is always on the field. And in the Playoffs, it's 1 and done. There are no redos later in the season to correct what went wrong in the last matchup. You have to get it right the first time and adapt in game to stop the other team from mauling you in the run game if that is what is happening. Again, I am not saying to not do what you do best. We absolutely should. But once in a while, you have to show something different, especially when what you are doing is getting wrecked during a game.

Lots of talk about McDermott and his scheme going on here. Here's the thing. What we see week in and week out is his system. He may not be calling the plays, but it is his system and it is the same system that he has used since he got here. He truly believes that the best way to win games is to play 2 deep S and have TJ on the field and play nickel defense instead of 3 LBs. And quite honestly, I agree with him at a fundamental level that this is the right way to play against many teams. HOWEVER, the problem I have with McDermott is he NEVER changes it up. Even if you want to run what we run as your base defense, any great defensive coordinator is going to show different looks, different personele, and different strategies at some point during a game. He never does this. It is his philosophy to play that defense every snap of every game no matter what is happening is that game and it gets him in trouble against teams that pound the ball. The problem with giving teams light boxes to run against us is that not only are the numbers less up front, but our defensive lineman and LBs are just light in the pants as it is. They can be knocked off the ball real easy by good running teams because they just can't hold up physically. Sometimes games call for putting a 3rd LB out there instead of worrying so much about the pass with Johnson, but he just never makes that adjustment no matter what the situation is or whether they have given up 200 yards on the ground already. He never adapts to what the other team is doing. That's why you see very little man to man, why we are one of the lowest blitzing teams in the league, and why when we do lose, we tend to get destroyed in the process. Honestly, it is a little strange. I mean, the goal on offense, is to throw as many unique and different looks at the defense as possible. Different formations, personele groups, eye candy, etc. You would think that doing the same thing on defense, at least once in a while, would be a good thing. Start making the offense think about what you're doing on defense rather than just what they are trying to get done offensively. I am not saying you have to be as exotic on defense as you are on offense, but there is no reason you can't play your base defense 70% of the game and then use something different for the other 30%. But McDermott has proven that he will only run his base defense 100% of the time. Just what he believes you need to do to win. And, I suppose if you had a dominant defensive line, that would be a pretty smart way of doing it. The problem is that our line is not dominant. We have good talent, but we don't have game wrecking talent anywhere up front and that is what you need to run our base defense all the time. Like I said, fundamentally, I agree with his philosophy. I do think our best personele package and system is what we run and for the most part, we run it very well. But any good defense shows something new on occasion and we just never do. We are very easy to gameplan for in a lot of ways. I mean, our opponents almost every week say it leading up to the game. They say they know what we do because it is the same system week in and week out, but our talent does run the system extremely well and because we are fundamentally sound most of the time, we are tough to play against for teams that throw the ball regularly. Heck, even last week against the Rams, so many of those throws and catches were just absolutely perfect and there was just nothing you could do. Because Stafford had all day on virtually every play, they could make every throw and catch precise and on target even though many times our coverage was right there and just beaten by perfection. If our defensive line would have gotten any pressure at all, that game might look a lot different, but they were a no-show. But teams that don't live and die by the pass don't have those same concerns against our defense. I think just throwing 3 LBs on the field on early downs sometimes wouldn't be the worst thing in the world. And with our athletic LBs, we can still play coverage if necessary in those situations. Just change it up once in a while.