Patrick Willis

Not neccesarily true. What is hard to find is a guy who does both well. There are a number of fast speed rush guys who get pressure and sacks. The trade off is being able to rush the passer and still hold up decently against the run. Heck, LaBoy could get 10+ sacks a year if he could stay healthy and stay on the field as many snaps as KVB. LaBoy had 6.5 sacks in 2005 even though he completely missed 2 games and split time with Odom.
However, at 250-260 pounds LaBoy is not very strong against the run and gets abused by 325 pound LTs.

Also, our OLBs are not beasts against the run which requires our DEs to be more than outside speed rushers.

 

We also have Rien Long coming back, and he's a good pass rusher. I agree with Soxcat, we need a runstopper at RDE more than anything, especially if we aren't going to upgrade the OLB position.

 

What?

It is true! Ever notice the dominant pass rushing 260lb DE's almost all go in rnd 1 with the leftovers going in rnd 2. Dominant run stuffing DE can easily be found in the middle rounds...because they are useful players, but will never be core players. Good run stuffers do their job well against the run but can only do their part. Good pass rushers make the whole defensive team better vs the pass AND cause turnovers. Don't you understand the difference? Or to make it simpler, the best pass rushers make the most money of the DE's. Yes, some of them can stop the run well...others don't. However, you won't find the reverse true. Run stuffers who don't rush the passer well will never be the highest paid player at the position.

Very true....but if you're gonna give something up, it'll be run stopping in favor of a dominant pass rusher, not the other way around.

Please name me one of these part time super speed rushers who get 10 sacks in limited playing time? Frankly, if they are dominant pass rushers, they start and are not part time players. Robert Mathis is perhaps the ultimate LIGHT speed pass rush guy...he's only 245lbs and yet, when they play the run, he holds up well because it's hard to lock your hands on him and he attacks the gap. According to what you think, teams should be able to rush for 5-10yds a pop just running at Mathis or Freeney (by running them over because they're so light, right?). That doesn't happen. Because of the scheme of the defense in their base set, they rush upfield. In their 8 man front, they slant them. Sometimes you get caught slanting in the wrong direction or they might over run a play allowing the RB into the back 7 sometimes, but that D is bad against the run for 2 simple reasons...scheme in their base defense and they had a lot of poor tackling in the back 7. You pretty much can't give up 300 yds on the ground with solid tackling in the back 7.

According to NFL.com, Laboy played in 15 games in 2005. Yes he had 6.5 sacks and split some time with Odom, but a few things are evident. First, if he was a dominant pass rusher, he wouldn't split time with anyone. Second, he's the better pass rusher of the two so he saw most of the action vs obvious passing downs...so he had his chances. Third, only 4 of his sacks were him clean (meaning no help from anyone else). Fourth, he had 0 forced fumbles. DE's who get forced fumbles are either good pass rushers (cause they hit the QB and knock the ball out) or dominant run defenders or both. Laboy is neither. LaBoy won't get 10 sacks in a year unless we seriously upgrade the secondary (so he can get more coverage sacks) or change DC's.

Another classic mistake is assuming a player can't play the run at 260lbs. If LaBoy is weak against the run it's because he's not physically strong enough, doesn't play with proper technique, or both. If being 260lbs meant you could get run over, no one would ever pass the ball against the Colts or Dolphins...and yet, they do. And it's amazing how you almost never see Mathis...at 245lbs...pancaked. Jason Taylor? Dwight Freeney?

They may not play the run the same way as Justin Smith, but they can be very effective.

What specifically does it require of them? What do you mean by 'more'?

Laboy is a good backup player and perhaps a situational rusher if your starting DE can't rush the passer. But everyone...including SK...acknowledges that he needs upgrading so that means he's not starting material.

Justin Smith is a nice player but in trying to build a top 10 D, he's not an important piece. A Dwight Freeney is!

Gut

 

Look at the NFL sack leaders and you will see plenty of 260 pound DEs (OLBs in 3-4 defenses) that were not neccesarily 1st or 2nd round picks.

