Why are the Redskins getting so much crap for upgrading the defense over the offense?

[sjinhan]

ok to start... I acknowledge that the definitely the defense was the much stronger unit of the two... However if actually look at the state of affairs on both side of the ball...

just ignore for a moment the stats about where our defense was ranked because that can mess up the reality of the situation...

Was there a point last year when your thought our defense was dominate? like the steelers? Ravens of the past? Umm I dont think so...

Well at the end of the season, did we have any players on the roster that would be a bigger difference maker on the defensive side of the ball? Umm I don't think so...

So most likely what we saw last year is the BEST that unit can accomplish... I dont think thats very comforting despite their yards per game stat ranking they ended with.... if we didnt add talent to the defensive unit, it was very likely that they would be worse...

On offense, I think its a different story.. there are ALOT of pieces there that did not work out as we have hoped and added to that its first year in the offense under Zorn..

Even without adding any players, the offense had ALOT of upside because of the learning curve, injuries, and player development. On the other hand, defense had no upside and was primed for a big drop off...

so what the big problem making sure that the good defense unit stays good or even great for the next seaon...

anyone else on the same page with me?

[clarkskin]

I think they made good decisions. The offense has tools and talent, and another year of seasoning should pay off. They are looking at adding pieces here and there (RB, O-line prospects) that could make a world of difference. Most importantly, the continuity aspect is what I am happy about. JC having another year will really be able to take command of the offense. And one of last year's rookie WR's should step up and contribute. That will have a huge impact.

And besides, defense wins championships.

[terrifNick21]

Simple, because people just like to *****.

[DCDiesel44]

I'm definitely on the same page. I feel like were taking the Ravens approach by having an extremely good defense and an offense that is talented enough to score the points needed for the win.

[usapatriot]

The D may not have been like the Steelers or Ravens but they held most teams under 20 points. With a decent offense you should be able to beat any team with our scores. Plus we keep bringing in offesive-minded coaches and they can't fix the offense.

[Brandon Lloyd Christmas]

our D wont be like the ravens or steelers until we can prove that we can create turnovers and apply vicious pressure to the QB.

its a mystery whether they will be able to or not. but i doubt we'll be to the level of the ravens and steelers.

[bih]

cause even a number 1 offense like saints last year cant win the games if your defense keeps alowing 40+ points. you build the defense first and if you can build the offense at the same time. defense is the key to the whole team!

[ACW]

our D wont be like the ravens or steelers until we can prove that we can create turnovers and apply vicious pressure to the QB.

Orakpo

[Andre3stacks]

Alot of people forget our Dline last year was pretty abysmal. Almost as bad as our Oline. Alot of people just go to NFL.com look at team stats and say "you guys have a top 5 defense wtf are you guys doing upgrading your Dline with Orakpo?? Haynesworth??"

The question is always development for me. From what i see players on defense develop much faster than those on offense. I think our coaching staff realizes that. Thats why we are bannking on FA to release some gems to us.

[Soup]

our D wont be like the ravens or steelers until we can prove that we can create turnovers and apply vicious pressure to the QB.

its a mystery whether they will be able to or not. but i doubt we'll be to the level of the ravens and steelers.

I agree it probably won't be like the ravens or steelers. I think its going to be an ugly defense though. Teams will just have a hard time even moving the ball on the redskins. I don't think the skins will get a lot of turnovers again this year but I have a feeling that they will have at least one shut out this year.

[Weapon X]

cause even a number 1 offense like saints last year cant win the games if your defense keeps alowing 40+ points. you build the defense first and if you can build the offense at the same time. defense is the key to the whole team!

+1 :applause:

[IbleedBnG83]

Great thread. I'll be the first to admit that I was very upset that the offense wasn't addressed, more specifically the OL in the draft. However, they did a heck of a job shoring up the defense with Haynesworth, Hall, Orakpo, and Barnes.

