PACKERS' ... Secret Superstar: Brad Jones

[pbmax]

During 2012 Camp for San Fran, the battle for nickel corner between Cox and Culliver:

"The 49ers easily could have handed the job to Culliver after the 2011 third-round choice played better than 40 percent of the defensive snaps last season.

http://espn.go.com/blog/nfcwest/post/_/id/71444/49ers-camp-battle-update-nickel-cb

[RashanGary]

Wist was pissing Packer fans off three years ago too. Shocker, haha.

[RashanGary]

During 2012 Camp for San Fran, the battle for nickel corner between Cox and Culliver:



http://espn.go.com/blog/nfcwest/post...date-nickel-cb

They played nickle 40% of snaps? That's more than I thought. We played what? 70% or so? Still, all teams play nickle. It's the most common defense in the league.

[Joemailman]

And MM had a couple really good rushing years with Grant. Good YPC, upper half of the league across the board, with killer passing attacks.

Yep. Grant had a total of almost 600 carries in 2008-2009. Give MM a good RB and he'll use him. It would have been crazy to give Alex Green a lot of carries last year

[pbmax]

Football Outsiders: http://www.footballoutsiders.com/gam...-round-preview

This season, the 49ers have faced three-wide sets on 59 percent of plays*, they've responded with nickel personnel on 83 percent of those plays (rest were base), and have given up only 4.9 yards per play (61 percent defensive success rate). In the 14 percent of plays that came against four-wide, however, they were in nickel personnel only 23 percent of the time (rest were dime), and gave up 6.8 yards per play (49 percent defensive success rate).

Carlos Rogers was on the field for 98% of Defensive snaps at 1036. 1036/.98 = 1057 total defensive snaps.

59 perent of plays 49ers faced 3 wide -> 1057 * .59 = 623 snaps

Respond with nickel personnel 83 % of 623 snaps = 517 snaps of nickel

517 nickel snaps / 1036 total = 49.9% of total defensive snaps in nickel.

And just to check my match, Chris Culliver, the nickel back? Played in 669 defensive snaps this year.

[wist43]

Wist was pissing Packer fans off three years ago too. Shocker, haha.

I do my best

[wist43]

As for the Niners playing nickel against us from the opening snap - that makes much more sense than Capers jumping to a 2-4 on 2nd and 6.

The Packers can't run the ball on the Niners. They know it, and we know it. Beyond that, I seriously doubt we can run against them when they're in the nickel. Unless they do something stupid like go to a 2-4, ala Harris's TD run.

The Niners have very good defensive linemen, they believe in controlling the LOS, and they're likely to have at least 3 DL on the field in the nickel. I'd be shocked if they came out an actually ran more 2-4. More 3-3, or 4-2, but not more 2-4.

[wist43]

Except that you keep goings on this thing where the Packers, unlike every other team in the NFL, never run the ball. Statistics on he other hand show that they were in the middle of the league last year.

Rushing - 16th in attempts, 21st in ypc, 20th in yards.
Passing - 16th in attempts, 9th in yards, 6th in ypa

Just because they have had shit running backs does not mean McCarthy does not like to run. At least drop some validity in your rants.

It's certainly not effective running. You want numbers?

- 3.9 yd/rush
- Take Rodgers and Cobb out, and you have a 3.55 yd/rush
- The base RB's (Green, Starks, and Benson) ran for 967 yds, and 3.49 yd avg.

Maybe it's a fluke b/c our offensive linemen are super-awesome pass blockers, right?? Well, not so much... as witnessed by 51 sacks

Gee, I wonder if there's something amiss with the OL??

We run only as a function of our passing game. We can't simply line up in a 2-TE formation and run the damn ball. 3rd and 1 is a passing down - and everyone knows it.

[RashanGary]

I do my best

Yes, yes you do.

I would say you have some adjusting to do though. Teams pass against GB mroe than most teams because they have to score against us more than most teams. Hence, they play more WR sets, hence we play more nickle than SF, who teams are more satisfied slugging it out against.

2-4 isn't as bad when one of your 4 is Nick Perry (more of a DE than LB) and the other is Clay Matthews, a stud at everything he does. We'll see how it pans out. Considering we do run the ultra small 2-4 nickle, Perry gives me some hope with his size/strength. It might not be such a soft defense if Perry can set that edge well.

[wist43]

Yes, yes you do.

I would say you have some adjusting to do though. Teams pass against GB mroe than most teams because they have to score against us more than most teams. Hence, they play more WR sets, hence we play more nickle than SF, who teams are more satisfied slugging it out against.

2-4 isn't as bad when one of your 4 is Nick Perry (more of a DE than LB) and the other is Clay Matthews, a stud at everything he does. We'll see how it pans out. Considering we do run the ultra small 2-4 nickle, Perry gives me some hope with his size/strength. It might not be such a soft defense if Perry can set that edge well.

I would agree, without taking the time to check out the numbers (since Zool is checking my math lately, lol), that teams are usually going to have a run/pass disparity - goes back to the quasi-argument of our offense getting off to a lead, and forcing them out of their run game plan, i.e. our offense is a form of run defense. That certainly doesn't apply to teams like the Niners and Giants.

