Gregg Williams vs. Greg Blache

[tone_dubbz]

To be fair to Blache ...

Total Defense:

Washington - 7th (298 yards/game)

New Orleans - 16th (333 yards/game)

Scoring Defense:

Washington - 10th (18.6 points/game)

New Orleans - 15th (20.1 points/game)

Sacks:

Washington - 9th (with 27)

New Orleans - 10th (with 26)

Forced Fumbles:

Washington - 8th (with 13)

New Orleans - 11th (with 12)

The only two major categories where New Orleans defense is clearly better than ours, statistically speaking, is interceptions and defensive touchdowns.

Interceptions:

New Orleans - 1st (with 22)

Washington - 27th (with 7)

Defensive Touchdowns:

New Orleans - 1st (with 7)

Washington - 32nd (with 0)

Credit indeed belongs to Williams for bringing heat effectively and playing with a lead, as many of those picks came as a direct result of QB pressure.

But again, to be fair to Blache, without even going to the film, I can easily recall at least 3 would-be interceptions that bounced off a Washington player's chest, and two of those would have probably gone for six. You can't put that on the coach.

Also, let's not forget Darren Sharper. He alone has 8 picks (more than our whole team!), and three of those he took to the house. I'll give Williams some credit for putting him in good situations, but to be fair, Sharper is having a serious DMVP campaign which can make any coach look like a genius.

I think Blache is doing a fine job, all things considered. He certainly deserves his share of the blame (there's plenty to go around for everyone!), but in my opinion, that side of the ball is clearly NOT the problem.

Lets not forget that GW inherited that Saints's defense, and its his first year implementing a new defensive scheme. Image what the D might look like after a year.

[SoCalSkins]

Lets not forget that GW inherited that Saints's defense, and its his first year implementing a new defensive scheme. Image what the D might look like after a year.

He won't be there next year.

[maddogtre]

What I'll never understand is why Gregg Williams becamse so conservative with the skins (maybe Gibbs conservative nature rubbed off on him). When he first came here the D was aggressive with constant pressure by his crazy blitzes. Springs had 6 sacks his first year!

Then he started to get more and more conservative (bend but don't break). The yards would stay low, but the sacks/turnovers were rare.

Someone mentioned it was because he couldn't trust the O, but I dont think thats it. Our O sucked just as bad when he first arrived and it didn't stop him.

I personally wanted him gone because of how Vanilla he got, and I also want Blache gone for the same reason. In my opinion, the aggressive pressure Ds are the formula for success. Low yards means nothing. The skins always hold teams to low yards, yet nobody every truly feared our D like Pitt/Balt.

Gregg went to Jax last year and didnt really do much. I think he finally woke up this year and remembered what brought him the initial success....his aggressive ways!

If he had our D now, with his current mindset/playcalling style, I think our D would be nasty.

[Darth Tater]

When the Saints played the Patriots on MNF, the Saints defense was just as much on showcase as the offense was. The defense continually blitzed and shifted so as to throw Tom Brady off and make him confused. When the Skins played the Eagles, the Skins defense shut down a good offense until the fourth quarter. The difference between the two is the coordinator. Where Blache went into prevent defense up by only 8, Williams continued blitzing up by 21. why did we get rid of him?

HAIL:helmet:

Um, Williams did NOT blitz much last night.

[Darth Tater]

We let him go because he said the QB position would be a open battle he didn't like JC, Vinny and Dan gave up too much to get him, and I don't think he would let Vinny tell him how to do his job kinda like how Vinny is doing Zorn know

Pretty much exact opposite.

[SoCalSkins]

What I'll never understand is why Gregg Williams becamse so conservative with the skins (maybe Gibbs conservative nature rubbed off on him). When he first came here the D was aggressive with constant pressure by his crazy blitzes. Springs had 6 sacks his first year!

Then he started to get more and more conservative (bend but don't break). The yards would stay low, but the sacks/turnovers were rare.

Someone mentioned it was because he couldn't trust the O, but I dont think thats it. Our O sucked just as bad when he first arrived and it didn't stop him.

I personally wanted him gone because of how Vanilla he got, and I also want Blache gone for the same reason. In my opinion, the aggressive pressure Ds are the formula for success. Low yards means nothing. The skins always hold teams to low yards, yet nobody every truly feared our D like Pitt/Balt.

Gregg went to Jax last year and didnt really do much. I think he finally woke up this year and remembered what brought him the initial success....his aggressive ways!

If he had our D now, with his current mindset/playcalling style, I think our D would be nasty.

Gregg took the Jacksonville job because it was the only position left after our 6 week hiring circus.

Del Rio is a defensive coach himself, so it wasn't a good fit.

