the VG board football thread

St. Widge said

I totally agree. As far as the defense, I wonder if the signing of Rodgers and Franklin have back fired on the defense. Rogers just isn't doing much as a pass rusher and Franklin is never going to be a pass rushers. That doesn't seem to fit into William's scheme and I think it might be hurting the blitz packages. When we had guys in the middle who would penetrate, it force QBs outside and/or forced the RB into the hole to block the DT. That left the blitzers with open shots at the QB and we are not getting that this year. Of course, it's also possible that they have just adjusted the blocking to our blitz packages, but I'm not football savy enough to make that call. That being said, they did destroy Cutler with the pressure, so any given game they may come out and do that again. And, when they do, we are totally unstoppable.

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I totally disagree. Rogers and Franklin have both been very good when they are used. Franklin eats space and Rogers gets doubled a lot while pass rushing. If not, he bulldozes his man deep into the backfield.

The problem is the layer behind them, especially against the run and screens, particularly WR screens. All the LBs stink. Vilma included, though he occasionally flashes and makes a play in pass coverage because his brain figured something out.

The offense has looked very efficient at times. But I have to think that in order to win a championship, we're going to have to be able run the ball when people know we are running the ball at some point. Even pass happy Green Bay used their running game to make their playoff run last year (remember Starks emerging and shocking people).

Even the games this year where our offense has looked good, we haven't been able to impose our will running the ball. This has to change in order to have the type of success we want.

It's the type of thing that can be fixed. It might be Kruetz; I'm not sure. I seriously think we have a tell. Somehow we're tipping off the run.