WP: Redskins’ 3-4 defense, finally built to Jim Haslett’s liking, is capable of causing havoc

[pjfootballer]

The Seattle game was fools gold. Seattle shot themselves in the foot with 13/14 penalties. They had 3 TDs brought back. Their offense moved with ease that game.

[Thinking Skins]

The Seattle game was fools gold. Seattle shot themselves in the foot with 13/14 penalties. They had 3 TDs brought back. Their offense moved with ease that game.

For as much as people say don't make excuses for Haslett, it seems like people are making excuses against Haslett. We have a great game against JAX, "well its Jacksonville". We stop Seattle in the second half, "they stopped themselves", We stop Arizona and Houston, "they're not good offenses".

Getting turnovers is a problem with this defense, getting sacks is a problem with this defense, third down percentage is a problem with this defense. But this defense overall is not the problem with this team. We don't fumble twice against Houston, we win that game. We don't throw a pic against Philly, miss a FG, or we move the ball 10 yards, we win that game. We don't throw 4 picks against the Giants and its a much closer game. We move the ball in the third against Seattle, its a much closer game. We don't throw 3 4th quarter pics against Arizona its a much closer game.

Firing Haslett won't fix this team. Sure he's a scapegoat with good reason, but people act like he's Ron Lynn and I have a problem with that.

[planter]

Haslett's defense is performing as expected. It 's the Skin's offense that is playing below expectations. Shall we start another thread?

[darrelgreenie]

The Seattle game was fools gold. Seattle shot themselves in the foot with 13/14 penalties. They had 3 TDs brought back. Their offense moved with ease that game.

I didn't see much gold in the Seattle game to be fooled by. We lost. But lets not beg the facts by making excuses based on plays that didn't actually count due to penalty.

If you remove our penalties or any teams penalties then.....

[darrelgreenie]

I don't get why Haslett gets so much negativity...

I hate being forced to defend Haslett.

But its my nature to remain as unflinchingly objective as possible.

Personally, I've stated that I thought Haslett should have been replaced during this offseason with Wade Phillips and I think regardless of what happens this season I think we should look at Rex, Wade and the Dennis Allen.

But with that being said, it is clear that this defense (a) lacks the fire power it had week 1 (2) isn't as bad as most fans think.

To answer your question why their is negativity despite the defense being:

#10 in the league with 336.2 yards per game.

#12 in yards per play.

#11th in first downs per game

the negativity stems from:

-carry over negativity from last year

-we've only one 1 game

-we're 27th in PPG allowed

I have a long list of metrics i look at to assess the defense: http://es.redskins.com/topic/366753-jim-haslett-time-for-him-to-show-something/?p=9855770

But the most accurate stand alone "single take" metrics that isolate the defense I look at are from FBO:

17th ranked defense

25th against the pass

7th against the run

And that seems about right to me.

Its tough to have a good pass rush without generating pressure and that's where we are...again.

Cofield went down and now we're down with 1 interior DL that can generate pressure.

When/IF Cofield comes back the pressure and therefore pass defense will improve.

But until the defense is pretty much gonna look the way it has.

Simple coverages to protect our suspect secondary.

[steve09ru]

Why did you leave out the Giants game?

 

What does that have to do with the price of tea in China?  And he left out the Giants game LOL.  You guys are playing meaningless games with statistics to lie to yourselves.  His historical defensive rankings tell a complete story.

left out the Giants because ThinkingSkins has already talked about that game in detail and we know the poor all around effort.  What I was showing is that it hasn't been the Giants game all season like many want to portray.

[steve09ru]

The Seattle game was fools gold. Seattle shot themselves in the foot with 13/14 penalties. They had 3 TDs brought back. Their offense moved with ease that game.

You do realize that when a penalty is called during a big play, that said penalty is usually one of the leading causes (holding led to no sack or disruption, false start is a false start, uneccessary roughness).  The 3 TD's, 2 occurred on the same drive and they still got a FG and the 3rd one they still scored a TD and kept the ball for an additional 6 minutes from if they would have just gotten the TD without the penalty.

[steve09ru]

You don't win by holding teams to their average yardage totals, you win by holding them well below those numbers. We don't hold anyone below their yard total averages, and we compound that by the fact that we get no sacks, force no turnovers, have major difficulty getting off the field on meaningful third downs and we allow opposing QBs the second highest QB Rating in the entire NFL. This deferral to pure yardage totals when we already know that our poor special teams play and turnover prone offense give teams short fields and short scoring drives is inaccurate or disingenuous.

Look at our own division this week. Dallas and the Eagles defenses helped their teams win by holding good teams below their yardage averages....

