Questions, Thoughts on the 3-4?

Pandion Haliaetus

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Do you think this was forced upon to highlight Adam’s strengths and scheme around his weaknesses?

While I feel run defense is going to play similar to the Red Bryant 5tech days of defense, I feel the passing defense is going to be a lot different than what we’re used to, that it’s going to be more creative, more adaptive to the modern offenses.

Like the whole idea of the scheme will be built to not only get the most out of Adam’s abilities by disguising him better on blitzes, pass or run, but instead of dropping defensive lineman into coverage we’d do so with more athletic linebackers.

But I’m thinking if the vision is on the whiteboard and they are trying to bring it to life then the Seahawks could likely target both Sauce Gardener and Channing Tindall.

Gardner just being an elite prospect in being able to handle himself athletically on an island in coverage whilst physical enough to support the run defense.

Tindall being a prospect that might seem undersized at 230 for an inside guy but he’s tough, physical, and violent. Has the athleticism and length to drop down into a deep zone much more so than a Jordyn Brooks and kind of be a hybrid safety.

The 3-4 D-Line might be missing a young stud but it looks on paper like it could be a solid rotation with Ford, Woods, Mone, Harris, Jefferson, and Collier.

But that back 8 could be dominant with 4 pretty athletic LBers. With the OLBs, Taylor and Nwosu, being potentially good to great at pass-rushing, pressuring, disrupting, attacking the edges, and far from inept at dropping into coverage assignments. Then on this inside you got two guys in Brooks and Tindall that can get get downhill fast in their run fits but are athletic enough to cover sideline to sideline and being able to drop down into coverage with Tindall potentially able to be more successful than Brooks deep into the secondary.

Which leaves the back 4 of Gardner, Jones/Brown, Diggs and Adams. If Gardener comes as advertised and is able to erase his side of the field, you potentially could play match-ups with Jones and Brown, with Diggs being an elite all-around safety.

Then there’s Adams, whose better suited in the box than perhaps in coverage like an undersized Will LBer and I think as you saw last season he can be scripted out by offenses. But you put 4 athletically gifted LBers in front of him, beside him, disguise him, being able disguise the pass-rush in general as a whole.

It could be a recipe for a rather dominant defense especially if a Waldron inspired Pete Caroll ball control, clock control offense can limit the wear and tear allowing the Defense be fresher, and remain strong throughout the game.

If Sauce Gardener is the pick at #9 and Tindall the pick at #40 or #41(some might feel it could be too high) would you guys hate it?

You might still be able to pick up an decent OT in the 2nd round and a solid back-up edge defender/OLB in the 3rd round to supplement Taylor, Nwosu, and Robinson? With Barton, BBK, Muse as ILBs?

I’m completely overlooking QB as a possibility. I just think Carroll and Seahawks much rather create the blueprint , the foundation of a dominant defense and then use the 2023 draft/free agency to perhaps obtain the next QB if Lock or whomever is not the answer and shore up the holes on the Oline.

(Us, They, We, Them, whatever it’s been a while since I’ve done a long, drawn out post)
 

Spin Doctor

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From what I understand we're going to be switching to more of a Vic Fangio style of defense rather than Pete Carroll's traditional fronts and cover 3 scheme. Sean Desai and our DC both have experience under this style of defense. What is the Vic Fangio style of defense?

Here is an article explaining what Vic Fangio's defense is all about: https://www.9news.com/article/sport...e-nfl/73-111acd84-dd14-496a-a4bb-6e0b5337d66b

This is most likely what our defense is going to look like, all signs are pointing towards it. The interesting thing in this articles talks about is McVay's struggles with the Vic Fangio style of defense. Now, this was during the Goff era, i'm not sure how this changes with Stafford manning the offense. I think that gives a good insight into Carroll's line of thinking and the hiring of Desai.

The most interesting part is what they do pre-snap and the usage of safeties in this defense. This aspect of the defense is going to be the most foreign in this regard to us fans. The main coverages are going to be very different, and the looks the defense gives pre-snap are going to be radically different.

