Despite popular perceptions of Seattle's defense, it's once again jumped a spot against both run and pass in Football Outsiders' opponent-adjusted rankings. They now consider us the #2 defense in the league, behind only Chicago.

http://footballoutsiders.com/stats/teamdef

In other news, Seattle's passing offense is now ranked #12!

http://footballoutsiders.com/stats/teamoff

I'll take it. We've held most teams to 20 points or less, including a murderer's row of the best QBs in the league. That is great defense no matter how you slice it.

And we are now scoring in the 20's consistently.

Defense always does better early. Hopefully they rediscover the early games.

hopefully we start stopping the run . Im not satisfied. not at all. Last weeks performance was disgusting.

yea yea we slowed down the run in the 2nd half , only 5 carries for 38 yards!! thats neary 8 yards a carry!!! Hopefully the presense of jason Jones will sure things up.

Largent80 wrote:And we are now scoring in the 20's consistently.

This is a huge factor IMO. Against some offenses, there is no shutting them down, only limiting them and keeping up with your own offense.

they only got 5 carries for 38 yrds or whatever it was because they stopped running the ball in the second half, for whatever reason... but ya pretty impressive defense other than the couple issues we need to tighten up... with the offense coming to life, could make for some pretty interesting games down the stretch..

MontanaHawk05 wrote:

Largent80 wrote:And we are now scoring in the 20's consistently.

This is a huge factor IMO. Against some offenses, there is no shutting them down, only limiting them and keeping up with your own offense.

All they can do is run the ball. They are a one dimensional offense. We couldn't even slow the running game. This was not the case of us playing a juggernaut offense. We just played poor run defense. Call it what it is.

Ha...Dom, I love ya. BUT, that was an incredible performance by a very elite RB. It was actually cool to see him do that.

Largent80 wrote:Ha...Dom, I love ya. BUT, that was an incredible performance by a very elite RB. It was actually cool to see him do that.

See that's where we disagree. I dont like to see my team get pushed around. No matter what the outcome of the game.

A better performance, for me, would have been to absolutely stone him. Just stuff him and allow zilch.

I am not a fan of his, or really any player or team besides the Hawks.

Peterson embarrassed our run defense last Sunday and I didn't think it was cool.

Nobody liked it... but AP is a 1st ballot HOF-er currently at his peak that will be talked in the company of Barry Sanders and Jim Brown.

He borders on being un-stoppable.

I agree Dom. Do you think I loved watching Michael Jordan make fools of Kemp and Payton most the time? Oh HELL no! I can respect the incredible athlete that he was but I want MY team to beat down any athlete coming to my town to take us down (to China Town, I'm on a rhyme roll), legendary or otherwise.

As a fan of the NFL, I love watching AP tear it up. But as a bigger fan of the Seattle Seahawks, I want my defense to shut his ass down in CLink, period. Hopefully next time.

Tech Worlds wrote:

Largent80 wrote:Ha...Dom, I love ya. BUT, that was an incredible performance by a very elite RB. It was actually cool to see him do that.

See that's where we disagree. I dont like to see my team get pushed around. No matter what the outcome of the game.

A better performance, for me, would have been to absolutely stone him. Just stuff him and allow zilch.

I am not a fan of his, or really any player or team besides the Hawks.

Peterson embarrassed our run defense last Sunday and I didn't think it was cool.

You don't have to. But if you're going to use it as a reason to cast an unfavorable light on the defense as a whole, it's a pretty unfair argument, especially when this particular problem really hasn't been present the entire season. Lots of defenses have trouble with Adrian Peterson.

Much more worrisome would be if we struggle with Shonne Greene next week, which I highly doubt we will.

MontanaHawk05 wrote:In other news, Seattle's passing offense is now ranked #12!

Wow.

Something else that's cool? Our overall team DVOA is shoulder to shoulder with the best teams in the NFL. Our team is +30% in DVOA. The #1 team is +37%.

Another thing that's cool? The Seahawks did that while slogging through a brutal schedule. I'm guessing DVOA takes that into account, but still. Damn.

MontanaHawk05 wrote:

Tech Worlds wrote:

Largent80 wrote:Ha...Dom, I love ya. BUT, that was an incredible performance by a very elite RB. It was actually cool to see him do that.

