Mighty Joe Young
Living in Troll's Heads Rent-Free for Decades
- Joined:
- Feb 8, 2021
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My favorite teams
The preseaon and the monsoon game gave us some nice false hope, but against a team with a veteran HoF QB and a good running game, we got to see what we all mostly expected to see...The Bears in year 1 of a total rebuild.
My thoughts -
* The O-Line had solid run blocking for most of the night, but even with that, its obvious on the Justin Fields sacks in pass pro that Mustipher and Borom are just flat overmatched. The thing is - the coaching staff and the GM know this too. Its why Patrick is rotating with Jenkins (he will take over for Mustipher when ready) and why they picked up Alex Leatherwood, who I am going to guess they will slide in as an improvement to Borom as soon as they get him ready (and he's over his Mono). Doesn't mean either of these guys are the long term solution, but I believe the state of the Wide Recievers and the O-Line have more to do with the play calling than any confidence or lack thereof in Fields overall.
* Speaking of Fields, really rough game for him, especially in the first half and at the end of the game. He was trying to do too much instead of letting the game come to him, and it was a regression day for him. But there was a slight bright spot. He did, when given time, deliver a quick timing strike over the middle in the second half that shows he can still learn. Still, as much as there are some here who want to pile on Fields as a bust right now, its still way too early, and they just played a Green Bay team who has a Playoff-ready defense and who knows Getsy's system really well overall. The smart play is for people to treat this like Fields' rookie year. Shit, I never thought Tua would amount to anything and apparently he had himself a day with the Dolphins - developing Fields is going to take more patience than a lot of you have. Try to have it anyway.
* The WRs we have right now are better blockers than WRs. I think this was by design. The GM and staff know they are going to try to win while being severely undermanned compared to other teams. So they are trying to win games on the ground. Which made the reason to abandon the run and some of the shotgun run plays very baffling. Hoping the coaches learn from that.
* Speaking of undermanned, are we glad we didn't pay Roquan Smith yet? In this defense, the Linebackers are the position group primarily in charge of stopping the run, and they have a horrible, horrible night of missed tackle after missed tackle and bad angle after bad angle. Smith and the Colds free agent, Muhammad, were getting run on all night long and didn't even slow the Green Bay running backs down to give the secondary a chance to swarm to the ball carrier. If you want to take away one potential positive from all the negative? I remember when Lovie installed the cover 2 in 2004, and in spots the defense looked just as awful as this for stretches with pro bowl and hall of fame players at the positions. This was 100% because the players were not trusting the guy next to them to mind their gap, and instead came over to "help", which opened up the field and made the defense fall apart. Too early to tell, but lets hope that's all the problem is here, and it will be fixed by the last 4 games of the season.
* Kyler Gordon - welcome to the league rookiee. He showed some good traits but also got his ass torched and was out of position a LOT. Jaylon Johnson he is not, that's for sure. But that said, think when all is said and done, Gordon will be permanently moved to nickel after this season. I think he can thrive and grow there - but I just don't see him as a full time outside corner like Johnson is.
*Conversely, Brisker looks like the real deal. Its hard to call a 2nd round pick "a steal", but he keeps playing like he should have been selected with one of the first 10 picks in the draft. Good on Poles for that one.
Honestly, that's all I can really say with confidence right now. Anything else would just be emotion from being pissed at losing to the Packers again. Trying to look at things objectively, and I really think by this time next year, half of the players on our team will be playing for someone else or out of the league.
My thoughts -
* The O-Line had solid run blocking for most of the night, but even with that, its obvious on the Justin Fields sacks in pass pro that Mustipher and Borom are just flat overmatched. The thing is - the coaching staff and the GM know this too. Its why Patrick is rotating with Jenkins (he will take over for Mustipher when ready) and why they picked up Alex Leatherwood, who I am going to guess they will slide in as an improvement to Borom as soon as they get him ready (and he's over his Mono). Doesn't mean either of these guys are the long term solution, but I believe the state of the Wide Recievers and the O-Line have more to do with the play calling than any confidence or lack thereof in Fields overall.
* Speaking of Fields, really rough game for him, especially in the first half and at the end of the game. He was trying to do too much instead of letting the game come to him, and it was a regression day for him. But there was a slight bright spot. He did, when given time, deliver a quick timing strike over the middle in the second half that shows he can still learn. Still, as much as there are some here who want to pile on Fields as a bust right now, its still way too early, and they just played a Green Bay team who has a Playoff-ready defense and who knows Getsy's system really well overall. The smart play is for people to treat this like Fields' rookie year. Shit, I never thought Tua would amount to anything and apparently he had himself a day with the Dolphins - developing Fields is going to take more patience than a lot of you have. Try to have it anyway.
* The WRs we have right now are better blockers than WRs. I think this was by design. The GM and staff know they are going to try to win while being severely undermanned compared to other teams. So they are trying to win games on the ground. Which made the reason to abandon the run and some of the shotgun run plays very baffling. Hoping the coaches learn from that.
* Speaking of undermanned, are we glad we didn't pay Roquan Smith yet? In this defense, the Linebackers are the position group primarily in charge of stopping the run, and they have a horrible, horrible night of missed tackle after missed tackle and bad angle after bad angle. Smith and the Colds free agent, Muhammad, were getting run on all night long and didn't even slow the Green Bay running backs down to give the secondary a chance to swarm to the ball carrier. If you want to take away one potential positive from all the negative? I remember when Lovie installed the cover 2 in 2004, and in spots the defense looked just as awful as this for stretches with pro bowl and hall of fame players at the positions. This was 100% because the players were not trusting the guy next to them to mind their gap, and instead came over to "help", which opened up the field and made the defense fall apart. Too early to tell, but lets hope that's all the problem is here, and it will be fixed by the last 4 games of the season.
* Kyler Gordon - welcome to the league rookiee. He showed some good traits but also got his ass torched and was out of position a LOT. Jaylon Johnson he is not, that's for sure. But that said, think when all is said and done, Gordon will be permanently moved to nickel after this season. I think he can thrive and grow there - but I just don't see him as a full time outside corner like Johnson is.
*Conversely, Brisker looks like the real deal. Its hard to call a 2nd round pick "a steal", but he keeps playing like he should have been selected with one of the first 10 picks in the draft. Good on Poles for that one.
Honestly, that's all I can really say with confidence right now. Anything else would just be emotion from being pissed at losing to the Packers again. Trying to look at things objectively, and I really think by this time next year, half of the players on our team will be playing for someone else or out of the league.