Secondly, there are only a few "dominant" pass rushers to begin with. There are a boat load of guys taken in the first two rounds that have been far from dominant (we have two on our team) and a number of guys taken later that have been quite good.

Third, what NFL games have you been watching to make the ridiculous comments you have made about the Colts run defense. Teams did run at Mathis and Freeney for 5-10 yards a pop and the Titans were one of them. Sure, if you have an all-pro safety the situation improves but for most of the year the Colts were simply terrible against the run.

Finally, the Titans have two OLBs that are not strong at the point of attack. A good blocking TE can do a good job of moving those guys around. That makes it more important to have DEs that can hold up against the run.

Your whole diatribe is based on getting one player, Dwight Freeney. Based on your perfect logic if we don't spend a tone of money and get Freeney we are doomed. That is simply BS. If we upgrade at a number of positions, and Smith would be an upgrade we can have a stout defense.

This just in, the Colts defense was 10th from the bottom in the NFL. This is despite having one of the best offenses (2nd in the league) in the NFL. The Colts already HAVE Freeney and that stud Mathis you talked about so kindly. If Freeney is such an important "piece" then why do they stink so bad, especially with their offense which led the league with 241 first downs? You do understand that the Titans only had 133 1st downs all year? 1st downs keep the ball away from the other teams offense and improve field position. The Colts offense also had only 9 ints all year, the Titans had 19. Heck, put the Colts offense on the Titans and all of a sudden the Titans defense starts to look pretty darn good in points and yards per game given up.

By the way just incase you want to write another thesis on how stout Mathis and Freeney are against the run you might want to consider that the Colts gave up an AVERAGE of 5.3 yards per rush. The Titans stunk terribly against the run but we only gave up 4.6 YPC. The Colts were dead last in the league against the run. So according to what I think, that teams would be able to run for 5-10 yards a pop. Well, they did.

As far as the diatribe about great DEs creating turnovers you might also want to know that the Titans had more total take aways than the Colts (28-25). I guess having two great DEs like Freeney and Mathis didn't really account for better stats in that category either.

 

If Titans are set on going for defense in the 1st then I would also go for a safety. It is a deep position that is undervalued by GM's, much like the Offensive Guard is. There is a possibility the Titans can move up in the draft to take an impact safety.

Besides we will know more after we start signing FA

 

maybe, he's an unrestricted free agent. i cant see us giving him anything more than a 1 year, minimum pay contract after a torn achilies tendon.

 

Sox...

Please respond to what I write and not what you THINK I write.

We're not discussing 260lb OLB's in 3-4 defenses...mainly because we don't play a 3-4 defense.

Thank you for arguing my point. There ARE only a few dominant pass rushers in the NFL and Freeney is one of them...which is the whole point of this discussion that elite pass rushers don't come around very often...so you get one whenever you can....especially when we really need one.

Which ridiculous comments have I made? That they have been very good at stopping the run in the playoffs? Please list some stats to counter that 'ridiculous' statement. As for pancaking Freeney and Mathis, please find me some video of anyone having pancaked Freeney or Mathis more than once in any NFL game. My point is that you talk about them being weak against the run because of their size. I counter that with asking for proof that those individual players are weak against the run to back up your comment. And to refute your comment, I pointed out 2 things. First, there are several players who are good against the run who are undersized (I see no counter to that argument from you). And second, the Colts, having altered their scheme, played excellent run D in the playoffs. If those 2 players (freeney and Mathis) were such liabilities against the run as you claim, how come the Larry Johnson's of the world didn't run right over Freeney and Mathis on every down)? In fact, they shut down Larry Johnson amazingly well. The only change to their D were 2 things....a variable scheme in which they played a 1 gap control D and didn't rush the passer with wreckless abandon on every down, and second, they didn't blow tackles in the back 7. Freeny and Mathis were playing the same positions when the D got shredded and were in the same place when the run D was superb. Therefore, they were not part of the problem. If they were, they would never have a good run D in any game vs KC's line and Larry Johnson - one of the best RB's in the league!

Please explain in detail how the two are related. Perhaps you could give us a sample play and describe how if our OLB is getting blocked 5 yds off the ball and our DE is controlling his own gap perfectly, how being more stout against the run will allow the DE to magically be able to control the gap he's in as well as 2 other gaps he's not in and not responsible for.