Gregg after seeing how Sean Peyton attacks and how Gibbs leads, is going to be an insanely good coach in my opinion.

He is 5 years younger than Zorn as well.

[pgray1111]

To kind of echo what someone else said, if people wonder why Williams defense lost some of it's aggression, it was definitely because of the lack of firepower from the offense.

Also, on the topic of Williams and the HC position here. Every time I think about this, i just get angry. Say what you will about the guy, but the players LOVED him. After the whole Sean Taylor tragedy, I got the sense that Williams was what kept the team glued together and pushed us to the playoffs. Had he become the head coach, i firmly believe we'd be well on the road to victory right now, mainly because of the lack of change that would have taken place.

As for the debate between Blache and Williams. i feel like they're a very similar type of playcaller. Sure, Williams might be known for exotic blitzes, but blache, to and extent is along those same lines. To me, the biggest difference in the two is their personalities. Williams used to run up and down the sidelines, pumping his fists and cheering the team on, and Blache is very subdued. i don't know about you, but I like the idea of a coach who actually seems emotionally invested in the team.

[SoCalSkins]

Blache is done. He came out of retirement and after his refusal to talk to media, he will not be coaching next year.

Gregg Williams is pretty young in terms of coaching standards.

[Jeff in D.C.]

I like Greg Williams, the guy has fire, passion, and intensity, something that's badly missing from this team right now. But if he was running the defense as head coach, or even if he brought in a D-coord, the result would probably be the same because of the offense. Williams had much the same problem as D-coord of the Jags last year, the offense wasn't good enough for him to take chances that would force turnover's. The Jags scored more than 24 points last year twice - once against the Texans and the other against the Lions. So it's hard to knock GW for having an average Jags D last year (he didn't have good personnel to work with on D either).

The offensive & defensive philosophies are set by the HC, so it's possible that Zorn has had alot of influence on Blache's being conservative, whereas with Gibbs he pretty much left the defense in Williams hands. If you look at the defense last year, it was pretty dominant all year, so doesn't Blache get credit for that?

[cphil006]

Lets not forget that GW inherited that Saints's defense, and its his first year implementing a new defensive scheme. Image what the D might look like after a year.

Could go up or down... historically speaking... It happened to us.

Vinny firing GW was him trying to make his mark rather than taking a legit system and continuing it on...

[redskins55]

How would it not have worked and how did it not work... we didn't go forward with the same plan.

Actually, going forward with the same plan would have been a playoff team... obviously we did NOT go forward with things the same. The "Front Office" decided to what kind of offense we would run (WCO) before naming a head coach.

Keeping Williams would have probably kept Al Saunders and we'd be even further along on offense with the players in the same system for longer.

Exactly...

Campbell looked much better with Saunders offense which was taylored to capitalize on exploiting mismatches. Our offense now is simply designed to get the ball out quickly. I wasn't a fan of Williams being head coach because he doesn't show humility or willingness to change. Remember we had a horrible defense in 2006 under Williams. He aliented LaVar Arrington and had a poor defense in Jacksonville last year. But if I had known we were hiring a circus clown in Zorn I would've endorsed Williams.

[pgray1111]

Exactly...

Campbell looked much better with Saunders offense which was taylored to capitalize on exploiting mismatches. Our offense now is simply designed to get the ball out quickly. I wasn't a fan of Williams being head coach because he doesn't show humility or willingness to change. Remember we had a horrible defense in 2006 under Williams. He aliented LaVar Arrington and had a poor defense in Jacksonville last year. But if I had known we were hiring a circus clown in Zorn I would've endorsed Williams.

Every situation is different and to point at the one bad year he had here defensively is unfair. If you remember correctly, that year there was tons of turmoil amongst the defensive backs and not to mention someone decided that Adam Archuleta was a better fit at safety than ryan clark. (I'm looking in snyder's direction here). Granted, it's supposed to be Williams job to keep those guys in check, but there was definitely more issues at play that season.

As for Lavar, let's be honest, in William's defensive scheme, the players who excel are the one's who play disciplined (Fletcher, springs, Sean Taylor, marcus washington, etc.). The major knock on Lavar throughout his career was that he was too wild of a player, and I think this infuriated Williams.

And to be his defender one more time, the whole thing in Jacksonville can be chalked up to the situation more than the coaching. Jacksonville's offense was dreadful last year, and when your offense is that bad, and you have a new coach come in, it's awfully hard to put something good together.

Let's be honest here. The thing that most fans complain about right now is the inconsistency and the lack of continuity. If we had just promoted Gregg to HC that year, and made Al Saunders the OC, I think we'd be having a much different (better) season right now, but as per usual, Dan and Vinny wanted to reinvent the wheel again.