Lets talk about our D and.........our DC....... (1 Viewer)

[d3vanj]

Gibbs turned a bunch of scrubs into the 11th ranked defense in 2006. He's capable of creating a good defense with the talent we now have.

QFT

Give him a year with some real talent, then try and evaluate him.

 

[purgatorysaint]

Scott our success rate on D went way up when we blitzed. In other words I disagree with your whole premise. Gibbs is the new Venturi and he should have been gone.

 

[meily]

Gibbs turned a bunch of scrubs into the 11th ranked defense in 2006. He's capable of creating a good defense with the talent we now have.

I agree, I think we Gibbs has done a solid job with the unit....in 06...but in 07 we came with the same players, and teams knew our unit and were we werent very good at...couple that with the unexpected bad play of Jason David and there you have it, and exposed defense with penchant for giving up the big play....we have Vilma, Gay and McCrary to help ad this rebuilding and I think Gibbs and co can get us back to a top 15 defense....we all wanna point the finger at specific players or coaches, but we were exposed last year, some dont wanna believe it, but we were....we thought we had arrived and we hadnt.

 

[geauxboy]

Scott our success rate on D went way up when we blitzed. In other words I disagree with your whole premise. Gibbs is the new Venturi and he should have been gone.

I'll be the first to say his play calling made us all frustrated at times, but I really think the personnel had a lot to do with it. Don't call an aggressive game if your DL and LBs can't get to the QB or atleast disrupt the rhythm. Over exposure didn't bode well for us last year from the DB's perspective.

I say one more year to see what can be done with this new squad. Add Big O to that and I really think we'll have a much better D so that should allow Gibbs to call games the way he really wants to instead of being held down by the level of production or lack there of.

 

[Pain_Link_Fence]

I am willing to see what he can do with a secondary coach that can signal before the snap.

 

[Scott B]

Scott our success rate on D went way up when we blitzed. In other words I disagree with your whole premise. Gibbs is the new Venturi and he should have been gone.

what do you mean that their success rate went up? I'm curious as to what exact numbers you are basing that from.

 

[BoNcHiE]

Scott our success rate on D went way up when we blitzed. In other words I disagree with your whole premise. Gibbs is the new Venturi and he should have been gone.

Our worse game of the season defensively came against the Eagles. We blitzed heavily in that game. Extremely heavily. There was no magic formula last year. We just didn't have the talent.

 

[Phatredial]

They also promoted Saints Assistant Defensive Line Coach Dennis Allen to Secondary Coach for the 2008 season, seems like a big jump to me but I guess In 2002, Allen’s first year with the Falcons, when he assisted in coaching the defensive backfield, the club tied for third in the NFL with 24 interceptions and improved from 30th vs. the pass in 2001 to 16th the following year so let hope he can successfully make the Jump Assistant Defensive Line Coach Dennis Allen to Secondary Coach. As we all know On January 23, 2008 it was announced that Ed Orgeron had been hired as the Saints new defensive line coach who was the head coach of Ole Miss last year and wasnt to successful......

 

[CargoJon]

I'll give Gibbs this year to prove whether or not he's any good. He will not be able to hide behind the "poor personnel" excuse this year. If we suck, it's him.

 

[bobad]

I gave Gibbs a mulligan for 2007. A defensive team is very hard to build, so I think Gibbs deserves the benefit of the doubt for at least another year or 2. If someone on Wade Phillip's level was available for DC, you may consider firing Gibbs. With the usual talent pool to replace him, no way you even entertain it.

Give Gibbs a break. Not only didn't Gibb's DL perform as expected, but he lost his pass rush specialist. I think he was really counting on Brian Young, and his absence may have hurt us more than we realize. His now fired D/L coach obviously wasn't helping matters.

I like the way Gibbs apparently made stopping the run top priority. You could tell the D-line's technique was aimed at keeping lane integrity. No team is going far if they can't stop the run, so that's job #1. Stop the run first, then get the horses necessary to apply an effective pass rush. I like the way Gibbs stuck to fundamentals, and didn't blitz getting off the bus. Blitzing is something you spring when not expected, not a regular part of a pro offense. I like Gibb's and Payton's choice for DL coach. Orgeron likes faster, more agile pass rushers. I wouldn't be surprised to see the same DL perform better this year.

I like the defensive acquisitions. Bobby McCray is obviously our new pass rush specialist. I think Vilma will win us a game or 2 this year by influencing what teams do against us. Randall Gay is a stopgap in case MM isn't ready and/or Jason David continues to flounder in man coverage.

 

['79 Saints]

Scott our success rate on D went way up when we blitzed. In other words I disagree with your whole premise. Gibbs is the new Venturi and he should have been gone.

