Defense has the players and talent: Gut Check time! LETS GO!!

[patsinthesnow]

San Francisco's Linebacker core is the best in the league, that's why their defense is good. Our talent there is nowhere close to them at that position.

The Bengals and Jaguars defense have better players all around than our defense.

To classify our defense "talent" wise I'd say:

1 All-Pro DT (Wilfork)
1 ALL-Pro ILB (Mayo)
1 All Pro player in a slump (Mccourty)
1 very good/borderline probowl DE (carter)
1 good safety (Chung)
1 decent CB (Arrington)
4-5 JAG LBs (Guyton, Ninkovich, Spikes, Fletcher, Cunningham)
3 JAG linemen (Ellis, Haynesworth until proven otherwise, Love)
5 absolute trash secondary players that would be STers everywhere else(Ighdigbo, Brown, Barrett, Molden, Phillip Adams)

If we just had average players to surround Wilfork, Carter, Mccourty, and Mayo, the defense would be good. The problem is it's pretty bad around them.

 

[mgcolby]

Yup. Ladies and gents these are your starters on D:

CB Moulden
CB Adams
S Ihedigbo
LB Guyton
LB Ninkovich

How many of them would be starting on any other team? Yup none. Heck even Leigh Bodden is having a hard time being picked up. Am all for confidence but delusional? No thanks.

Have you seen some of the LB corps around the league? They both would start in Philly....

 

[mgcolby]

Guyton has been awful this year, worse than I've ever seen him play and I really have thought bad thoughts about him. He improved last year, but that improved is gone.

Spikes has been inconsistent, very inconsistent.

The secondary..well we have Chung playing well...then there is everybody else...would they even start for another NFL team? McCourty and Arrington might, but the rest?

Its a disaster. It isn't a problem they can fix in a week and it may not be something they can fix this year. Sad truth of the matter, I don't think we have the horses to compete at the NFL level.

5-2 against teams that are 24-19 against the rest of the league? Yup they should drop down to the FCS....

Did you actually process a thought before you wrote that?

 

[mgcolby]

A top 10 D?

Scrubs Antwan Molden and a multiple cut Phillip Adams two perennial lifetime PS players just one injury away from starting in the secondary?

An underachieving McCourty who has not adjusted to the new D and an inconsistent Chung who is decent one minute and lousy the next??

No Pass Rush as usual?

And you say this could be a top 10 D??

If this D gets out of the 30s and into the mids 20s rank by seasons end,its an improvement ... thats all we can hope for in 2011.

We have to get rid of Boyer and Patricia and get someone good in there to help these guys out next year.

Does being in the teens (17th to be exact) in the one defensive stat that matters...scoring...count?

 

[JJDChE]

San Francisco's Linebacker core is the best in the league, that's why their defense is good. Our talent there is nowhere close to them at that position.

The Bengals and Jaguars defense have better players all around than our defense.

To classify our defense "talent" wise I'd say:

1 All-Pro DT (Wilfork)
1 ALL-Pro ILB (Mayo)
1 All Pro player in a slump (Mccourty)
1 very good/borderline probowl DE (carter)
1 good safety (Chung)
1 decent CB (Arrington)
4-5 JAG LBs (Guyton, Ninkovich, Spikes, Fletcher, Cunningham)
3 JAG linemen (Ellis, Haynesworth until proven otherwise, Love)
5 absolute trash secondary players that would be STers everywhere else(Ighdigbo, Brown, Barrett, Molden, Phillip Adams)

If we just had average players to surround Wilfork, Carter, Mccourty, and Mayo, the defense would be good. The problem is it's pretty bad around them.

I think if you look around the league, that lineup compares very favorably. A few teams have elite talent all around. Maybe 5 or 6 teams. The rest are similar to, or worse, than us.