First, please quote me where I said if we don't get Freeney we're doomed. If you can't quote me, please don't make things up...saying I said them. It is tiresome.

Second, didn't we upgrade several positions last year and still have a terrible D? So much for that theory.

Yes, Smith would be an upgrade, but he'd cost too much for his benefit. Ever heard of a cost-benefit analysis? Smith wouldn't rate a big contract so I wouldn't give him one. If you give him a big contract for limited production, they you are speeding up up running into cap problems...and for what? A good run defending DE who might net us 5+ sacks a year? Not worth it IMO.

A guy like Freeney on the other hand can improve our whole pass D almost by himself AND increase our number of turnovers on D...key factors in who wins and loses a football game.

If you read my post, I explained it already. Bad scheme vs the run and bad tackling in the back 7 = bad run D. Better scheme with better tackling and same personel=excellent run D in playoffs. What in these equations has changed? Personel? Scheme? And/or tackling?

Please read above answer as this again explains the same reasoning you either didn't read or are ignoring.

You love coming up with meaningless comparisons of stats. Freeney and Mathis' takeaways vs our whole team? That seems fair. Oh wait, that doesn't make sense. How about we see how many takeaways Freeney and Mathis had vs our conglomerate of DE's and see which group did better. Or more importantly, how about we compare everyone who plays RDE on the Titans and see if having Freeney would have helped us more in takeaways (ignoring for the moment his many more QB pressures which would increase our likelihood of forcing INT's and a lower completion percentage.

Dwight Freeney had a career low in forced fumbles at 4. Mathis had a near career low in FF with 4 as well. LaBoy had a career high with...wait for it....1!!! KVB also had 1. So far, Colts DE's 8 FF's and the Titans 2...maybe Connover can save us...nope. Zero FF for him. Odom...had zero. Josh Savage had...zero. I'm starting to see a trend. To make matters worse, even if you add every DE AND DT who played in 2006, Freeney by himself has more forced fumbles then ALL OF THEM COMBINED!!!

So thank you for contributing more to my argument. You just proved that he alone would improve our turnover ratio as well as pass rush quite well!

Gut

 

I clearly pointed out the total ineptness by the Colts to stop the run to counter your baseless argument trying to defend Freeny's weakness as a run defender. They were horrible against the run this year (5.3 average!). I never used the term "pancake". You try to make an argument based on their decent showing in the playoffs but if you think the Colts front office isn't concerned about their defenses ability to stop the run you would be crazy.

I also pointed out that their defense was terrible despite having one of the best offenses in the league. The inept Titans defense was far better when you consider the ineptness of our offense.

Yes, I do understand and consider cost benefit analysis. Thats the whole argument I'm making. We can have differences of opinion about the value of Freeney vs the value of Smith + whatever other players we can sign (like a decent DT?) with the money we save which is fine. You apparently are the one who doesn't understand the cost benefit analysis. The Colts have Freeney (and Mathis) and they stink defensively. It is a valid point to make when someone is arguing that throwing money at Freeney is going to solve our problems.

 

Sox...

So what your saying is that those guys stink because defensively, the D stinks. So they have no good individual players because every player's worth is based on the team's overall stats. That's what you're arguing? My 10yr old son knows better and so do you.

If you took your argument and applied it to the Titans, you'd also have to say Pacman Jones stinks because he's part of a bad defense statistically. Would you agree with this or do you think Pacman is one of the better CB's in the league? If you think Pacman is good, you invalidate your own argument. So what do you think of Pacman?

Notice how you don't counter my counters to your post...you avoid them and simply repeat your argument. That's not a debate. Try actually defending what you said by addressing my points specifically.

I also noticed how you massaged the numbers. The Colts run D hasn't been 'decent' in the playoffs, it's been DOMINANT. An avg of 44 yards per game is not only awesome, it'd be awesome even if you doubled that number!!! So are Freeney and Mathis now dominant run defenders because as a team they have been dominant the last 2 games?

Gut