See that's where we disagree. I dont like to see my team get pushed around. No matter what the outcome of the game.

A better performance, for me, would have been to absolutely stone him. Just stuff him and allow zilch.

I am not a fan of his, or really any player or team besides the Hawks.

Peterson embarrassed our run defense last Sunday and I didn't think it was cool.

You don't have to. But if you're going to use it as a reason to cast an unfavorable light on the defense as a whole, it's a pretty unfair argument. Lots of defenses have trouble with Adrian Peterson. Much more worrisome would be if we struggle with Shonne Greene next week, which I highly doubt we will.

Yes lots of defenses struggle with him true. But do they let him average 10 yards a carry? .

We played poorly against a great player. Why is that so hard to admit?

How about we all calm down and see what happens against the Jets meager offense. I predict total domination, to which most of the naysayers will be come around. The defense is good. It may not be great, but it doesn't have to be great. The team as a whole is growing and we now have a much more complete team. I'm thinking we're going to be very hard to beat these last 7 games. A good offense always helps out the defense. If the defense can regain it's early season form I wouldn't be shocked to see a couple 17+ point wins.

But if they don't think we'll be well positioned for the postseason. I like that our Bye is this late, it gives us rest and we should be able to make some hay the last 6 games (after bye) with 3 road and 3 home games.

Tech Worlds wrote:

MontanaHawk05 wrote:

Tech Worlds wrote:See that's where we disagree. I dont like to see my team get pushed around. No matter what the outcome of the game.

A better performance, for me, would have been to absolutely stone him. Just stuff him and allow zilch.

I am not a fan of his, or really any player or team besides the Hawks.

Peterson embarrassed our run defense last Sunday and I didn't think it was cool.

You don't have to. But if you're going to use it as a reason to cast an unfavorable light on the defense as a whole, it's a pretty unfair argument. Lots of defenses have trouble with Adrian Peterson. Much more worrisome would be if we struggle with Shonne Greene next week, which I highly doubt we will.

Yes lots of defenses struggle with him true. But do they let him average 10 yards a carry? .

We played poorly against a great player. Why is that so hard to admit?

It's not hard to admit; even Red Bryant admitted that they were lacking focus in the first half. I'm just bugged when people start making statements about over quality about how the defense was "overrated" to begin with, as if shutting down elite QB's was just an irrelevant mirage and that this is a worrisome trend when it's only happened twice. I didn't like the performance either, but in my view it's an easily fixable, very temporary wobble in an otherwise awesome defense.

I do respect you for being willing to call the D out on this after a WIN. Most people wait until after a loss.

MontanaHawk05 wrote:

Tech Worlds wrote:

MontanaHawk05 wrote:[quote="Tech Worlds"]See that's where we disagree. I dont like to see my team get pushed around. No matter what the outcome of the game.

A better performance, for me, would have been to absolutely stone him. Just stuff him and allow zilch.

I am not a fan of his, or really any player or team besides the Hawks.

Peterson embarrassed our run defense last Sunday and I didn't think it was cool.

You don't have to. But if you're going to use it as a reason to cast an unfavorable light on the defense as a whole, it's a pretty unfair argument. Lots of defenses have trouble with Adrian Peterson. Much more worrisome would be if we struggle with Shonne Greene next week, which I highly doubt we will.

Yes lots of defenses struggle with him true. But do they let him average 10 yards a carry? .

We played poorly against a great player. Why is that so hard to admit?

It's not hard to admit; even Red Bryant admitted that they were lacking focus in the first half. I'm just bugged when people start making statements about over quality about how the defense was "overrated" to begin with, as if shutting down elite QB's was just an irrelevant mirage and that this is a worrisome trend when it's only happened twice. I didn't like the performance either, but in my view it's an easily fixable, very temporary wobble in an otherwise awesome defense.

I do respect you for being willing to call the D out on this after a WIN. Most people wait until after a loss.[/quote]

Hey our guys arnt scrubs and I am sure they will get things fixed. Pete is a hell of a defensive mind. If it can be fixed he will do so.

But I have to admit that I am no longer as confident in our defensive ability to shut down the run as I was prior to the Patriots game.