Just b/c you play a lot of nickel though, doesn't mean you have to go small up front. Go with a 3-3, mix up your rushes, bring the S down and show a lot of different fronts, mix in the occassional blitz out of the slot... do those few things alone, and you'd go a long way toward being more productive in your front seven.

Combine that with teaching the kiddies in the secondary how to play a little zone defense, and maybe we bottle up some of the explosive plays. Usually I'm an advocate of playing a lot of man, but given that Capers is letting teams run wild past his front six, it might be prudent to get more eyes lookin at the mess that is comin their way.

[RashanGary]

Just b/c you play a lot of nickel though, doesn't mean you have to go small up front. Go with a 3-3, mix up your rushes, bring the S down and show a lot of different fronts, mix in the occassional blitz out of the slot... do those few things alone, and you'd go a long way toward being more productive in your front seven.

That was my thought initially too. They played a lot of one high safety in 2010. It was the defense we hung our hat on, our identity. Peprah and Woodson played in the box. Collins covered the deep middle alone. Tramon and Shields ran with receivers down the field as well as anyone. Collins could cover sideline to sideline deep. That extra guy in the box made our six man front strong enough to hold because it was an 8 man box. We tried it in 2011 too, even with Collins here. Collins moved into the box, Burnett deep. We got shredded. Then Collins got hurt. We still played one high. We got destroyed. We switched to zone with more one high. Shields and Williams got shredded because they played too far off the ball, afraid to get beat deep. I remember you were just as pissed when teams were passing for record setting numbers as you were last year when SF and Minn ran wild on us at the end of the season.

We don't have zone corners. We can't keep our eyes to the ball. We don't have an elite safety, we can't bring an extra guy in the box with man defense because we'll get shredded over the top. My only remaining hope is that our DL/LB rotation will be stronger this year, and Burnett's play will improve enough to mix in some more one high looks (only if we don't get destroyed by them.)

We'll see though. Jones is tough dude. Perry, although he seems like a complete retard, may be strong enough at the point of attack and pressing the pocket to make that 2-4 defense a little more similar to a 3-3 front.

Clearly, if our run defense is as poor as it was last year, we'll win a ton of regular season games, then lose when we hit that dominant run team in the playoffs or SB. We weren't good enough last year and need to be better.

I'm sure there are solutions I can't imagine. I'm no DC, but I've watched a lot of football at this point in my life. I've seen things fail a few different ways. I've only seen things truly succeed one way for us (the 8 in the box nickle defense.) Hopefully I get to see a second way this year because Nick Collins isn't coming back and Morgan Burnett will never be Nick Collins.

I envision Shields, Williams and Hayward being a little smarter in zone this year. Not using it a lot, but a little bit, just enough to mix it in. I envision Burnett being a little better this year. Not good enough to play one high a lot, but just enough to mix it in. I envision us playing mostly man defense with two-shell over the top like last year (easiest defense to run against, same defenses AR sees most weeks), but I hope this time our DL rotation is a little stronger and Perry is a little stronger on the edge so even though it's our go-to defense, it's a little stronger up fron. . . That's kind of how I envision the defense growing, but that's a hope. The reality could be completely different.

[RashanGary]

And there is no such thing as a perfect team either. The 18-0 NE Patriots ran into their nightmare matchup in 2007. Strahan, Tuck and Osi beat the shit out of Tom Brady. He had wide-eyes, looked scared, confused. That NE team couldn't run the ball and they ran into maybe the best pass rushing front in NFL history. Bad luck.

That's why I'm glad the Packers are good every year. When you're good every year, one of those years you might not run into that nightmare matchup. When you're good for only one or two years, you better hope you're really fucking good and you stay really fucking healthy, and even then, someone could just have a good game or someone might even be having a slightly more perfect, lucky season.

The Packers are an elite team. There are reasons to expect some growth from the defense and run game this year. More reason to expect growth than regression. Hopefully we run into Atlanta and Minnesota, not Seattle and SF. If we do run into Seattle and SF, maybe we're better than they are on that day (and that could happen too.) Winning the SB is a big job. The bright side is we have a chance every year, including this one.

[Cleft Crusty]

It's certainly not effective running. You want numbers?

- 3.9 yd/rush
- Take Rodgers and Cobb out, and you have a 3.55 yd/rush
- The base RB's (Green, Starks, and Benson) ran for 967 yds, and 3.49 yd avg.

That's dishonest cherry picking frankly, due to injuries. What did Harris have for yards? Cobb got carries because he's dynamic and because he was covering for others injured. Other teams use WR for carries as well. Recall also that the Packer had a few injuries along the offensive line that changed their ability to run the ball, not to mention pass protect. You can't have a discussion about the running game in isolation like that.

[denverYooper]

I like the part where the argument with numbers and sources was completely ignored in favor of categorical belief.

[woodbuck27]

More bullshit from the Great Pessimistic One. Packers defense was 11th in PPG last year. 11th in YPG last year. In my book, 11th out of 32 isn't one of the worst. If Capers is as bad as you think he is, then to get those results, the Packers defensive personnel has to be better than you say it is.

How many teams (in the NFL) are eligible to make the playoffs?

Where do the Green Bay Packers rank with those teams on' D'?

GO PACKERS !