To blitz or not to blitz A Smith? (1 Viewer)

[rikquik]

The 49er's have a very balanced offence. They are not going to beat you with the pass (like us) or with the run (like Atlanta), but they need a combination of both. That means that you have to have a very disciplined game on defense, because each play could be either a run or a pass. IMHO, you can't blitz unless it is an obvious passing down. Run blitzing might get you a 5 yard loss, but it might also get them a 25 yard gain. Gore is too good for it to be effective many times in the game..

The reason we blitzed so much last week was because the Falcons had to play catch-up, and everyone knows they are lousy at it. If we get the 49ers in the same position, then we might blitz a little more. However, so far they haven't shown the ability to really dominate through the air, so I wouldn't think we would take too many chance with blitzing.

 

[Marlboro Man]

Considering that Alex Smith has a QB rating of 85 without pressure, and drops to a rating of 58 when he gets pressure, I would think that you would want to pressure the heck out of him. We might even get some turnovers from them this week if we do.

 

[SpinnerSaint]

Run blits on first and second down and send a cornerback a few times throughout the game to mix it up. Def put 8 in the box on first and 2nd downs to attempt to take gore out of it.

 

[birdog]

Even if we don't blitz that much......our CBs must stay close to their WRs! It is important to stay as close as possible, so Alex Smith can hold on to the ball a bit longer, which would be to our advantage! But we have to blitz sometimes, in order to confuse Smith, and keep up the pressure on him!

But more importantly....we MUST have an aggressive defensive game-plan, and PRESSURE A Smith as much as possible! they will try to run the ball at any cost to defuse that pressure, but if we can put them in 3rd and long situations....we'll win the game!

 

[LSSpam]

Last week we probably saw the most aggressive blitzing scheme by our defense this season. It worked against the Falcons.

Should we continue this against the 49'rs or would that weaken our run defense and open up holes for Gore or screen passes?

What do you think?

We'll blitz for the same reason we blitzed Atlanta both times, getting players into the backfield to disrupt any run plays.

The 49ers don't have outstanding WR's, pretty much just Antonio Bryant.