Get ready for a wild second half ride people. The rookie gets it and we're going to win a lot of games the second half of this season.

I think tech and montana are violently agreeing.

AP is a badass. our D did not have their a-game when they played him and he tore them a new one. The end.

But, as montana points out, this whole extrapolating of a single game performance into a blanket statement about the quality of the team, units, individual players, and coaching staff is dumb. Feels like people enjoy kneeing themselves in the face or something. I don't get it.

19 replies, and I'm the first to notice that our DVOA rank is actually 11th, not 12th? For shame!

It's amazing what a couple good offensive games will do for ya.

Second half we punted and put Minnesota on the 5 yard line. They surprised everyone with a pass on first down. Ponder had ages to throw the ball as we didn't rush anybody - incomplete.......

Second down - AP rushes to the edge gets 15 yards easily. Nobody close. I am thinking here we go again.......

1st down - pass incomplete
2nd down PASS incomplete
3rd down PASS!!!!! incomplete

The minnesota adjustments in the half made one heck of a difference for our run defense. With that said AP has made a living running on teams that knows he will be coming. He is one of the best backs ever to play this game so looking back on it I can "enjoy" him faking people out

Believe it or not, I'm with Techworlds on this one. Those DVOA stats are misleading, and most likely propped up a great deal by the first 5 games of the season when the defense was lights out.

I am not here screaming that the sky is falling. I fully expect the defense to get things turned around. But I dont know how anyone can watch the defense over the course of a month, in consecutive weeks give up 350+ passing to Brady and Stafford and 150-200 to Gore and Peterson, giving up 75% on 3rd down in Detroit, and say "ho hum. so what?"

People were calling this an elite defense. The Flynnicists were screaming that the team was wasting an elite defense by playing a rookie qb. THAT was the prevailing opinion of how good the defense was. ELITE. It's beyond clear that the defense isn't elite, and our expectations were a bit overblown. The first half of the GB game did a lot to it, and now looks more an anomaly than anything. Still, a very good defense with the ability to play elite. But not an elite defense. Not when you have performances like the past month.

I'm with Tech. I don't think the defense sucks. But I want it to be awesome. Because I know it has the ability to be so. Just ok doesnt cut it, as far as I'm concerned.

Hawkadeus wrote:I am not here screaming that the sky is falling. I fully expect the defense to get things turned around. But I dont know how anyone can watch the defense over the course of a month, in consecutive weeks give up 350+ passing to Brady and Stafford and 150-200 to Gore and Peterson, giving up 75% on 3rd down in Detroit, and say "ho hum. so what?"

Perhaps by remembering that a crucial player is out with an injury?

MontanaHawk05 wrote:

Hawkadeus wrote:I am not here screaming that the sky is falling. I fully expect the defense to get things turned around. But I dont know how anyone can watch the defense over the course of a month, in consecutive weeks give up 350+ passing to Brady and Stafford and 150-200 to Gore and Peterson, giving up 75% on 3rd down in Detroit, and say "ho hum. so what?"

Perhaps by remembering that a crucial player is out with an injury?

If Jason Jones makes that big a difference, we got problems.

Hawkadeus wrote:

MontanaHawk05 wrote:

Hawkadeus wrote:I am not here screaming that the sky is falling. I fully expect the defense to get things turned around. But I dont know how anyone can watch the defense over the course of a month, in consecutive weeks give up 350+ passing to Brady and Stafford and 150-200 to Gore and Peterson, giving up 75% on 3rd down in Detroit, and say "ho hum. so what?"

Perhaps by remembering that a crucial player is out with an injury?

If Jason Jones makes that big a difference, we got problems.

Interior pressure has been the primary difference between this year and last. It's always been a crucial component for pass rush, and Jones hasn't been bad against the run either.

MontanaHawk05 wrote:

Hawkadeus wrote:

MontanaHawk05 wrote:Perhaps by remembering that a crucial player is out with an injury?

If Jason Jones makes that big a difference, we got problems.

Interior pressure has been the primary difference between this year and last. It's always been a crucial component for pass rush, and Jones hasn't been bad against the run either.

That's fine and all. But if the effectiveness of your entire unit drops off a cliff sans one single player, a rotational back up at that, then you are riding a very fine line. Great defenses can withstand one missing one player.

