First Team Defense

[Smonroe]

Still a work in progress.  I know we didn't have Hankins (and a few others).  

 

Give up too many big plays.  I think 6 of the Steelers first 12 plays were 10 yards or more.  

Problems setting the edge.

 

Very susceptible to the easy underneath pass.

 

The D could be good once they gel, but they have a long way to go.

[RockThatBlue]

I didn't think they were too bad. The run D needs work but they held big ben to 3 points. Granted, he didn't play the whole first half, but I'll take that every time against Big Ben.

 

Thought the secondary played a bit more aggressive vs their WRs. Overall the 1st team D looked much better than it did last week.

[IndyScribe]

Work in progress. Once they gel, they'll be decent. The Colts were also missing Hankins, Wilson, and Hooker on defense. 

[RockThatBlue]

1 minute ago, IndyScribe said:

Work in progress. Once they gel, they'll be decent. The Colts were also missing Hankins and Hooker on defense. 

Don't think Wilson played either.

[IndyD4U]

Looking forward to re-watching it today. I've been disappointed in Sheard so far. Hopefully that will change. 

 

Simon continues to be a beast. And Farley has made the safety group interesting. 

 

[PeterBowman]

I think they'll be opportunistic....they'll give up plays but they seem to have that ability to offset that by causing turnovers

[Smonroe]

1 minute ago, IndyD4U said:

Looking forward to re-watching it today. I've been disappointed in Sheard so far. Hopefully that will change. 

 

Simon continues to be a beast. And Farley has made the safety group interesting. 

 

 

Just rewatched the first half, you're right about Sheard.   I just don't know if we have anyone better?

 

Everyone is going to pick on Melvin but he's not bad.  Over the top help from Hooker is going to be a must.   Hairston is a good hitter, needs work on coverage but I like how far he's come so fast.  Hopefully Wilson gets back soon.  

 

Still wondering if Spence will even make the team.  

[bananabucket]

Not impressed at all really.  We're gonna need these turnovers to continue because teams are moving the ball quite easily.

[Smonroe]

12 minutes ago, bananabucket said:

Not impressed at all really.  We're gonna need these turnovers to continue because teams are moving the ball quite easily.

 

Yeah, the saving grace is that the underneath stuff can be cleaned up.  

 

I'm disappointed in the front seven run defense.  I thought that was supposed to be our strength this season.  

 

The second and beyond team defense guys need a ton of work on tackling techniques.  

[jameszeigler834]

51 minutes ago, Smonroe said:

Still a work in progress.  I know we didn't have Hankins (and a few others).  

 

Give up too many big plays.  I think 6 of the Steelers first 12 plays were 10 yards or more.  

Problems setting the edge.

 

Very susceptible to the easy underneath pass.

 

The D could be good once they gel, but they have a long way to go.

Ya but we did improve from the last couple of weeks again I for one didn't expect this defense to go from 3rd worst in total defense to one of the best inside one offseason its going to take time.

[Peterk2011]

Kinda mixed feelings. I saw promising things, and I see disappointing things too. I think the front and edge will come together, their problem is that everybody is new to everybody, they never played a meaningful game snap together yet. They need to gel.

 

Regarding the secondary, I just hold my opinion yet. There were soo many changes, different personnel, and there were always not one, but multiple guys missing, that I just don't know how they might look when they actually play a full game together.

 

I don't like our ILB corp so far. We need improvement there.

[Boiler_Colt]

Still can't set the edge or tackle in space. Cutback lanes are always open against this D, have been for years. Pass rush will still be an issue.  The turnovers are great, I wanna see more picks from the secondary though. I still think they need to upgrade the ILB position significantly.

[krunk]

Morrison was fine to me. Bostic is limited with the cast. I like the hit he and Morrison put on Smith Shuster. We didnt really have our nickel group with Jackson and Spence out

[Flash7]

Who is projected to be on the starting defense? And is Henry Anderson deserving of a starting spot? He's been invisible the last 3 games.

 

Who starts opposite of Vontae? Who starts at safety?

[IndyScribe]

1 minute ago, Flash7 said:

Who is projected to be on the starting defense? And is Henry Anderson deserving of a starting spot? He's been invisible the last 3 games.

 

Who starts opposite of Vontae? Who starts at safety?

Wilson starts opposite of Davis. For safety, it'll probably be Geathers and Hooker(eventually). Butler will probably start the first few games.

