The Fumbles

[StoneCold]

This is not an attack on Russell. What I'm wondering is if Russell was instructed to try to stay in the pocket longer? I felt in the Titans game he was gun shy and took off early a few times.

SC

 

[tdigitee]

I had the same thought - he didn't seem as inclined to take off. Whether that was by design, or the Cardinals D not allowing as many escape routes, I don't know.

 

[NorCalSeahawk]

I would tell him to run more (even though that's not what I would prefer). That O-line is still letting guys walk through the gaps. So until they get their tackles back and shore up some things in the middle it'll be hard for Wilson hang out in the pocket very long.

 

[Sarlacc83]

On one of those plays, you can clearly see there's nowhere to run up the middle.

Which is why he needs to throw it a receiver's feet and live to fight another day.

 

[StoneCold]

According to Pete they have been doing a better job of protection. Hard for me to really tell as what I notice is the pocket collapsing. But on two of the fumbles R held the ball for a goodly long time. He was getting time, just not finding anyone to throw to. I have no doubt he'll cut down on teh fumbles as the year goes on. I can just imagine, in the QB meetings, Pete saying that R needs to trust them more. If he takes off too early they don't really get a chance to fully execute the protection. I could also see how staying in the pocket more gives them better opportunities to learn how to work as a group.

SC

 

[C-Dub]

This is not an attack on Russell. What I'm wondering is if Russell was instructed to try to stay in the pocket longer? I felt in the Titans game he was gun shy and took off early a few times.

SC

Honestly I felt the O-line was worse than normal. He had even less time to make anything happen. Bowie, Carp, McQ and even Unger a few times making mistakes. Bowie was just flat out bad though.

I remember the announcers talking about an internal clock, and each time he got hit was within 2 seconds. That's all on the line.

The line was so bad, we couldn't even get a screen off.

 

[DavidSeven]

Pete said this morning that the fumbles were protection issues. Russ probably could have made a better decision on the first one, but on the others, he's taking blinde side hits that carry a high risk of strips. This was much less of an issue when we had Okung protecting him on that side.

 

[Sgt. Largent]

The 2nd fumble was total blindside, so can't blame him on that one. The first one down by our goal line was all on Russell, he not only has to protect the ball better but he has to be smarter about holding the ball too long. Either take off and run or throw it away (which he did numerous other times).

BUT, I also give partial blame to Pete and Daryll for the fumbles. We were up 14-3 and dominating Arizona on defense, no reason to call a pass play on 3rd and long down by your own goal line. Call a draw or screen, and worst case scenario you punt and let your defense punch Palmer in the mouth a few more times.

Same with the 2nd fumble. Run the damn ball, who cares if you have to punt and make Arizona go 90 yards. This is the part of Pete I don't like at times, he gambles too much when he doesn't have to.

 

[bestfightstory]

Ha. I was impressed by the courage required to trust our o-line like that!

 

[Kixkahn]

I am trying to figure out why we seem to be fumbling in the nice weather games and not the rainy ones. It is the opposite of what you would expect.

 

[mikeak]

2nd one lost - Yes it was blindside

BUT

O-line banged up, Arizona was pressuring like crazy

1 second, 2 second, 3 second - somewhere there it should go "oh crap" but he tried to make a throw at 4 seconds which didn't really happen all game so what was different this time.

Just saying a little bit of blame for everyone......

 

[BamKam]

We are just on a bad streak of fumbles, almost every NFL team goes through them at some point during a season as it is almost impossible to completely avoid. Sometimes no matter how well you secure the ball a defensive of player will get a helmet or a hand on there and poke it loose, kudos to them.

The fumble Russell had on the 3 was a really bad one, he needs to know given the situation that he can't be holding onto the ball that long. The second one was just a great play by the defense.

Arizona has a good defense, they are an underrated team. If they actually had a good QB they could probably make some noise. There next 7 games are completely winnable and I would predict that they win 5 of those putting them at 8-6. They will lose to us and home and then the final week have a shot at upsetting the 49ers as they only lost to them by 12 on the road.

 

[scutterhawk]

On one of those plays, you can clearly see there's nowhere to run up the middle.

Which is why he needs to throw it a receiver's feet and live to fight another day.

I thought that too, but then again I don't know that he's maybe not being told that if he does that, and the ball gets tipped, that it's a risk for a turnover.
I'm trusting that they know what the hell they're doing, and hopefully, this is just a phase that we have to get through until we get our O-Line back up to snuff.

 

[Hawks46]

AZ's DL is very good. They were staying in their lanes on the outside, and blitzing up the middle.

What pisses me off about this, is that if they do nothing but A gap blitzes with the LBers, why don't we throw more screens ? It's a ton easier to get numbers on the outside when the opposition is sending 2 guys up the middle. Also a nice TE to that zone right over the blitzers heads would've been nice.

I did see more short passing though. We still seem to have a hard time beating the blitz without Wilson scrambling to the outside and beating it that way. Teams are going to keep blitzing us until we do.

And yea, that 1st fumble was totally on Wilson. He saw the guy coming, tucked the ball to run, and still fumbled it. 2nd one, well that happens to QBs from time to time. It's not always avoidable.

 

[StoneCold]

Another thought I had is R has to stay in the pocket too long a few times to learn when he's stayed in the pocket too long.

SC

 

[brimsalabim]

Russell brought it up himself during the post game and said he is going to work on it.

 

[iigakusei]

A huge error I hadnt seen mentioned by Russell was the play where he ran at the end of the first half...a mental error I hope doesnt happen again.

 

[formido]

It's easy to second guess individual fumbles, but at the end of the day, if you expect Wilson to stand in the pocket and make winning plays, he's going to take fumbles. The pass protection is really poor. He's been avoiding risky pocket play lately by scrambling, but Arizona did a good job of containing his runs.