It's hard to remember sometimes but the opponent has as much of a say in the outcome of the game as we do. If the opponent is strong in a certain area and weak in others, we win by exploiting that weakness more than they can utilize their strength. Giving up yards to Peterson was frustrating as a fan and there were things we should have done better about it. However, most of us would have taken holding them to 20 points if we had been given the choice before the game. Add in the forced fumble which our offense was able to turn into 7 points, and the Vikings game feels like the second game we have won this year because of both our offense and defense.

Hawkadeus wrote:

MontanaHawk05 wrote:

Hawkadeus wrote:
If Jason Jones makes that big a difference, we got problems.

Interior pressure has been the primary difference between this year and last. It's always been a crucial component for pass rush, and Jones hasn't been bad against the run either.

That's fine and all. But if the effectiveness of your entire unit drops off a cliff sans one single player, a rotational back up at that, then you are riding a very fine line. Great defenses can withstand one missing one player.

Jones is anything but a rotational backup.

Tech Worlds wrote:

Largent80 wrote:Ha...Dom, I love ya. BUT, that was an incredible performance by a very elite RB. It was actually cool to see him do that.

See that's where we disagree. I dont like to see my team get pushed around. No matter what the outcome of the game.

A better performance, for me, would have been to absolutely stone him. Just stuff him and allow zilch.

I am not a fan of his, or really any player or team besides the Hawks.

Peterson embarrassed our run defense last Sunday and I didn't think it was cool.

Damn right!

We allowed AP to run wild in the first half, yet, which team was up on the scoreboard at halftime? Second half, different story. Yards given up do not necessarily lead to points given up.

Given that Ponder basically sucks, why did AP and the rest of minnies Rb's get so few carries after halftime? Could it be we adjusted and made their life more difficult? Cuz I have a hard time thinking they would put the game in Ponder and a bunch of hurt Wr's hands.

Hawkadeus wrote:Believe it or not, I'm with Techworlds on this one. Those DVOA stats are misleading, and most likely propped up a great deal by the first 5 games of the season when the defense was lights out.

Go check out the weighted DVOA, which makes games earlier in the season increasingly less influential. Report back your results.

volsunghawk wrote:

Hawkadeus wrote:

MontanaHawk05 wrote:Interior pressure has been the primary difference between this year and last. It's always been a crucial component for pass rush, and Jones hasn't been bad against the run either.

That's fine and all. But if the effectiveness of your entire unit drops off a cliff sans one single player, a rotational back up at that, then you are riding a very fine line. Great defenses can withstand one missing one player.

Jones is anything but a rotational backup.

Even if he's a starter. If the 2012 Seattle Seahawks defense hinges on Jason Jones, that's a problem. If you are a top to elite defense in the NFL, you should be able to withstand losing a single player, outside of top level all-pro players. If Houston lost a player of Jones' ability, and their defense fell in the tank, we'd all be saying, "see look, guess Houston's d isn't as amazing as everyone thinks."

To all those saying the Minnesota game exposed our defense as not being very good, we gave up 306 yards. Our average is 309.2. So if anything, that performance made our defense (statistically) better.

It just looked bad because it was one player picking up most of the yardage.

JSeahawks wrote:To all those saying the Minnesota game exposed our defense as not being very good, we gave up 306 yards. Our average is 309.2. So if anything, that performance made our defense (statistically) better.

It just looked bad because it was one player picking up most of the yardage.

Yea.

Ponder's stat line:



I know it's Christian noodle arm ponder, but for the love of god that's insane! We totally shut their passing game down.

JSeahawks wrote:To all those saying the Minnesota game exposed our defense as not being very good, we gave up 306 yards. Our average is 309.2. So if anything, that performance made our defense (statistically) better.

It just looked bad because it was one player picking up most of the yardage.

I dont look at it as a matter of total yards. I look at it as a matter of what opposing offenses are able to do to us play by play. For one half of the game, the opposing offense made our defense look terrible. At least by running the ball. Plays where our defenders looked clueless and the opponent was gashing us left and right.

I want to give the Hawks d credit for making halftime adjustments and playing much better in the 2nd half. But for some baffling reason the Vikes only ran Peterson FIVE times in the 2nd half. Instead choosing to put the game on Ponder's arm. Hawks d won out, so you give them that. But the only time the Hawks d didn't get run all over by Peterson was when the Vikings decided not to run the ball.