Sounds like they have brought a lot of great prospects on the OL and WR positions. I'm really hoping they start building talent.

[AAARedskin]

The media despises Dan Snyder in case some of you haven't noticed. So, they never praise the Skins.....it's more fun for them to bad mouth instead. They'd be ga-ga over Dallas or the Giants upgrading their defenses with the same players, etc.

[MumboSauce]

Well when I saw the way the draft went that was the line of thinking that came to mind. Make the strong suit even stronger instead of being mediocre-good on both sides, make one side dominant, or at least try.

The point you make that stands out is the fact the defense had no room to grow or an upside...while there is the possibility the offense would improve(another year in system, growth of young players, healthy players. etc.) So I catch your drift.

We'll see how that strategy works out.

[The Full Monty]

defense wins championships.

[Disegn]

anyone else on the same page with me?

i like the whole post, very well said. definitely makes me feel warm and buttery that the redskins didn't let a good thing (the defense) come to an end, the redskins actually added a few more years to it.

[HA1LV1CT0RY]

I applaud them for upgrading the defense, I'd love to see an existent pass rush. I just think we had some opportunities to take some offensive players and passed. (duke in the 5th)

[generals01]

I applaud them for upgrading the defense, I'd love to see an existent pass rush. I just think we had some opportunities to take some offensive players and passed. (duke in the 5th)

Do you all not remember how miserable it was watching our offense go 2-6 to close out last year? We had one of the lowest scoring offenses in the league. I like the Orakpo pick but O Line needed to be addressed sometime in the draft. I would have gone with Jamon Meredith or Duke Robinson in the 5th rather than a linebacker who had only played 9 or so games at the position and was suspended. I don't know how they can justify not drafting any O Line.

[sonsofwashington]

I don't know why either. Although it would be nice to actually score more than 20 a game the fact of the matter is we have to put someone on the line to deal with Jacobs, Westbrook, Barber. Last time I checked their backups are pretty damn good too.

Don't any of you remember the Dallas game last year where Barber essentially ran the clock out on us because we could not stop the run? We live in the NFC East and anything you can do to improve the line on either side of the ball is a must to survive. I think we pay too much, but I am glad Dan spends it os opposed to hoarding it.

[4skins23]

Because the defense didn't need to be improved. Offense did. Too late now. The 'skins should trade orakpooo for a proven lb Foote from Pittsburg.

[The Sisko]

I see where you're coming from with the OP, however the flaw in your logic is that you take for granted that we actually did improve our defense with our picks. I'd argue that we didn't really upgrade the defense...well, if you don't count Orakpo. At the #13 spot, I think we took perhaps the safest and best player available at that spot. Great, no problem. Granted, that is a vast improvement over what we had before. But I don't think that's what people are bothered by so I'm not considering that pick.

I think like most, the real problem I have is that we, by Cerrato's own admission, were looking to trade up to take Orakpo exclusively. There wasn't any talk of us trading up for another player, oh like say one of the top two OTs.

We had a major need at DE so I honestly don't have a problem with us taking Orakpo. I think he's going to be very good and he was the BPA. However, there seemed to be zero recognition of the fact that we also have an equally glaring need at RT and NOTHING was done to address it. Well, nothing other than sign a 400lb tub-o-lard that will likely never get his weight down enough to be able to make the team.

Where I think we royally screwed the pooch was with the rest of our draft picks. I went into depth about my reasons for feeling that way here.

Notice that I didn't necessarily have a problem with us shoring up the defense. After all, we needed a Sam LB almost as much as we needed a RT. The problem I had/have is that outside of Barnes, we picked crap players. And Barnes was a guy we could have probably had later in the draft anyway. Furthermore, there were OL players late in the draft that would have had a shot at making the team and we passed on them in favor of players that will never play a down for us, or probably anyone in the NFL.:doh:

So outside of our first pick, we really didn't improve our defense or our team much, if at all. Unless you think drafting a bunch of guys that don't have a shot in hell at making an NFL roster an "improvement".