[ÅÐØNϧ 1]

Run Defense still sucks & I'd like to see better tackleing some of the defenders in the 30's jerseys looked like lil bugs bounceing of windshields .

[RockThatBlue]

1 hour ago, IndyD4U said:

Looking forward to re-watching it today. I've been disappointed in Sheard so far. Hopefully that will change. 

 

Simon continues to be a beast. And Farley has made the safety group interesting. 

 

It might just be me but I thought Sheard looks out of shape. I remember a specific play last night where he was chasing someone and I thought "Man Sheard looks huge" and not a good kind of huge.

[PrincetonTiger]

I like what the D did last night

[Smitto]

The defense showed more upside than anything else...  they're only gonna get better with time. 

[JRnINDY]

28 minutes ago, Flash7 said:

Who is projected to be on the starting defense? And is Henry Anderson deserving of a starting spot? He's been invisible the last 3 games.

 

Who starts opposite of Vontae? Who starts at safety?

It seems Anderson was given the spot but I would rather see Ridgeway or Grover there.

Loved Andersons rookie season but he has been invisible since. 

[B~Town]

I see there is a lot to work on but I also saw something I really liked from many of the players they were playing with a chip on there shoulder showing some swag . I loved it they were aggressive not afraid to lay the wood and were showing some attitude .  

[GoBlue12]

My two biggest concerns on defense are getting overpowered by the OL, which happened even when Hankins and Wood were in in previous game, and our poor coverage of short, over-the-middle routes which opponents feast on to move the chains.

[throwing BBZ]

Thought they looked more like a unit, were more aggressive, and made some plays. yaaaaaa

go COLTS

[JRnINDY]

Spence needs to get back soon. In the pre season game he played in, he showed he should be the starter.

[chad72]

Our rush is flat out not getting there, no matter the personnel. Stop running fire zone blitzes with Sheard in coverage, makes us look like fools when the blitz doesn't get there. We should start thinking of using 3 safeties and 3 CBs, IMO if we're going to be blitzing.

 

Hate to say it, we're missing Walden at the edge, he set it better than what we've shown so far.

[Superman]

49 minutes ago, RockThatBlue said:

It might just be me but I thought Sheard looks out of shape. I remember a specific play last night where he was chasing someone and I thought "Man Sheard looks huge" and not a good kind of huge.

 

Sheard is bigger than the OLBs we're used to. He has 30 pounds on Mathis.

[Superman]

2 hours ago, Smonroe said:

Still a work in progress.  I know we didn't have Hankins (and a few others).  

 

Give up too many big plays.  I think 6 of the Steelers first 12 plays were 10 yards or more.  

Problems setting the edge.

 

Very susceptible to the easy underneath pass.

 

The D could be good once they gel, but they have a long way to go.

 

I'm rewatching right now, had to watch online yesterday and I couldn't give it my full attention.

 

I was bothered by the run plays on the first drive also. But the good news is it was as simple as Sheard on the first run and Simon on the second crashing too far inside and losing the edge, and they did so on both plays because of the Steelers misdirection. Very coachable issues. 

 

Then the defense was susceptible to the underneath stuff because they played some zone, and AB was able to sneak into the open spots for Ben to hit him quickly. I don't know what we'll do differently about that, or why we seem to play more zone against the Steelers since 2014 (and they always kill it). 

 

Also, the screen pass on the first play, their center was almost 3 yards upfield, and the refs didn't call it; they called a facemask on Melvin away from the play. Should have been offsetting penalties. 

 

There was still some sloppy play and lack of execution defensively, but I think the issues were more about attention to detail than they were about effort, ability, physicality... So I'm more encourage about this performance than I was about the previous two, that's for sure. 

[will426]

Defense needs to be held more accountable for not wrapping up id make them practice that nonstop..each game someone is throwing a shoulder or making a lazy attempt to tackle someone with 1 arm instead of two 

[Coltgoat]

Hope Hankins can help against the run and those underneath routes have been a weakness/hole for our D forever.

Let's hope some coaching (more coaching) can fix this.

[RockThatBlue]

One thing the defense is clearly better at is getting turnovers. I hope it carries over to the regular season. 

 

John Simon has been a turnover creating machine so far.

[IndyScribe]

7 minutes ago, RockThatBlue said:

One thing the defense is clearly better at is getting turnovers. I hope it carries over to the regular season. 

 

John Simon has been a turnover creating machine so far.