"It's hard to remember sometimes but the opponent has as much of a say in the outcome of the game as we do. If the opponent is strong in a certain area and weak in others, we win by exploiting that weakness more than they can utilize their strength."

I disagree with this to a point. If we had a truly elite defense, it would dictate what the other team can do. They impose their will on the other team, and take them out of their game plan. It's SF's defense telling teams they just aren't going to run that day. It's Pitt and the Raven's defense a couple of years ago saying that you're just not going to move the ball on us. To a certain extent, it was our defense telling the Pats they weren't running against us when they had been average 250 yds/game rushing the previous 3 games. Brady had a career high in passing attemps. Career High.

An elite offense will do the same thing. It's SF, us, and Houston telling folks "hey, we're gonna run. try to stop it" and then running on them. That's when teams stack the box and we kill them over the top, which is what Pete and Bevell want to do, precisely. So, saying a team kinda had it's way with us, or "he's an elite player, no one else stopped him" or "they've done it to other teams" isn't us being elite that game, for sure. Besides, Minny hasn't done that to everybody , or AP would have 1600 yards already this season.

I also disagree that it is a 1 game anomaly. SF and Minn gashed us with the run, and Detroit killed us with the pass (since they can't run well, and passing is their strength), it's becoming a trend, and that's worrisome to a lot of us.

Hawks46 wrote:I also disagree that it is a 1 game anomaly. SF and Minn gashed us with the run, and Detroit killed us with the pass (since they can't run well, and passing is their strength), it's becoming a trend, and that's worrisome to a lot of us.

The only thing that's really been a significant trend is the quality of opponent we've faced these last four weeks. That was the toughest part of our schedule in terms of offensive strength. It's easier from here.

kearly wrote:

MontanaHawk05 wrote:In other news, Seattle's passing offense is now ranked #12!

Wow.

Something else that's cool? Our overall team DVOA is shoulder to shoulder with the best teams in the NFL. Our team is +30% in DVOA. The #1 team is +37%.

Another thing that's cool? The Seahawks did that while slogging through a brutal schedule. I'm guessing DVOA takes that into account, but still. Damn.

Just for fun, I took the top teams in the playoff race and used DVOA to figure out who'd win - if it's close in DVOA (+/- 15%) the home team gets it. Here is what the final season's playoff teams would be:

West
x-SF 12-4
(5th Wildcard) Seattle 11-5

North
z-Chicago 14-2
(6th Wildcard) Green Bay 11-5
Detroit 7-9
Minnesota 6-10

East
x-NYG 12-4
Dallas 11-5

South
z-Atlanta 13-3
TB 8-8

I have a hard time believing Dallas is suddenly going to win out, but I stuck by the rules and that's what happens. Doesn't matter, though, they don't get in.

1st round: Seattle at SF, GB at NYG

I'm going to save this just to see how close it comes to being right. what the heck. (Obviously, by my rules, the home team wins almost every playoff game, so the playoffs go like this: Giants advance to play Atlanta, Atlanta wins. SF advances to play Chicago, Chicago wins, Atlanta at Chicago, Chicago to the SB.)

MontanaHawk05 wrote:

Hawks46 wrote:I also disagree that it is a 1 game anomaly. SF and Minn gashed us with the run, and Detroit killed us with the pass (since they can't run well, and passing is their strength), it's becoming a trend, and that's worrisome to a lot of us.

The only thing that's really been a significant trend is the quality of opponent we've faced these last four weeks. That was the toughest part of our schedule in terms of offensive strength. It's easier from here.

I agree with what you're saying. The opponents defintely factor in to the results. That is true. That said, what you're saying is our defense isn't good enough to stop good offenses. That we should only be expected to stonewall bad to mediocre offenses. If thats the case, I dont see how we can be all too excited over our team and our prospects.

How many teams truly have balance between offense and defense? I think from this point on what we're going to see is that if you're lopsided one way or another, we're going to beat you. You're going to be hard pressed to find a team that plays better on both sides of the ball than we do, consistently. I feel magic coming.

