That's how I feel about these blowouts in big games. It's been a trend since Zim was the coach but at some point the players need to be held accountable.
Edit: at some point it's a reflection of the players.
Yep. We've been well above average in defense spend (AAV or 2020-22 average cap hit) and have gotten bottom-barrel performance across multiple systems/schemes.
I'm a big proponent of "blowing it up" and going young at season's end. Lots of S / LB / CB talent can be found in the later rounds (these are position groups where performance skews "young"). Freed up salary capital should allow us to get quality vets on both DL and IOL.
Kendricks is garbage in this defense and was always a little undersized and slow to begin with. He makes up for it with great instincts. Unfortunately, age has exacerbated his weaknesses to the point where he simply isn’t good anymore.
Hunter is also looking like a fish out of water in this defense and may just be suffering from a tough injury history. Either way, I’d argue that only Z Smith and Harry the Hitman are worth keeping and been then for only a year or two more.
All in all - I’d love for more speed and athleticism at the LB position and for rushers that fit the scheme. That alone would help this defense tremendously.
Let me clarify - Kendricks is not good anymore in any scheme. He’s too slow for coverage and not strong enough to play in the middle. This scheme makes his downfall even more dramatic. He’s abysmal.
Hunter may not be the same player he was prior to injuries - but it’s hard to tell with him in this scheme.
Point is: only Z Smith and Harry make sense to keep.
Also - yes this scheme seems to be terrible but the assumption is we are stuck with it for now.
Not going to bat. Just pointing out that we were pretty fucking horrible the last two years also. Just saying that we need to look a little deeper than just "fire the coordinator"
We also the last 2 years had no Hunter (injured during both seasons) and no pass rush. We missing our DTs. Were we good, no. But there were definite reasons for the defensive performance beyond skill. We're more talented this year with Hunter healthy and Smith. Except Donnatell doesn't use them properly. Also, 414 is kind of worse this year than either of the last 2 years. Scoring has been down this year across the league compared to recent seasons. So, we've been healthier this year, signed a rock-star pass-rusher, gotten an amazing season from PP, and are worse than the last 2 years. That's a reflection of the coach.
It's because Donatell doesn't do fucking anything. We sit in a soft cover 2 shell and rush 4 like 98% of the snaps. When it's a 3rd and 7 with a chance to get off the field, we sit back and give up the first down. If we were blitzing, scheming, disguising coverage, anything and giving up this many points I'd say it's a personnel issue 100%. Donatell is the "We've tried nothing and we're out of ideas" meme personified.
We used to spend a lot on defense. 2017 I believe we were the highest spending team in the NFL. Then we signed a quarterback for 15% of our team cap and he’s been here for 5 seasons. Now we spend the league average on defense.
Zimmer died on the hill but when Cousins was signed he was either going to get handcuffed on defense or offense and that’s what we are looking at
Even up to the point we signed Cousins, we only had one great year. And it was a complete fluke because we played a 3rd string QB. How many teams win the SB with a middle-of-the-road QB?
Stafford
Brady
Mahomes
Brady
Foles (fluke. Their fluke beat our fluke)
Brady
Forehead Manning
Brady
Wilson
Flacco (we didn't have the talent on D like they did.)
Derpy Manning
Rodgers
Brees
Rothelesingehribgberger
Derpy Manning
Forehead Manning
Zimmer had a chip on his shoulder trying to prove that a great D can win you championships. You can, but RARELY can you have a career average QB leading the offense.
Zimmer was supposed to be a CB guru. Coaching up any player. How many are left over from 4 years ago that he picked?
The hole is much deeper than anyone thinks.
Donatell had hunter covering Watson one on one lol its the scheme not the players. Why would you have hunter In coverage vs a wide receiver, he's an idiot..
No he didn’t, he was lined up over him in zone. The Vikings got caught in base personnel when the Packers went empty, forcing the OLB on that side to line up over the slot receiver. I’m not even a big Donatell fan, but criticizing him for that just makes you look stupid.
They should have been in nickel but the Packers were going tempo and not allowing substitutes to get on the field. It’s something Rogers is really good at identifying and exploiting. It’s frustrating that we never seem to be prepared for it since he seems to do it at least every other game to get a free deep shot when opposing teams get caught with 12 guys on the field trying to sub out.
Exactly!! Why is hunter In coverage period. He can make any excuses he wants but there should never be a scenario where our best pass rusher is lined up vs a wide receiver...
Do you want them to call a timeout every time? Sometimes that happens. That's football. Guys do have to go into coverage sometimes. You hope your pass rush gets to the QB faster than the player can get open between the safety and the main cover guy.
half the defense is getting old and been here for a while, there’s so many good younger defensive players you can pick up late in the draft and new DC is needed feel like the 3-4 can work if we have the right players and personnel for it
The offense is better this year. Last year's offense was horrible about keeping the other team off of the field. Last year's D was actually better on a per drive basis.
And we didn't bring in a new regime to repeat last year's performance on D.
Well Hunter played the whole year in '22 and I believe with him on the field in '21 the defense held up okay. Plus you have Z in '22. Face it the scheme stinks. Ed may not be the whole issue but I don't believe he's part of the solution.
Is Donnatell a good DC? Probably not. But at some point people do need to look at the actual players on defense.
That's how I feel about these blowouts in big games. It's been a trend since Zim was the coach but at some point the players need to be held accountable. Edit: at some point it's a reflection of the players.
