Hapless Bills Fan Posted December 9, 2011 Share Posted December 9, 2011 Perhaps, in regards to the Colts, for instance, that point bears scrutiny, not reapeating. Since we are interjecting facts: The Colts D was 1 in points allowed in 2007, yet they went one and done in the playoffs. Same for 2005--they were #2 in points allowed and had a quick exit because the offense could only put up 18 points. In other elimination games, they have put up 17,16, 3, 0 and 17 points going back to 2000. The Colts have had plenty of decent to very good defenses. They haven't had good coaching in many years. OK, I'll admit to oversimplifying. he other part of the picture, of course, is what killed the Bills in 4 superbowls - the quality of the opponent and the game plan. A truly dominant defense with a good game plan can stifle a finess offense on any given Sunday. Curious about the coaching thing: In 2006, the Colts won the Superbowl with Dungy. In 2007, the defense improved markedly - Dungy was still the coach - are you saying they lacked decent coaching with Dungy? (curious - I have liked Dungy as a coach from a distance, but really never scrutinized him) Caldwell, I have no opinion of - I do have the opinion that the Colts overall team quality has been eroding over the years, leading to this years collapse. Granted that the Colts have had several years of good defenses, albeit a top-10 defense in both points and yards given up only twice. I personally don't believe that teams win consistently without at least a mediocre or better defense. A curious point is that the Colts often show a significant gap between rank by points and yards, which truly dominant, physical defenses don't - it usually indicates that a great offense is helping out the defense by keeping the ball out of the D's hands, and the D is not as good as their scoring rank would indicate. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mr. WEO Posted December 9, 2011 Share Posted December 9, 2011 (edited) OK, I'll admit to oversimplifying. he other part of the picture, of course, is what killed the Bills in 4 superbowls - the quality of the opponent and the game plan. A truly dominant defense with a good game plan can stifle a finess offense on any given Sunday. Curious about the coaching thing: In 2006, the Colts won the Superbowl with Dungy. In 2007, the defense improved markedly - Dungy was still the coach - are you saying they lacked decent coaching with Dungy? (curious - I have liked Dungy as a coach from a distance, but really never scrutinized him) Caldwell, I have no opinion of - I do have the opinion that the Colts overall team quality has been eroding over the years, leading to this years collapse. Granted that the Colts have had several years of good defenses, albeit a top-10 defense in both points and yards given up only twice. I personally don't believe that teams win consistently without at least a mediocre or better defense. A curious point is that the Colts often show a significant gap between rank by points and yards, which truly dominant, physical defenses don't - it usually indicates that a great offense is helping out the defense by keeping the ball out of the D's hands, and the D is not as good as their scoring rank would indicate. Absolutely--how else can you explain such a mediocre playoff history with such stacked teams. Dungy was blessed with great players on both sides of the team for years. On offense, I can't name a team in the last 15 years that had, consistently, as much talent at all skill positions than the Colts. Yet only 1 SB win. He struggled against NE mightily. HE went one and done 4 times--in the Manning era! He lost in the playoffs to inferior teams. His prior team WON the SB as soon as he left! That, to me, is sign of inadequate coaching. Edited December 9, 2011 by Mr. WEO Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Juror#8 Posted December 9, 2011 Author Share Posted December 9, 2011 (edited) Um, no actually. Should it be? I do appreciate you taking the time to provide some information, but it seems a little mixed up. (I prefer using scoring as a metric but the story is similar with yards) In 2003, they sucked on both offense (22nd) and defense (24th) and finished 5-11. In 2004, better defense (5th) but no offense (31st) and had finished 6-10, not 5-11. In 2005, the Redskins were 10-6 and went to the playoffs, not 6-10. They were 9th in both scoring and points - this would appear to correlate better defense, with making the playoffs, providing the other side of the ball exhibits minimal competence (is at least mediocre) In 2006, they were 5-11 and sucked on both offense and defense. In 2007 (9-7) and 2008 (8-8), their defense improved and so did their record. In 2009 and 2010, they were 18th and 21st in defensive scoring (I really don't like yards given up as the defensive metric), and they had losing seasons. In summary, in the two seasons when the Redskins has both a top-10 defense and a mediocre (middle of the pack) offense, they had winning seasons and went to the playoffs. The Bills currently appear to have a mediocre (middle-of-the-pack) offense. This would appear to support the hypothesis that maintaining the quality of the offense, while building a decent defense would be the priority as a decent defense would also help the offense. Returning to your original question "Why do some folks here want this team to be the Washington Redskins of the last decade - aka GREAT defense; Pathetic offense; Little success", your premise appears to be faulty: I don't see how anyone can describe a team that has ranged between 5th and 27th in points given up (average of 16th) as having "GREAT defense" over