Hawkadeus wrote:I agree with what you're saying. The opponents defintely factor in to the results. That is true. That said, what you're saying is our defense isn't good enough to stop good offenses. That we should only be expected to stonewall bad to mediocre offenses. If thats the case, I dont see how we can be all too excited over our team and our prospects.

We DID stop good offenses this year. It's far easier to explain the recent issues as temporary and very fixable wobbles than as the truth about a defense that clamped down on Tom Brady.

We played 4 of the top 5 offenses and only Detroit did anything against us. And they still only won at the very end. We held the 11th best offense to 7 points. Think about it, we rank so high AFTER playing the best the NFL has to throw at us.

We only face one offense in the top 16 the rest of the way. Our defense should be fine.

We played great for one month, then crapply for one month. Which should be more applicable right now? Im sorry, but for me, its the most recent one. Just as I would be saying if we played one month of crap defense followed by a month of great d. Which is the case for our offense. I dont know why one would try to fight against trends and say that we should assume current trends mean nothing and that we should go with what was happening a month ago. only reason is foolish homerism. If you disagree, then you should not be buying into the Hawks offense improving. Because who cares about the last month. the previous one is what matters most. Right?

I hope coaches concentrate on the run defense here on out considering every team left on the schedule aside from Arizona are far better rushing the ball than passing it.

SalishHawkFan wrote:1st round: Seattle at SF, GB at NYG

I would kill to go to SF on wild card weekend, and win. I want to shut the Whiners up so badly.

I have a hard time believing any defensive stat that has the 49ers below us. Doesn't fit the eye test.

hedgehawk wrote:I have a hard time believing any defensive stat that has the 49ers below us. Doesn't fit the eye test.

That 49er Defense has been manhandled at home, and got manhandled by the offense we just beat.

Navyhawkfan187 wrote:

hedgehawk wrote:I have a hard time believing any defensive stat that has the 49ers below us. Doesn't fit the eye test.

That 49er Defense has been manhandled at home, and got manhandled by the offense we just beat.

They didn't get beat by the run, by Ponder beat their asses. That should tell you everything you need to know about their defense.

Hawkadeus wrote:We played great for one month, then crapply for one month. Which should be more applicable right now? Im sorry, but for me, its the most recent one. Just as I would be saying if we played one month of crap defense followed by a month of great d. Which is the case for our offense. I dont know why one would try to fight against trends and say that we should assume current trends mean nothing and that we should go with what was happening a month ago. only reason is foolish homerism. If you disagree, then you should not be buying into the Hawks offense improving. Because who cares about the last month. the previous one is what matters most. Right?

Results based analysis is giving you diarrhea of the keyboard. Look at the individual and collective matchups to forecast, not what happened last game. Trends don't mean a damn thing, it is all about the matchups.

For instance, did we actually play bad D against the Patriots, as you say? I recall a D that stopped the run fairly well, dished out enough hits to give Patriot receivers short arms as the game wore on, and stiffened in the redzone and at the end of the game on Brady's last two drives. Go to the box score and look at Brady's yards and you will hiccup, but then figure out his YPA and understand that we got them out of their game. It was actually a good defensive performance. Because we won enough matchups.

Then the Niners. Gore had two really good runs and a handful of decent runs. Give him and them credit. How many points did they get in that game? 14? And Alex Smith looked terrible? So why did they run so well? Look at that offensive line, which is the best run blocking group in football. The simple fact is that you can cry about bad run D all you want, 14 points says that our offense lost that game, not the run D. Our receivers faced a D as violent as ours, and they got short arms. Don't pin that loss on the D. But we did lose too many individual matchups, thus Gore's run totals.

The Lions game certainly didn't feature much good running by the Lions, but that is one loss you can pin on the D. That was a legit 28 they hung on us. Still, we were one defensive play away from stealing a win. But in choosing to shut down Megatron, we put our secondary and linebackers into some unfavorable individual matchups and gambled wrong on Stafford's supposed impatience and desire to throw into the short middle.

