It's amazing how much better of a coach Capers is when he has Kevin Greene, Greg Lloyd, Carnell Lake, Levon Kirkland, Chad Brown, Rod Woodson, Deon Figures, Darren Perry, Brentson Buckner...
Players not schemes. Coaches can make a difference, but they have to have players, and those players are chosen by the GM, and scouted by the scouts. I listed players from the 1994 Steelers. Three of those guys were 1st Team All-Pro. That's a who's who list there. In the TT/MM era, when have the Packers even had half that many good players on defense in one season?
If you live by the philosophy of draft and develop and you are typically not active in free agency to fill needs, then the only way you are going to have an opportunity to build a defensive roster like the players above is through the draft. That means your hit vs. miss rate must be even more special as a GM, and your additional picks may never pan out.
Of the players I listed above, Greg Lloyd was a 6th rounder and Kevin Greene was a 5th rounder. Obviously both are self-made guys who worked hard and maximized their talents. The others listed were mostly 1st and 2nd round guys, save for Perry who was an 8th round guy (before they went down to 7 rounds).
The point is, these excellent players were great together and guess who their DC was? None other than Spray Paint Hair, Dunder Dummy himself. I bet candidly, Dom wishes he had the players above vs. some of the "developing" players he now has. I bet Rodgers wishes that too.The 1994 Steelers team was not a fart in the wind either. Capers was hired by Cowher when he took over the Steelers in 1992, and the Steelers already had a lot of good players on defense. Capers 1999 Jaguars defense was very good. A few of his defenses in Green Bay have been good.
The Packers have some talent on defense, but not to the level of defenses that Dom has coached previously. If someone else shops for the groceries and cuts corners, or doesn't realize what the right ingredients are, don't blame the cook, he did the best he could. Something was sure cooking in the front office of the Steelers in the early 90's and the Jags of the late 90's, and they had the same idiot DC.
TT has drafted okay overall on defense, but he has had a lot of misses, especially in the early rounds when you need to hit more often. When you draft Jerel Wothy and Khyri Thornton and they are gone before their rookie contracts are up, that's either bad luck (injuries) or bad evaluation. Dom can't overcome bad picks. He coaches whoever is on the roster. Give him some more excellent players.
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