You do realize that you don't rush the QB laterally, right? He is not there to spearhead our run defense; he's there to get *up*field and put pressure on the QB. Team are going to run/exploit the gaping hole he leaves behind. That becomes Ryans/Cushing/Manning/Quin's responsibility to cover. Every defense with a pin-his-ear-back-and-go pass rusher has this issue. Again, it's cool to be unimpressed *so far*. It's also OK to consult a calendar and realize it's still the middle of August; it doesn't eradicate the concern nor is it intended to - it just takes some of the edge off of it.
Why are you criticizing Mitchell so much? He isn't even the starter and is just a 2nd year player who was supposed to play the 4-3. The success of our defense depends a lot more on Mario not being lost than on Mitchell.
Mitchell is a starter. And the success of our defense depends on all 11(+) guys doing their job effectively; not a single, high-profile guy already being lined up as the whipping boy for casual fans who think he's more important than the starting nose tackle. Let me tell you something, if Mitchell gets consistently abused in the middle, it won't matter what Mario does. There are two OLBs and several other players that can get to the QB; but there's only one guy plugging that middle and keeping our MLBs clean. If he's a bust......
If he's a bust, we'll put someone else in there. It's not like we're paying Mitchell big bucks and counting him to be one of our best defenders. If NT is the most important position on defense, then Wade is an idiot for counting on the undersized, 2nd year Mitchell to handle it. If Mario can't handle OLB, then Wade is also an idiot for putting him out there.
I think that justtxyank and several others are confusing Mario's role in this defense as a OLB with that of a traditional LB.
Yeah I'm just confused. When running backs run at him I made the mistake of thinking he needed to be able to get them. I realize now that he isn't supposed to tackle running backs. Apologies. We're all good now!
1. It's been said ad nauseum that Wade doesn't employ a traditional, 2-man occupying NT. He wants a penetrating one-gap DT, not a guy closing both gaps. He did that, got a sack and 4 tackles. Mario got jack crap. 2. Your arguments here are a bit hypocritical in the face of your free passes for Mario. Hasn't Mitchell also had only the two weeks in a transition? Doesn't he have the rest of the preseason? Isn't he just one guy in an 11-man unit that would benefit from healthy ILBs cleaning up his mess? You clearly disagree, but the majority here (and elsewhere) took away from last night's game that Mario was struggling mightly. There's a bigger spotlight on him, but (IMO) Mitchell didn't look bad in the way Williams did. And what's with the whipping boy business? You think anyone here wants him to fail? Wants to blame losses on him? People saw a glaring red flag last night and hope the issue is corrected. We all want to see the best out of this team and its roster. We'll all be concerned when we see a player having trouble with his assignments. We're all crossing our fingers with this transition to OLB. Honestly, you could have just come in this morning and said: "Mario didn't look very good last night, but I think we should wait a little bit before hitting the panic button" Instead, you leaped in slamming posters for expressing concern over what they saw, not acknowledging for a while that he did indeed look rough out there.
I realize that is the "official plan" but I still have my doubt about Cushing being able to pull it off. He hasn't been right since all that "overtraining" caused his body to emit female hormones. I believe that you can now understand why I was so skeptical back in January during the gleeping over FixIt's defense being the panacea that will remove all of their defensive shortcomings. I just didn't buy into these personnel decisions - especially the ones about Mario at OLB and Mitchell at NT. I expect this to be a continuing issue well into the season. For now, Last night I saw some good things happen against so-so personnel but I also saw a lot of the same problems I saw last year with the Cows defense.
Not cute, not amusing, and definitely childish. Somewhere out there is a sportstalk station waiting for your phone call.
Mario Williams will not be a dominant defender, he will not be disruptive, by pure size and athelicism he will be OK, maybe getting 10 sacks but he will not be an elite player and here is why... His legs are too long, don't laugh. It became very obvious to me once I saw him standing up at OLB. Mario has explosive power, he has great straight line speed, he is a physical freak, he has determination and he is strong at the point of attack. But the problem for Mario is that he is long legged, he is a long strider. He cannot physically make a quick edge burst move like a Demarcus Ware, James Harrison or Robert Mathis. These players have the ability due to initial quickness to get leverage and angle on tackles. Mario's first step is just too long, by pure physics and balance he cannot even learn to get the quick explosive first step that strong rushers with shorter legs have. Mario has great pursuit speed because he is a long strider, he can flat run fast once he gets going. But as an edge rusher he has never dominated unless the blocker is knocked off balance or he is able to use his arm very effectively. But 80% of the time Mario gets locked up with the blocker and has to fight his way to the QB. If Mario had shorter legs and had a quicker initial burst to get leverage or change of direction he would be averaging 16 sacks/ season. I hope the Texans realize just how hard it is for him to get quickly into his first step, it is very painful to watch, look the next game, he is always locked up with the blocker on his rushes. Yes, he is strong enough to get loose sometimes but most of the time he does not get the angel and leverage to force himself to collapse the pocket. I can now see how frustrating it must be for him since his legs are very long and has to take longer strides to get going. There are receivers who have the same problem, they have speed deep but lack quickness off the line due to long legs. I know it sounds funny but I think Mario will have to be used in stunts more, put inside some and given some strong windmill and hand techniques to free himself. He just has very long legs for is body size, he is about 6'-5" and he has less stomach and chest and more legs than alot of players rushing from the end.
I just googled it. Yep, he did. http://www.yardbarker.com/nfl/players/wade_phillips/126296 "Early in his tenure with the Cowboys, Phillips described himself as a "Mr. Fix-It" because of his track record of improving defenses. Those words would later haunt him."
Aww... Sarcasm. Time will tell with Mario Williams and his transition from a three point stance to standing upright. (Because, honestly, that's the only thing actually that's changed) And as ridiculous as it may seem, father time may need a liiitle bit more than just over 2.5 weeks.
