Manders v Chiefs

I think the alarm will sound if we lose either of our first 2 games, or if they are too close....both of which are very very possible.

I'm definitely not defending him. I was more so pointing out that - blitz or no blitz - they haven't been effective.

But I don't put a lot of stock in the preseason, or get too caught up with the results. I just think it's so different, schemes, players, game planning, 'experimenting'. It isn't comforting though, that we are seeing the same things that were wrong with this defense last year.

In my opinion, if the defense is crap again coming out of the gate (especially the 3rd down defense) I want to see a change by week 5.

Good point. When things aren't working well we, me included, have a tendency to look for easy fixes: blitz more! switch back to a 4-3 ! more screens !

But the game is way more complicated than that, those "solutions" are way too vague. There are billions of ways to blitz, millions of way to align in a 4-3 and many different ways to screen. The matter is finding the appropriate way for each situation, depending of your personnel, scheme, opponent and in game situation... And that's why none of us are Head Coaches ^^

Beside from X and O, one thing we can judge to a certain extent is intensity and discipline. This defense lacks both. And this points towards coaching.

I think the alarm will sound if we lose either of our first 2 games, or if they are too close....both of which are very very possible.Lawrence, reportedly, looked great last game. Kid has superb talent and is a winner. Imagine him and Pederson will be gunning for us week 1. Etienne is no joke at all either. Know it's only week 1, but it really is a game we need to win.

Last year this defense blitzed 31% of the time, when the opposing QB dropped back to pass. That was good for 7th most in the league.

I looked into this blitz thing last year. it was an interesting dive. We didnt blitz a lot in the first 4-5 games then dialed it up more.

What I wanted to find out was "what counts as a blitz"?

-Traditionally if you rush 5 or more, its a blitz. Excluding goal line plays (and I imagine but havent seen in writing those 4th and 1 QB sneaks).
- If you rush 4 or more in a 3-4 formation
- If you show 5 but only rush 4, its counts as a blitz (this I heard on radio from football outsiders or PFF). This surprised me.

Last year we did a lot of 5 man rushes.

London Fletcher said the other day that our most used 3rd down formation is a 5 man rush where the LB shows intent to rush the A gap. This forces the offense to call Five-O which means the O protection is now man 5 hats on 5 hats.

We did this 5 man rush A gap so teams couldnt double our edge or DTs and we hoped one of our stubs won 1 on 1.

Sometimes the LB (Holcomb) would rush and sometimes he would show rush then drop back.

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London said hes not worried about our PS 3rd down D bc we werent showing or using what we will do in the regular season.

Conversely .. mahomes said after the game he was surprised we did a "fire" blitz on one of his TD passes, saying you never see that blitz in PS