You don't win by JUST holding teams. Offense needs to do their part, defense needs to force turnovers and Special Teams needs to show up. This defense has done enough to where if we were competent in other facets, we could be 4-2.

Same thing I posted earlier but have included how the other opponents fared against same team (Red indicates around (within 5 yards yards) or worse than Redskins defense gave up).  And again, NYG game isn't included as it's already been discussed in detail with the numbers and we all know how bad that was  For the games we were in:

 

 

Philly averages 379 total, 262 passing, 116 rushing, 30.5 points  :  1st down/game - 21  3rd down % - 41%

Skins allowed 379 total, 321 passing, 54 rushing, 27 points :  1st down - 22  3rd down % - 36.3%

Jax allowed     420, 275, 145, 27 pts, 24, 42.1%  

Colts allowed   458, 331, 12 7, 30 pts  , 24 , 41.6%

SF allowed 213, 191, 22, 0 pts, 11,  41.6%

STL allowed 352, 207, 145 , 20 pts, 22 , 53.3%

NYG allowed  448, 24 5, 203, 27 pts ,24, 30.8%

 

Houston averages 337 total, 206 passing, 128 rushing, 22 points :  1st down/game - 18  3rd down % - 36.8%

Skins allowed 331 total, 206 passing, 115 rushing, 10 points :  1st down - 16  3rd down % - 50%

Oak allowed     327, 139, 188, 30 pts, 20, 60%   

NYG allowed    411,  292, 119 , 17 pts, 20  , 16.7%

Buffalo allowed 301, 264  , 37, 16 pts  , 19  , 35.7%

Dallas allowed   330 , 154, 176 , 17 pts  , 15, 30.8%

Indy allowed  332 , 196, 136, 21 pts , 18, 12.5%

 

Jax averages 290 total, 221 passing, 68 rushing, 13.5 points :  1st down/game - 12  3rd down % - 37.2%

Skins allowed 148 total, 123 passing, 25 rushing, 10 points :  1st down - 8  3rd down % - 23%

Philly allowed  306, 242, 64, 17 pts, 18,  14.3%

Indy allowed  344, 239, 105, 17 pts, 18, 40% 

San Diego allowed  320, 235, 85, 14 pts, 21, 64.3% 

Pittsburgh allowed  243, 187, 56,  9 pts , 12, 25%

Tennessee allowed 379, 297, 82, 14 pts, 27, 53.5%

 

Seattle averages 336 total, 186 passing, 150 rushing, 26.6 points :  1st down/game - 19  3rd down % - 38.1%

Skins allowed 403 total, 178 passing, 225 rushing, 27 points :  1st down - 19  3rd down % - 35.7%

GB allowed 398, 191, 207, 36 pts, 25, 36.4%

Dallas allowed  206, 126, 80, 23 pts, 9, 38.4%

San Diego allowed 288, 180, 108, 21 pts, 14, 37.5%

Denver allowed 384, 255, 129, 26 pts, 26, 41.2%

 

AZ averages 308 total, 222 passing, 86 rushing, 23.2 points :  1st down/game - 19  3rd down % - 41.1%

Skins allowed 317 total, 243 passing, 74 rushing, 20 points :  1st down- 19  3rd down % - 41.1%

San Diego allowed 403, 294, 109, 18 pts, 22, 46.2%

NYG allowed 266, 142, 124, 18 pts, 21, 38.5%

SF allowed 338, 254, 84, 23 pts, 24, 61.5%

Denver allowed 215, 178, 37, 20 pts, 9, 18.8%

 

Is the defense great?  Absolutely not.  Are they as pathetic and horrid as people make them out to be?  Absolutely not.  Can this team win with this defense if other parts of the team are clicking?  Absolutely.  Does this defense need to force more turnovers?  Absolutely.  Has this defense been hit with injuries that could be affecting the turnover aspect and making them into a 'good' defense?  Absolutely.

 

What if our offense could move the ball consistently to change the field position battle?  What if the special teams would get flagged for penalties on every play and/or give up big returns?  When teams average starting field position requires less than 25-30 yards in order to get into field goal range, that's a problem.

[ExoDus84]

PPG is still atrocious. Trouble stopping teams when it really matters. A portion of that is due to poor field position. I read we are on pace for the worst average starting field position in history since the merger.

 

I can't wait for Has to be gone. I don't care if we've shown very limited improvement this year. His defenses haven't cracked the top 10 in a decade, and his tenure with us has been just awful.

[Laron Burgundy]

I hate being forced to defend Haslett.

But its my nature to remain as unflinchingly objective as possible.

Personally, I've stated that I thought Haslett should have been replaced during this offseason with Wade Phillips and I think regardless of what happens this season I think we should look at Rex, Wade and the Dennis Allen.

