Just saw a tremendous tribute to Drew Brees on the NFL Network halftime show. What needs to happen for us to meet them again in the Super Bowl? What needs to change on our end.
Here - I'll start:
1) Our third-down efficiency on offense needs to improve to about 80%.
2) We need to avg about 4.9 yds. per rushing attempt, and have around 30 attempts per game.
3) Our third-down efficiency on defense needs to be what it was against the Panthers.
4) We need at least 1 sack per quarter.
5) Randy Moss needs to return to first half of 2007 form.
How about you?
QB12
Sorry if I repeat some ideas, but I was so excited to respond to this, I didn't read the other posts yet.
1.) We can improve our third down offense and running game if we leave Matt Light at LT and move Volmer to RT. This will strengthen the exterior of our O-line. Next, I say we draft Mike Iupati out of Iowa to replace one of the guards that we may lose this off season. Iupati could be drafted with a second round pick.
If we want to make serious strides in upgrading our O-line, we could consider trading Dan Koppen for a high second round pick, and then draft Maurkice Pouncey.
2.) In terms of our defense, we need help upgrading our pass rush. If we upgrade that, our third down defense will drastically improve. Most mock drafts have us taking Jerry Hughes, but I'm starting to doubt that he will last that long. He most likely with rise up draft boards after his bowl game. That, and the need for pass rushers, may cause him to go higher than he should.
3.) Moss isn't going to be the Moss of 2007 again because teams know what he did and don't want it to happen again. We run an offensive system that his heavily reliant on three receiver sets. We don't have three great receivers. In fact, we entered this season with very little quality depth at wide receiver. That was a very poor decision by our coaching staff.
4.) Brady has been getting hit a bunch because of our foolish reliance on the shotgun. Yes it helped us shatter records in 07, but that's because the league wasn't ready for us. It's two years later and they have clearly figured us out. The problem isn't all with our players, but with our coaching staff. Teams have adapted to us, but we haven't made adequate adjustments to stay ahead of the game. That's not to say that we don't make several adjustments, I know that we do. I am saying that defenses are making more than we do. This is why we cannot close out games.
Teams know what we are going to do. More importantly, teams know that they may give up 15 yards maximum if we run out of the shotgun. The NFL teams usually consider big plays 20 yards or longer. A fifteen yard gamble is not that big of a risk. More importantly, since we don't run the ball often, even when it's working, it makes it extremely easy for teams to take that risk. Considering the fact that it's easier to hit the QB out of the shotgun, teams actually have an incentive to blitz of Moss and Welker are double teamed. If a defense devotes 4-5 players to Welker and Moss, then that leaves 6-7 players that could be sent at Brady.
5.) There are times this season that we have run the ball with some consistency. Our games against Baltimore, Atlanta, and Carolina are examples of this. But does this consistency last? It shows up in a game or three, but we usually go back to our pass happy ways after a while. We ran the ball a great deal towards the end of the 07 season, but abandoned it in the Superbowl because we only ran at predictable times. We ran the ball against Baltimore and Atlanta, but got away from it against Denver and Indianapolis. Maybe we'll do this more consistently as time goes on, but our past body of work has shown that we haven't.
