The Falcons Defense is smoke-n-mirrors all year - got exposed

[g-dawg]

I think the Falcons defense has improved each year from 2008 until now and the personnel has gotten better. However, its still nowhere near a great defense. As a matter of fact, I'm not sure we are much better than an average defense.

Falcons offense dominating the time of possession always masked our flaws. We are said to have the "bend but don't break" defense but when you consider everytime the Falcons defense faced good offenses - they gave up a ton of yards and even a lot of late scores in regular season (i.e. both Saints games, Ravens 2nd half, Packers regular season, Cincinnati, etc.).

I see a defense that plays to prevent big plays and let the opposing offense make mistakes and eventually beat themselves. Well that works when you are playing clearly inferior teams than the Falcons and that is about 18 teams in the NFL. However, the Falcons brand of defense is never going to win you the 2 or 3 games it will take in the playoffs to win a SuperBowl. I believe Falcons probably would have lost to Saints again in ATL as well had we faced Drew Brees again.

Granted, lots of defenses have bad days versus the likes of Drew Brees and Aaron Rogers but Falcons give up 350yds plus through the air when they face guys like those and Manning, Brady and probably Rivers as well.

Let's look at the remaining four teams in hunt for the SuperBowl - Steelers/Jets/Packers/Bears - all four of those teams have very stout defenses and have superstars on the defensive side of the ball.

Steelers: James Harrison, Troy Polamalu, LaMarr Woodley
Jets: Darrelle Revis, Bart Scott, Calvin Pace
Packers: Clay Matthews(who Falcons should have drafted), Woodson, BJ Raji
Bears: Urlacher, Peppers, Lance Briggs, Charles Tillman

You may argue that some of those guys are not quite superstars but you get my drift. Falcons don't have any thumpers up front in the front 7 especially. I like our linebackers but none are huge playmakers in blitz packages. The front 4 do not seem to be able to generate consistent pressure and no good team fears our defense.....Dunta has been god-awful and Grimes makes lots of plays but gives up as many.

On top of all that, I think our soft-scheme in the Cover-2 is to blame as well. We need a much more aggressive defense, play more bump-n-run with the corners and much, much, much more pressure.

Now, I have vented - feel much better.

[caver50]

That game exposed our suspect defense weakness that I noticed all year. We could have easily been 9 and 7. If there is such a thing as luck, then we had more than our share. In fact, it exposed weakness on both sides of the ball. With another year under thier belt, some players will get better and some will have to go. Personally I would love for us to get Aso and move Robinson to nickel. Probably won't happen, but it sounds good.The Bierman was a bit of a dissapointment, not the year that I thought he would have. He doesn't appear to be starting material imo. The run D is pretty good, but we have been weak on the pass rush all year. Sometimes it just kills me when the opposing QB has so much time to run around out there. The Pats
game today was a prime example of what good pressure can do.

[ViperXX79]

Yep I've been saying the same thing since week one but people just ignored it cause we were winning. Teams don't win the SuperBowl with prevent defenses.

[Swift Is a Die Hard]

I disagree we have some solid defensive players ..Abe/Babs/Lofton

rest outside Grimes could be replaced I wouldnt give 2 shits about

Moore has talent but just needs to work on tackling and getting in better position

Dunta was a huge MISTAKE ...its pretty evident now

[cnasty]

Our DL is completely undersized. I noticed it the first game of the year against Pitt. We got manhandled in the trenches and that happened basically all year. Not a single starter listed over 300. We get shoved around like teenagers.

[phocis850]

We need to go 3-4.

We need the extra body in coverage since our pass rush sucks anyway.

[Radical]

(01-17-2011 01:03 AM)phocis850 Wrote:  We need to go 3-4.

We need the extra body in coverage since our pass rush sucks anyway.

We did rush 3 a lot against the Packers...

WTF is going to the 3-4 with a coaching staff that has never ran a 3-4 going to do for us?