An interesting read, it'll give you a lot of insight in what Pete is trying to do, and why he's trying to do it.
 

bigskydoc

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This is starting to sound like the defense I thought Carroll was trying to build and field for the 2020 season. It was derailed by injuries, and a coordinator who wasn't up to the task, an who was, inexplicably, retained. Granted, that was the classic, Carroll, 4-3 with 3-4 personnel/ concepts defense. I do think the official switch to a 3-4 embodies what he was trying to do in 2020, and should prove more successful.

Cutting Wagner should allow Adams to take over as the leader of the defense. I've suspected friction between the two for the last two seasons, and KNJ did not seem up to the task of sorting through that issue.

So, no, I don't see this as building a defense to work around Jamal Adams' weaknesses and strengths. I see it as the defense that Carroll has been wanting to install, since the 2020 offseason. Adams was brought in, and Taylor and Brooks were drafted, because they are good fits into the new system.

I'm hopeful that we are about to see the fruits of the last few years of accumulating personnel to run this system.
 

sdog1981

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It will be interesting to see how the team implements this style of defense.

They were only in their base defense 40% of the time last season. So this team might be rolling out more 2-4 and 3-3-5 fronts
 

AgentDib

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We have an advantage with nobody really knowing what our defensive front is going to look like. Fangio was known for variation and we'll probably have a dozen different defensive alignments that get rotated through. I'm not expecting much 6-1 as the Rams have adjusted with Stafford and Kupp now being able to exploit gaps in coverage in the middle of the field.

Gardner is a great prospect, but there are some teams picking after us who traditionally value CB very highly and are in need of one. At the same time, we've demonstrated the ability to get value out of lower ranked CBs.

If Gardner is available at #9 then we could probably work out a very generous trade down with the Eagles, Vikings, Ravens, Texans, Chargers, or maybe even Washington. Swapping #9 to the Eagles for #15 and #51 would be a great move for us and a plausible trade.
 

Spin Doctor

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This is starting to sound like the defense I thought Carroll was trying to build and field for the 2020 season. It was derailed by injuries, and a coordinator who wasn't up to the task, an who was, inexplicably, retained. Granted, that was the classic, Carroll, 4-3 with 3-4 personnel/ concepts defense. I do think the official switch to a 3-4 embodies what he was trying to do in 2020, and should prove more successful.

Cutting Wagner should allow Adams to take over as the leader of the defense. I've suspected friction between the two for the last two seasons, and KNJ did not seem up to the task of sorting through that issue.

So, no, I don't see this as building a defense to work around Jamal Adams' weaknesses and strengths. I see it as the defense that Carroll has been wanting to install, since the 2020 offseason. Adams was brought in, and Taylor and Brooks were drafted, because they are good fits into the new system.

I'm hopeful that we are about to see the fruits of the last few years of accumulating personnel to run this system.
A little yes a little no. If we do switch to a Fangio system, it's going to be completely different from what we did here last season. The front is going to be the least of the change.

Fangio's defenses work on deception and subterfuge, they don't just line up and play. They change up what they're doing and give you a bunch of different looks. It's actually quite a complex defense compared to Carroll's traditional approaches. The secondary assignments in particular are the interesting part. A lot of times they'll fake that one guy has the assignment and they'll hand it off to another guy. The safeties and the corners usually can swap out interchangeably post snap and the safeties have a fair amount of freedom.

This is the defense style that really confused Russell Wilson. It's also something McVay has had issues with in the past. I suspect that Carroll's had trouble cracking McVay's offense so he wanted to go to a system that McVay has had issues with. Another fun fact, this is the same style of defense that the 49ers run.

The one thing that this defense does that Carroll might've been trying to emulate before, is it brings pressure from unpredictable angles. We did a lot of zone blitzing, though our zone blitzing was god awful under Norton. If we do make a full switch to this defense it's going to look radically different from anything we've done under Pete Carroll previously.
 

Spin Doctor

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It will be interesting to see how the team implements this style of defense.

They were only in their base defense 40% of the time last season. So this team might be rolling out more 2-4 and 3-3-5 fronts
We were actually in base defense more than any other team not named the Jaguars last season.
 
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