I just re-watched a bunch of games from last season... in games where the opposing offensive line was suspect/absence of a running game (i.e. Seattle, Atlanta, Carolina), the Saints were very successful with the blitz -and could have blitzed even more.

In games where they faced a good offensive line or made good blitz pick-ups, the Saints were carved alive (Philadelphia, Chicago, the Rams...)

Injuries to Charles Grant, Brian Young decimated any semblence of a pass rush... Hollis Thomas was overweight in the beginning and then ran out of gas at the end.

Lack of speed in the linebacker corps was exposed.

Safety play was suspect at best. KK could cover the short stuff, but lacked the speed to help on the deep patterns. Bullocks/Harper were inconsistent as they frequently moved up into the box to provide run support and help the linebackers, leaving the conrers one-on-one too often in the secondary.

Jason David has been discussed ad nauseum.

Now, that said... does someone think that another DC would somehow turn these guys into a collection of Pro Bowlers?

Someone mentioned Marvin Lewis in another thread about defense... he was an genius with Baltimore and their Pro Bowlers -why has the Bengals defense struggled? Did he forget to coach?

Speaking of Baltimore, why did Brian Billick, the offensive coordinator for an offense that set the record for most points in a season (back in 1998 w/the Vikings) fail to generate a similar offense in Baltimore? Did he too forget how to coach? Or could he only coach one side of the ball at a time?

Of course not.. neither coach had the same players they had at the previous job.

So we're back to talent evaluation again... but again, these teams (along with the Saints) manage to acquire talented players on one side ball, but not the other. In Baltimore's case, for every Ray Lewis, Chris McAlister or Ed Reed, there is a Chris Redman, Kyle Boller or just about every receiver they have drafted.

I'm not saying that Gibbs is the best DC out there, but keep in mind what they were able to do in 2006 with the same personnel relatively healthy, and there was little indication that they wouldn't be able to at least keep that same level of performance in 2007.

 

[BRSaintfan]

As far as 2006 vs. 2007, that's apples to oranges in my opinion. Not only did we play higher caliber teams in 2007, we also were stagnant in Free Agency and missed on immediate impact players in the draft. Bad teams from 2006 got better for the 2007 season and were competitive (i.e. Houston, Tampa Bay).

I'll give Gibbs another shot this year, but if the defense flutters with better players and a 2nd-to-last place schedule, then something else is amiss.

 

[Scott B]

Let me just add that it's not only about blitz calls or lack thereof. There were MANY times that Gibbs called the right defense, and the Saints defensive player lost the one-on-one matchup. There was one play in particular that I remember from the Philly game where it was a 3rd down and short, Westbrook gets the handoff and there is (gulp) Josh Bullocks right there to meet him in the backfield. Westbrook makes Bullocks completely miss and picks up the first down. That's not play-calling, play design, lack of aggresiveness, etc. That's a simple matter of the player not producing DESPITE being in a position to make the play. And that is just one example of many from last season. Can't blame Gibbs for that.

 

[geauxboy]

Let me just add that it's not only about blitz calls or lack thereof. There were MANY times that Gibbs called the right defense, and the Saints defensive player lost the one-on-one matchup. There was one play in particular that I remember from the Philly game where it was a 3rd down and short, Westbrook gets the handoff and there is (gulp) Josh Bullocks right there to meet him in the backfield. Westbrook makes Bullocks completely miss and picks up the first down. That's not play-calling, play design, lack of aggresiveness, etc. That's a simple matter of the player not producing DESPITE being in a position to make the play. And that is just one example of many from last season. Can't blame Gibbs for that.

lus-un2:

So true. You can call the right play all the time, but if they don't execute .................

 

[robsmith32]

what 2nd to last schedule is a misnomer.. you make it sound like it should be an easy sched.. think again.. that only impacts 2 games.. and at that those that won fewer games last season, also has higher draft picks.. they will have improved more than their counterparts, most likely. Plus you have the injury factor to account for.. a major injury to a prime player can devestate a team's win/loss column.. think delhome for the panthers.

People on here at the end of the season was trying to get what's his name from denver.. who runs the same kind of defense and had similar problems having the top cb tandem in the league. something wrong with that picture.

the 1st half of 06 thomas was still a good cb, one of the better per football outsiders dvoa. but that 2nd half he hit a wall with injuries, and slowdown.. just couldn't compete at the high level anymore.

and as far as gibbs calling blitzes.. yes we did far better when the blitz was effective.. but i'm guessing you're not looking at all the blitzes that were called, and the o-line picked it up without a problem, only to have us burned. and people come on here frustrated cause wasn't blitzing.. we were blitzing, it just wasnt' working.