the last decade (if you insist on yards, that would be range of 3rd to 31st with an average of 14th) I would say this indicates that except in very special circumstances, a team needs both sides of the ball to be at least competent, and one or the other side to be good. It is interesting as appearing to indicate the quality of a defense can vary wildly from year to year. Please excuse my transposing of the one record. Excellent points - especially the point about the Redskins' successes with top 10 defenses and middle-of-the-pack offenses. Though I still believe that I've thrown enough examples/metrics/scenarios out to support an approach to building a potent offense primarily, your post above is food for thought and has me thinking a bit more critically. As I mentioned in a previous post, I think that the approach that Cincinnati has adopted is a refreshing one, and likely will be successful for them long term. And despite the Colts' "one-and-done" playoff appearances, there is no denying that they have been one of the more successful franchises in modern history - and we're talking sustained success. They've done so with a keen eye towards offensive superiority and haven't been disuaded by very, very poor defenses at times. Similarly, the Patriots seemed to have quietly transitioned to an "offense first" paradigm post 2006. The year before Cincinatti's 12-4 year, in an interview with Chad Johnson, he said that they wanted to mimic the Colts' offense first philosophy, and both he and Carson Palmer had attended a Colts game or two...if I remember correctly. Maybe, at the end of the day, it's a zero sum game. As I look at the numbers in a more detailed way, the successful teams, more often than not, have a Great offense or defense and are serviceable on the other side of the ball. Maybe every other instance operates on the fringes comparatively (1999 Rams, 2000 Ravens, 2007 Colts). But with that said, it's difficult for me not to want to build from the offense out if only because it is easier to find talent that's plug-and-play on the offensive side of the ball. Edited December 9, 2011 by Juror#8 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
All_Pro_Bills Posted December 9, 2011 Share Posted December 9, 2011 Looking at the last 9 Super Bowl winners yields an interesting view. 2010 Green Bay - 10th in points scored and 2nd in points allowed. 2009 New Orleans - 1st in points scored and 20th in points allowed. 2008 Pittsburgh - 20th in points scored and 1st in points allowed. 2007 New York Giants - 14th in points scored and 17th in points allowed. 2006 Indianapolis - 2nd in points scored and 23rd in points allowed. 2005 Pittsburgh - 9th in points scored and 3rd in points allowed. 2004 New England - 4th in points scored and 2nd in points allowed. 2003 New England - 12th in points scored and 1st in points allowed. 2002 Tampa Bay - 18th in points scored and 1st in points allowed. 6 of the 9 SB champions had defenses ranked higher in points allowed (3 - 1st, 2 - 2nd, 1 - 3rd) vs. their offenses in points scored. To me this points to an element of truth in the saying 'defense wins championships'. Even looking at the losers all the teams, with the exception of Arizona in 2008 at 28th, had defenses in the top 10 in points allowed. Only New Orleans with the #1 scoring offense in 2009 won the SB. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NewEra Posted December 10, 2011 Share Posted December 10, 2011 1323279750[/url]' post='2330528']Not buying it. If your defense can't get off the field, all you have is an offense that looks good sitting on the bench. As others have said, you don't need the #1 defense in the league (although that NEVER hurts), but you do need to make some stops and be able to give your offense a chance to score. When the Bills defense was getting turnovers and putting the team in positions to score, the Bills were winning. They made stops with turnovers, but did not necessarily force alot of punts. Now, we don't make stops via either turnovers or forcing punts so you see -- we don't win. Give me some more defense (and better yet a D coordinator what can help put the players in a position to make stops) and I'll be a happy guy. That's dead last in sacks while getting 10 in one game vs the Deadskins -- I think a total of 7 in the other 10 games. That's pathetic! Ummm, the defense will get off the field. Then the offense comes on the field and drives down the field and scores a td. You can look at it the other way around too. If you're offense is constantly driving down the field scoring tds, the defense is on the field a lot less, allowing them to get fresh and not get tired. If you're offense is constantly going 3 and out, the defense is constantly on the field. Even if they're good, they're tired and susceptible to getting beat/breaking down/getting injured. The majority of the teams that win the super bowl nowadays have great offenses. Some have good defenses too. A couple have had great defenses with mediocre offenses. MOST have GREAT offenses. Its the truth. Over the last 25 years, the SB champs have averaged around 34 points in the super bowl. An AVERAGE of 34!!!! That's great offense. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bowery4 Posted December 10, 2011 Share Posted December 10, 2011 Run and gun offense means not having the ball in your offenses hands very long (in BB or FB)most teams play a very aggressive defense scheme to increase TOs and make it work. We need a stronger talent base on D to make that work for us, if we are to stay with Chan's scheme IMO Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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