[Beef]

(01-16-2011 11:26 PM)g-dawg Wrote:  I think the Falcons defense has improved each year from 2008 until now and the personnel has gotten better. However, its still nowhere near a great defense. As a matter of fact, I'm not sure we are much better than an average defense.

Falcons offense dominating the time of possession always masked our flaws. We are said to have the "bend but don't break" defense but when you consider everytime the Falcons defense faced good offenses - they gave up a ton of yards and even a lot of late scores in regular season (i.e. both Saints games, Ravens 2nd half, Packers regular season, Cincinnati, etc.).

I see a defense that plays to prevent big plays and let the opposing offense make mistakes and eventually beat themselves. Well that works when you are playing clearly inferior teams than the Falcons and that is about 18 teams in the NFL. However, the Falcons brand of defense is never going to win you the 2 or 3 games it will take in the playoffs to win a SuperBowl. I believe Falcons probably would have lost to Saints again in ATL as well had we faced Drew Brees again.

Granted, lots of defenses have bad days versus the likes of Drew Brees and Aaron Rogers but Falcons give up 350yds plus through the air when they face guys like those and Manning, Brady and probably Rivers as well.

Let's look at the remaining four teams in hunt for the SuperBowl - Steelers/Jets/Packers/Bears - all four of those teams have very stout defenses and have superstars on the defensive side of the ball.

Steelers: James Harrison, Troy Polamalu, LaMarr Woodley
Jets: Darrelle Revis, Bart Scott, Calvin Pace
Packers: Clay Matthews(who Falcons should have drafted), Woodson, BJ Raji
Bears: Urlacher, Peppers, Lance Briggs, Charles Tillman

You may argue that some of those guys are not quite superstars but you get my drift. Falcons don't have any thumpers up front in the front 7 especially. I like our linebackers but none are huge playmakers in blitz packages. The front 4 do not seem to be able to generate consistent pressure and no good team fears our defense.....Dunta has been god-awful and Grimes makes lots of plays but gives up as many.

On top of all that, I think our soft-scheme in the Cover-2 is to blame as well. We need a much more aggressive defense, play more bump-n-run with the corners and much, much, much more pressure.

Now, I have vented - feel much better.

Peters & Spoon are rookies, & Moore is essentially a rookie too. And it's way too early to say they can't become great, especially after they all clearly had really good rookie seasons by comparison.

Babs, Abe, & Lofton are beasts, period. Teams that don't fear them are foolish.

And I love Grimes, but I still firmly believe he's undersized to be a starting outside CB. I think with his athleticism he'd be a ridiculously good nickel or even SS, especially on blitz packages. I think he's faster, more agile & able to adjust, & therefore significantly less likely to whiff on a QB when rushing or be able to chase one down who's scrambling.

Dunta is no different than any other NEW player entering a system & has a learning curve. As usual, the instant-gratification lazy populace expects immediate super-stardum & over-inflates expectations to a ridiculous degree simply because a lot of money was involved & all the other hindering factors & challenges are completely ignored. So next year, when Dunta has 6+ interceptions, I'm betting lots of people shut up & conveniently forget this bout of whining.

DeCoud & Biermann simply under-acheived this year. Thought they would beast it up but it just didn't happen. Part of that is BVG's fault though. His cover packages suck, so it's hard for DeCoud to overcome that. And truthfully, Biermann still had a ton of QB pressures this year & was only inches & fractions of a second away from a bunch more sacks. With better secondary coverage, he would have gotten more.

Nicholas & Peterson... just average. Nothing else really to say there.

So yeah, we definitely have our holes, but with only a few moves, a coverage style change, & some players developing into their expectations, which is still very possible & even likely, I think this lineup can get us top 10 at both run & pass def. But we need a bona fide real CB opposite Dunta, move Grimes inside, & we need to change our coverage style. And obviously picking up a DE & a pass rushing OLB if Biermann & Nicholas don't live up to expectations.