[SKIN4WAHOOZ]

we are criticized by the same people who come out with power rankings in may. the same people who said orakpo would be gone at # 13. the same people who predict division rankings and are wrong EVERY YEAR. who gives a shiet. they chose a profession where they dont have to be right.....and for good reason!!!

[sjinhan]

IFurthermore, there were OL players late in the draft that would have had a shot at making the team and we passed on them in favor of players that will never play a down for us, or probably anyone in the NFL.:doh:

So outside of our first pick, we really didn't improve our defense or our team much, if at all. Unless you think drafting a bunch of guys that don't have a shot in hell at making an NFL roster an "improvement".

Well if Cerrato and company did not feel like there was anyone in the 5th-7th round that could really help us on the line.. could you fault them for maybe looking for players who could contribute to special teams right away? if those guys can pan out to actually position players then great...

I mean we could been drafting another Rhinhart just for the sake of drafting OL... (I am hoping Rhinhart still pans out by the way)

Cerrato said in one of his interviews when asked about not drafting OL this year... he gave his reason as this year being weak for OL except for those top 4-6 tackles that got drafted first-early second round... he also noted it looks like that next year is going to be very deep for OL...

if what Cerrato said during that interview is true then can you really fault him for not drafting OL? Now if we dont get any OL next year in supposedly a strong OL draft according to Cerrato then I would be jumping on your band wagon...

[paintrain]

Pretty simple, reporters are lazy and sheep fans are lazier. It's far too easy to regurgitate information they've heard someone else say than to do the thinking and research for themselves. Our defense was good in two statistical categories, yards against (4th) and points against (6th overall, but 3rd worst in the division) but in the game impact categories-sacks and turnovers-we were a bottom third defense. Those areas needed to be addressed.

For all that want to crap on DeAngelo Hall for whatever reason, he's been a ball hawk. Haynesworth and Orapko are all about push and pass rush. We addressed issues that needed to be addressed.

For all of the call to fix our OL, which struggled down the stretch-no doubt, we were 6 plays from being at least a 10 win team last year.

St. Louis game-Kendall doesn't make that bonehead catch & fumble that's returned for 6 and Leigh Torrence doesn't get beat deep after we'd taken the lead inside the last 2 minutes. That's 9 wins.

Cincinnati game-Cedric Benson takes a screen pass on 2nd and 19 from inside their own 8 yard line 80 yards to set up a touchdown and Mike Sellers doesn't get in, then fumbles at the goal-line. 14 point swing in a game we lose by 7. That's 10 wins.

SF game, we blow a 10 point halftime lead, then rally back to tie the game with less than 1:10 to go before giving up a huge pass across the middle to set up the game winning FG. At worst we had that tied.

For all of the gloom, doom and whining that goes on around here it's amazing how flimsy most of the claims of our demise seem to be.

[The Sisko]

Well if Cerrato and company did not feel like there was anyone in the 5th-7th round that could really help us on the line.. could you fault them for maybe looking for players who could contribute to special teams right away? if those guys can pan out to actually position players then great...

I mean we could been drafting another Rhinhart just for the sake of drafting OL... (I am hoping Rhinhart still pans out by the way)

Cerrato said in one of his interviews when asked about not drafting OL this year... he gave his reason as this year being weak for OL except for those top 4-6 tackles that got drafted first-early second round... he also noted it looks like that next year is going to be very deep for OL...

if what Cerrato said during that interview is true then can you really fault him for not drafting OL? Now if we dont get any OL next year in supposedly a strong OL draft according to Cerrato then I would be jumping on your band wagon...

Maybe I didn't entirely make clear what I was trying to get across. Had he taken a better LB prospect or a better player in the secondary, I could buy his argument. That he bypassed viable players (nevermind the issue of need) for crap is what I have a problem with. If he had taken good, quality prospects at whatever position, I don't think one can argue with that too much.