Best Things, Worst Things Lately

can’t argue with most of what you’re saying. mendenhall still scares me a little bit with how he carries the ball, but he does seem to be focusing a lot on ball security, including holding with two hands when he’s running up the middle. Otherwise it’s been a pleasure to see someone hit the hole with authority and not bother stutter-stepping on the way… Really hope Farrior hasn’t permanently lost a step, sure doesn’t seem to be the rock in the middle that he was last year, though.

Hard to disagree with anything you said, but I will add that I am a little disappointed in the poor tackling by our D lately. Too many YAC’s. I love it when Ryan Clark whacks somebody, but sometimes he misses, and that leads to big plays for the bad guys. Also, Farrior has had a couple guffaws this season, usually centered around covering a back out of the backfield. It could be that he has lost a step…and it is probably also true that O Coordinators are picking up on this and planning accordingly. I wonder why we don’t use Mendy more this way. He has pretty soft hands and great burst after catching the ball…hello Bruce, are you listening?

True – that has been the worst unit on the field by far. I didn’t really rank them, just typed out the things in my head in no particlar order.

The coverage unit problems are fixable. As a coach you can change personnel, change tactics and even kick it out of bounds if you are punting. Why they don’t kick it out of bounds after all their problems I have no idea. I wonder if the NFL discourages it in some secret way? If you are as old as I am or older, you will remember the Coffin Corner tactics used by all teams in the 70s and 80s. Pinning your opponent inside the 10 yard line by kicking out of bounds on a punt was the accepted standard. Crowds applauded on a well-struck punt by a Ray Guy which gave the opponent no chance of a return and poor field position. More recently the rage is to down the ball on a high kick. Only problem is they can’t execute it consistently and you still have the returner able to fair catch the ball, negating some yardage gain.

I think their coverage problems stem from attitude as much as anything else. No one wants to play on the cover unit unless you are very hungry to prove yourself. No matter what – I blamed Cowher before and Tomlin now for the poor play. You can’t let the players dictate what is important. Problem in the NFL is that you have limited numbers and it’s hard to shit-can more than a few people mid-season.

are the ‘Lambert’ avatar symbols— yours & mine.