Ballard has been preaching turnovers for the entire offseason. It's nice to see that it has paid off so far.

[jchandler7]

2 hours ago, Flash7 said:

Who is projected to be on the starting defense? And is Henry Anderson deserving of a starting spot? He's been invisible the last 3 games.

 

Who starts opposite of Vontae? Who starts at safety?

I agree on Anderson. He hasn't done anything last 3 games. Havnt hard anything from practises on him and he didn't get any push in the practise I got to go see. If he doesn't pick it up Ridgeway or McGill will be taking his place. Mabey we'll find a good player after cuts. 

[chad72]

1 hour ago, jchandler7 said:

I agree on Anderson. He hasn't done anything last 3 games. Havnt hard anything from practises on him and he didn't get any push in the practise I got to go see. If he doesn't pick it up Ridgeway or McGill will be taking his place. Mabey we'll find a good player after cuts. 

 

If Anderson is not getting much pass rush, I think they should just play a 3-man front with McGill one-gapping from the NT position on 3rd and longs. We are used to him one-gapping from the UT position in a 4-man front but I think we will get more 1-on-1 match up advantages if we go to a 3-3-5 (or 2-3-6 like Ravens do sometimes, Rex continued to do it with Jets too at times) with plenty of coverage options instead of bigger LBs or DLs in coverage. When you have huge gaps on DL, on 3rd and longs, that is when OL starts guessing, and you can run delayed blitzes better, IMO.

[krunk]

The underneath stuff didnt bother me so much. It was clear to me we were playing to take away the deep ball and letting them have the underneath stuff with the intention of rallying to the football. All the other stuff they did the idea was to keep tight coverage and force contested throws into tight windows. Made them drive the football field instead of all those long bombs and what not. Some of you for whatever reason keep looking for all this monster pass rush. As far as I'm concerned in usually okay as long as I see pressures and people causing the QB to move his feet. I mean that's about what you're going to see anyway when the QB is dumping the ball short and underneath. You're not going to see a littany of sacks.

[life long]

40 minutes ago, chad72 said:

 

If Anderson is not getting much pass rush, I think they should just play a 3-man front with McGill one-gapping from the NT position on 3rd and longs. We are used to him one-gapping from the UT position in a 4-man front but I think we will get more 1-on-1 match up advantages if we go to a 3-3-5 (or 2-3-6 like Ravens do sometimes, Rex continued to do it with Jets too at times) with plenty of coverage options instead of bigger LBs or DLs in coverage. When you have huge gaps on DL, on 3rd and longs, that is when OL starts guessing, and you can run delayed blitzes better, IMO.

I agree. IMO we run the 3-4 incorrectly. The excuse before was the players we had were not suited for their positions. Now we have the correct size, but I definitely would like us to get more creative. We run one of the most bland 3-4's I can think of. Honestly I would prefer we run only man coverage. I am aware of having to run what the players do best, but I am sure the opposing OC knows which guys run man or zone when on the field.

[crazycolt1]

7 minutes ago, life long said:

I agree. IMO we run the 3-4 incorrectly. The excuse before was the players we had were not suited for their positions. Now we have the correct size, but I definitely would like us to get more creative. We run one of the most bland 3-4's I can think of. Honestly I would prefer we run only man coverage. I am aware of having to run what the players do best, but I am sure the opposing OC knows which guys run man or zone when on the field.

One thing you have to keep in mind is this unit is new to each other. It can't be expected for them to play like a seasoned unit. That comes with time.

[CR91]

First team defense allowed just 13 points in three games and caused 5 turnovers. 

[Smonroe]

7 minutes ago, CR91 said:

First team defense allowed just 13 points in three games and caused 5 turnovers. 

 

This is true.  However, if it weren't for those turnovers they weren't really stopping anyone.  Especially against the run.

 

I'm not trying to put them down, I said they could be good once they gel as a unit.  I didn't like what I saw from Hankins last week, and except for Simon and Morrison I don't see much with the LBs.  

 

As @crazycolt1 just said, it takes some time to get to know each other and gel as a unit.  

[GwinnettColt]

I've been impressed with Farley and with Simon.  They were surprises as I didn't know much about them before the preseason.

[John Waylon]

I think we're in for a wild ride with this defense. They seem to emphasize creating turnovers, but they are still susceptible to giving up big easy plays in both the pass and the run game. There doesn't seem to be much of a consistent middle ground with them thus far.

 

 

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