Quote:
Originally Posted by Megatron96
Fair points.
Though using CAR as an example (didn't know that was their worst game, just picked that one because I knew that they were not very good on offense), and cherry-picking certain stats is just standard CP procedure. Just going with the flow, as it were.
Anyway, I could point out that the Chiefs defense overall played more than well enough to dominate DEN kn every key statistical area, except for scoring efficiency, which would be the Chiefs worst day in that regard, so should also be thrown out.
Further, I'll point out that DEN's defense as a whole has been together longer and has more veterans, and leave it at that for now.
My other point would be that DEN has played a slate of pretty pedestrian opponents this season for the most part.
But as i said during the GDT, there are obvious issues with the KC defense, and in spite of their overall dominance in that game, the unit is still underperforming, particularly on DL and at S. However, the fact that there are a lot of rookies that are obviously still in the developmental stages of their careers, as well as new faces that are still learning their roles, gives me hope that they will continue to progress and improve down the stretch.
And maybe if DEN had just gotten more BJs they would've beaten CAR?  |
The Cincinnati game set off the alarm for me. There were warning signs before, but the dam broke that day. 3.85 points per drive blows away the 07 Patriots, and they blow away everybody else. Imagine if Boyd doesn't drop a wide open TD lob. And if Dunlap isn't left unblocked on that 4th down play. Then we're talking 5.4 points per drive. And on the drive that led to their only punt, what if that OPI isn't called? They had just made a big play and were driving again. Do we have any confidence that drive wouldn't have ended with a score?
As bad as it were, it could've easily been an all-time horrific defensive performance.
I'm not too down on the defense overall, and the young players still have some time to improve before the biggest games. What annoys me is people suggesting that this defense is much better than last year's. I don't see how anybody can say that. Sure, it's easy to point to doofuses like Sorenson and Niemann, but their snap counts went way down in the 2nd half of the season.
In Nov and Dec last year, the defense allowed UNDER 13 ppg. And they played some good offenses in that stretch. Not only that, but KC's offense wasn't exactly humming during a lot of that stretch, so they weren't keeping the defense off the field.
For a bit, everybody thought the defense was great. The nat'l media was even calling it dominant and claiming they were carrying the offense. But everybody turned on them quickly after they gave up 31 in Cincinnati and of course the famous 4th quarter vs Buffalo (even though losing Mathieu had a lot to do with that).
Where was all this "that's what happens vs good offenses" talk then? All I heard all offseason was that our defense sucked ass. Weird double standard.
If at any point this season, this defense allowed under 13 ppg for two full months, I'd be ecstatic.