But with that being said, it is clear that this defense (a) lacks the fire power it had week 1 (2) isn't as bad as most fans think.

To answer your question why their is negativity despite the defense being:

#10 in the league with 336.2 yards per game.

#12 in yards per play.

#11th in first downs per game

Our offensive line has allowed rather few sacks, stats don't always tell the whole truth.

But to be clear, I don't think our defense has been worst in the league bad, but I'll be damned if we don't have at least 2 or 3 embarassingly horrendous coverage breakdowns per game. Thank god not all of them get exploited.

[pjfootballer]

Regardless, if some of you want to keep Haslett, be my guest. I've seen enough that I just know I want him gone. Another season of teams going up and down the field with ease, no sacks and no turnovers. It's like Groundhog Day.

[steve09ru]

I'm not saying he needs to be kept, I'm saying that the defensive players we have can be a very solid group with someone who schemes better and is aggressive.  Therefore, the defense as a whole does not need to be blown up but wouldn't hurt my feelings if Haslett was let go of for someone who can cause havoc and create turnovers.

[98ORAKPO98]

Best defense in the league baby! jk but we sure did look good last night with Breeland Island leading the charge! Why don't we blitz like that more often?

Redskins' blitz shuts down Dallas

http://espn.go.com/blog/washington-redskins/post/_/id/12420/redskins-blitz-shuts-down-dallas

[carex]

The Seattle game was fools gold. Seattle shot themselves in the foot with 13/14 penalties. They had 3 TDs brought back. Their offense moved with ease that game.

 

They scored the touchdowns because of the penalties.  Our defense is not good enough to succeed despite their opponents excessively breaking the rules.  That's not really surprising

You do realize that when a penalty is called during a big play, that said penalty is usually one of the leading causes (holding led to no sack or disruption, false start is a false start, uneccessary roughness).  The 3 TD's, 2 occurred on the same drive and they still got a FG and the 3rd one they still scored a TD and kept the ball for an additional 6 minutes from if they would have just gotten the TD without the penalty.

 

he must figure the Redskins would have punted multiple times during the extra six minutes so they could have racked up the points

[Captain Injury]

Brisland.

[TheItalianStallion]

Our poor papg right now is mostly because of the turnovers. Even in the NYG game, all but 14 of their points came off turnovers. The only game where our D flat-out stunk was @PHI. I think our personnel are pretty good. A better DC would have this group comfortably in the top half of the league, as I think Monday night proved, when Haslett actually got creative.

[Stadium-Armory]

Those cover zero biltzes are feast or famine and we can't expect to do that every game. Yes, it worked in this situation but its not hard for a QB to see no safety help. Romo even talked about it post-game. Point is, I wouldn't read too much in to the pressure and assume we've turned some corner on D. Breeland however was great and I hope to see him continue his upward trajectory.

[ConcordNCSkinsFan]

No this Defense hasn't turned into a juggernaut but at least they've found what their identity should be. Like the Cardinals they have to heavily blitz and take their chances putting the young corners on an island due to lack of straight Pass Rush. Other teams will exploit that better than Dallas did but it still needs to be the foundation of the Defense. All the aggressive calls let these guys play with more of an edge and it showed in how physical they were. Haslett can't get complacent next game just because he's playing against a rookie QB.  

[darrelgreenie]

The defense Monday night is an example of the effect personnel has on outcomes.

Haslett's blitz heavy gameplans aren't new. He's used them at times BUT success of the players execution determines the success of the play/gameplan and whether or not Jay can keep calling it.

The blitz got home because the players executed. Meriweather got home when his number was dialed up.

Breeland played like an all-pro when he was targeted.

Haslett is the same coach as he's always been. Like most coaches he's heavily personnel dependent. Jim is an average coach, he'll put players in position to make plays, then its up to them.

Week to week he's not gonna be able to scheme up a defense out of thin air without players making plays.

Haslett's perception from ES/fanbase is much worse then the reality:

Football Outsiders currently ranks Haslett's defense:

http://www.footballoutsiders.com/stats/teamdef

14th Overall

22nd vs Pass

8th vs Run

[Audible_Red40]

Those cover zero biltzes are feast or famine and we can't expect to do that every game. Yes, it worked in this situation but its not hard for a QB to see no safety help. romoSUCKS even talked about it post-game. Point is, I wouldn't read too much in to the pressure and assume we've turned some corner on D. Breeland however was great and I hope to see him continue his upward trajectory.

This.

How many times over the past couple years have we heard how stupid Haz is for running the cover zero blitz.....because they can't tackle, can't play press man, can't get to the QB and receivers like Dez will kill us.

Tread carefully with this scheme.