And then the Vikings. Yeah, watching us get gashed by purple Jesus was tough, but we lost a starting LB early in that game. I don't think Jason Jones being gone had that big an effect beyond keeping some of of our other DT's on the field a bit too much, but look at the matchups. Loadholt can't pass block for shit, but he can single block Red Bryant. He's good. Mebane's penetration actually worked against the Hawks, it created cut back lanes that only scatbacks should be physically capable of exloiting, but hey, purple Jesus. Kalil was in the 2nd level constantly too, and actually had one of the best performances of the week according to Football Outsiders. We lost straight up matchups. Get your brain off the yards, look at the matchups. We didn't play terrible defense, they played great run offense. How many teams are built to do that? Not very many. There is no trend, though.


Now look at the Jets. Can Shonne Greene exploit a cut back lane? Not really. Do their tackles road grade like the Vikings? Nope. Does their center guard combination do a good job of creating run space in the middle? Kind of, yeah, but not like the Vikings or Niners. Our Run D should win the matchups this week. Does that mean some trick play with Tebow won't gash our run D? Does that mean that if Wright can't go we might surrender a couple of run plays that look bad? It just might, but over all we should stop the run against THIS team. And once the Jets go one dimensional, they are toast. Because there are no matchups that favor them in our secondary.

Scottemojo wrote:

Hawkadeus wrote:We played great for one month, then crapply for one month. Which should be more applicable right now? Im sorry, but for me, its the most recent one. Just as I would be saying if we played one month of crap defense followed by a month of great d. Which is the case for our offense. I dont know why one would try to fight against trends and say that we should assume current trends mean nothing and that we should go with what was happening a month ago. only reason is foolish homerism. If you disagree, then you should not be buying into the Hawks offense improving. Because who cares about the last month. the previous one is what matters most. Right?

Results based analysis is giving you diarrhea of the keyboard. Look at the individual and collective matchups to forecast, not what happened last game. Trends don't mean a damn thing, it is all about the matchups.

For instance, did we actually play bad D against the Patriots, as you say? I recall a D that stopped the run fairly well, dished out enough hits to give Patriot receivers short arms as the game wore on, and stiffened in the redzone and at the end of the game on Brady's last two drives. Go to the box score and look at Brady's yards and you will hiccup, but then figure out his YPA and understand that we got them out of their game. It was actually a good defensive performance. Because we won enough matchups.

Then the Niners. Gore had two really good runs and a handful of decent runs. Give him and them credit. How many points did they get in that game? 14? And Alex Smith looked terrible? So why did they run so well? Look at that offensive line, which is the best run blocking group in football. The simple fact is that you can cry about bad run D all you want, 14 points says that our offense lost that game, not the run D. Our receivers faced a D as violent as ours, and they got short arms. Don't pin that loss on the D. But we did lose too many individual matchups, thus Gore's run totals.

The Lions game certainly didn't feature much good running by the Lions, but that is one loss you can pin on the D. That was a legit 28 they hung on us. Still, we were one defensive play away from stealing a win. But in choosing to shut down Megatron, we put our secondary and linebackers into some unfavorable individual matchups and gambled wrong on Stafford's supposed impatience and desire to throw into the short middle.

And then the Vikings. Yeah, watching us get gashed by purple Jesus was tough, but we lost a starting LB early in that game. I don't think Jason Jones being gone had that big an effect beyond keeping some of of our other DT's on the field a bit too much, but look at the matchups. Loadholt can't pass block for shit, but he can single block Red Bryant. He's good. Mebane's penetration actually worked against the Hawks, it created cut back lanes that only scatbacks should be physically capable of exloiting, but hey, purple Jesus. Kalil was in the 2nd level constantly too, and actually had one of the best performances of the week according to Football Outsiders. We lost straight up matchups. Get your brain off the yards, look at the matchups. We didn't play terrible defense, they played great run offense. How many teams are built to do that? Not very many. There is no trend, though.


Now look at the Jets. Can Shonne Greene exploit a cut back lane? Not really. Do their tackles road grade like the Vikings? Nope. Does their center guard combination do a good job of creating run space in the middle? Kind of, yeah, but not like the Vikings or Niners. Our Run D should win the matchups this week. Does that mean some trick play with Tebow won't gash our run D? Does that mean that if Wright can't go we might surrender a couple of run plays that look bad? It just might, but over all we should stop the run against THIS team. And once the Jets go one dimensional, they are toast. Because there are no matchups that favor them in our secondary.

gotta agree.