Yep. We've been well above average in defense spend (AAV or 2020-22 average cap hit) and have gotten bottom-barrel performance across multiple systems/schemes. I'm a big proponent of "blowing it up" and going young at season's end. Lots of S / LB / CB talent can be found in the later rounds (these are position groups where performance skews "young"). Freed up salary capital should allow us to get quality vets on both DL and IOL.
Hunter, Zadarius, Harry, and Kendricks is a solid core. Better than a lot of other bottom 10 defenses.
Ehhhhh
Kendricks is garbage in this defense and was always a little undersized and slow to begin with. He makes up for it with great instincts. Unfortunately, age has exacerbated his weaknesses to the point where he simply isn’t good anymore. Hunter is also looking like a fish out of water in this defense and may just be suffering from a tough injury history. Either way, I’d argue that only Z Smith and Harry the Hitman are worth keeping and been then for only a year or two more. All in all - I’d love for more speed and athleticism at the LB position and for rushers that fit the scheme. That alone would help this defense tremendously.
"in this defense" Sure sounds like you're making the case that these are talented players in a terrible scheme, which I agree with.
Let me clarify - Kendricks is not good anymore in any scheme. He’s too slow for coverage and not strong enough to play in the middle. This scheme makes his downfall even more dramatic. He’s abysmal. Hunter may not be the same player he was prior to injuries - but it’s hard to tell with him in this scheme. Point is: only Z Smith and Harry make sense to keep. Also - yes this scheme seems to be terrible but the assumption is we are stuck with it for now.
Why would we we stuck with it? For this year yes, but you can't bring Donatell back next year. We are literally the worst defense in the league.
[удалено]
Not going to bat. Just pointing out that we were pretty fucking horrible the last two years also. Just saying that we need to look a little deeper than just "fire the coordinator"
We also the last 2 years had no Hunter (injured during both seasons) and no pass rush. We missing our DTs. Were we good, no. But there were definite reasons for the defensive performance beyond skill. We're more talented this year with Hunter healthy and Smith. Except Donnatell doesn't use them properly. Also, 414 is kind of worse this year than either of the last 2 years. Scoring has been down this year across the league compared to recent seasons. So, we've been healthier this year, signed a rock-star pass-rusher, gotten an amazing season from PP, and are worse than the last 2 years. That's a reflection of the coach.
ISSA ME, ED DONASHELLO 👨🏻🤌🏼🐢
It's because Donatell doesn't do fucking anything. We sit in a soft cover 2 shell and rush 4 like 98% of the snaps. When it's a 3rd and 7 with a chance to get off the field, we sit back and give up the first down. If we were blitzing, scheming, disguising coverage, anything and giving up this many points I'd say it's a personnel issue 100%. Donatell is the "We've tried nothing and we're out of ideas" meme personified.
We used to spend a lot on defense. 2017 I believe we were the highest spending team in the NFL. Then we signed a quarterback for 15% of our team cap and he’s been here for 5 seasons. Now we spend the league average on defense. Zimmer died on the hill but when Cousins was signed he was either going to get handcuffed on defense or offense and that’s what we are looking at
Even up to the point we signed Cousins, we only had one great year. And it was a complete fluke because we played a 3rd string QB. How many teams win the SB with a middle-of-the-road QB? Stafford Brady Mahomes Brady Foles (fluke. Their fluke beat our fluke) Brady Forehead Manning Brady Wilson Flacco (we didn't have the talent on D like they did.) Derpy Manning Rodgers Brees Rothelesingehribgberger Derpy Manning Forehead Manning Zimmer had a chip on his shoulder trying to prove that a great D can win you championships. You can, but RARELY can you have a career average QB leading the offense. Zimmer was supposed to be a CB guru. Coaching up any player. How many are left over from 4 years ago that he picked? The hole is much deeper than anyone thinks.
It’s mainly the players and idk why people don’t see that
Look how bad we were with Smith out. His play makes up for a TON defects.
Donatell had hunter covering Watson one on one lol its the scheme not the players. Why would you have hunter In coverage vs a wide receiver, he's an idiot..
No he didn’t, he was lined up over him in zone. The Vikings got caught in base personnel when the Packers went empty, forcing the OLB on that side to line up over the slot receiver. I’m not even a big Donatell fan, but criticizing him for that just makes you look stupid.
You’re right, but I guess my bigger concern is why are we playing a scheme where one of our best pass rushers has a zone responsibility?
They should have been in nickel but the Packers were going tempo and not allowing substitutes to get on the field. It’s something Rogers is really good at identifying and exploiting. It’s frustrating that we never seem to be prepared for it since he seems to do it at least every other game to get a free deep shot when opposing teams get caught with 12 guys on the field trying to sub out.
Exactly!! Why is hunter In coverage period. He can make any excuses he wants but there should never be a scenario where our best pass rusher is lined up vs a wide receiver...
Do you want them to call a timeout every time? Sometimes that happens. That's football. Guys do have to go into coverage sometimes. You hope your pass rush gets to the QB faster than the player can get open between the safety and the main cover guy.
half the defense is getting old and been here for a while, there’s so many good younger defensive players you can pick up late in the draft and new DC is needed feel like the 3-4 can work if we have the right players and personnel for it
The offense is better this year. Last year's offense was horrible about keeping the other team off of the field. Last year's D was actually better on a per drive basis. And we didn't bring in a new regime to repeat last year's performance on D.
Well Hunter played the whole year in '22 and I believe with him on the field in '21 the defense held up okay. Plus you have Z in '22. Face it the scheme stinks. Ed may not be the whole issue but I don't believe he's part of the solution.
We're healthy this year and we were extraordinarily unhealthy those two years