The Defense is Pretty Overrated

[LUKE23]

After last nights game we are 13th in scoring D and 17th in overall D. We haven't forced that many turnovers. We're middle of the pack in sacks. Last night, granted the D was put in bad field position several times, but they also gave up some big drives to an offense, that no offense, shouldn't move the ball at all on us if we are a good defense. Bears before last night were averaging slightly over 200 yards per game on offense, we let them get damn near 300.

It's time for this defense to start playing better. It's average right now.

[Mags FTW]

We need to blitz more. We're getting decent pressure with our front four, but not enough to get sacks and forced throws by opposing QBs. We have corners that are good enough to do it more often.

[Cliff Levingston]

The Bears offense also whipped out a lot of stuff that we hadn't previously this season. The play action pass was in full effect even though our run game wasn't very successful. They got Hester and Olsen much more involved in the offense (finally) and used the tight end (Clark and Olsen both) quite a bit. The offensive line couldn't run block your D line but they did a great job in pass protection overall.

Plus you lost the field position battle badly due to all the kicking away from Hester. Your defense is good, but Cliff Levingston never thought it was as good as the media and most Packers fans were making it out to be.

[jviers77]

The defense isn't overrated, they just spent way too much time on the field in the 2nd half last night. If the coaching staff would've played to win instead of not to lose, they might've kept the defense off the field more. They were out of gas by the end from all the 3-and-outs by the ultra-conservative play calls on offense. I'd rather watch the team lose by trying to bury the opponents than by trying to "protect a lead." Even with the turnovers last night, I blame the coaching staff for lack of balls when calling plays on offense.

[TJ_Ford_11]

After last nights game we are 13th in scoring D and 17th in overall D. We haven't forced that many turnovers. We're middle of the pack in sacks. Last night, granted the D was put in bad field position several times, but they also gave up some big drives to an offense, that no offense, shouldn't move the ball at all on us if we are a good defense. Bears before last night were averaging slightly over 200 yards per game on offense, we let them get damn near 300.

It's time for this defense to start playing better. It's average right now.

Seriously man, is it really necessary to constantly create these negative threads and posts? You've complained in about 75 posts in the last 24 hours. Just suck it up and quit acting like a baby. The defense is not a bad defense. If you think it is, you haven't been watching the same team as I have through the first 5 games of the season.

[paulpressey25]

I think this is the best defense we've had in years......

D's don't do well in hot weather...it was very hot last night....

The Bears seemed to start every possesion on the 40-48 yard line because of MM's decision not to kick to Hester.

The D had to defend an even shorter field twice in the red zone and on the final drive due to three things not their fault (which cost us 21 points and the game):

a) Favre's pick which was inexcusable with a 10-point lead and the third quarter dwindling down. It's one thing if Favre tosses those in tie games or when behind....but we were up TEN POINTS in the late third.

b) They held the Bears to a FG, but that crazy special teams formation penalty gave the Bears 4 more downs in the red-zone and they got the Benson TD.

c) Finally, I'm convinced the D held on that 3rd down where we challenged the spot. That spot was awful. And how the hell do those refs carry the chains out accurately to decide a measurement based on one-inch?

[LUKE23]

-= original quote snipped =-



Seriously man, is it really necessary to constantly create these negative threads and posts? You've complained in about 75 posts in the last 24 hours. Just suck it up and quit acting like a baby. The defense is not a bad defense. If you think it is, you haven't been watching the same team as I have through the first 5 games of the season.

Either respond to the topic at hand or don't respond. You shouldn't be talking at all after guaranteeing victory last night in the first damn quarter.

The D is overrated so far by GB fans. Fact.

[mnstinks]

After last nights game we are 13th in scoring D and 17th in overall D. We haven't forced that many turnovers. We're middle of the pack in sacks. Last night, granted the D was put in bad field position several times, but they also gave up some big drives to an offense, that no offense, shouldn't move the ball at all on us if we are a good defense. Bears before last night were averaging slightly over 200 yards per game on offense, we let them get damn near 300.

It's time for this defense to start playing better. It's average right now.

Pretty harsh to bring this up after last night's game. 285 total yards allowed is not that bad. They had only two long drives yardage wise, the Packers had four.

Plays per Drive
3
3
3
12
5
6
5
1
8
4
3
8
1 (end of game)

Blame last night's loss on the offense and the blown coverage on the last td.

[LUKE23]

I'm not saying D is why we lost last night. Turnovers, penalties, and conservative play calling are. However, this D isn't playing up to it's capability so far this year, in my opinion. They've been a bend but don't break style D for the most of the year. I think this unit has top 10 potential, needs to start playing like it.

Agreed with the poster who said we need to blitz more. It's time to mix it up.

[Ayt]

Our D didn't get much help in the second half. Our first series we ran 5 plays for 14 yards, got one first down, and got a FG. Then we went 3 and out on our next five possessions. We finally got our second first down of the half on the last series of the game.

[BuckFan25226]

Luke, for the most part I'm usually on the same page with you regarding the Bucks and Packers. Maybe you are just as salty as I am right now and need to vent. But this defense is still good. As others have said before, the field position battle was dominated by the Bears, especially in the 2nd half.


First thing, the stupid and very questionable illegal formation call which Chicago took points off the board. Then of course, that turned into a touchdown. There is 4 points right there off of a penalty

2nd thing, look at the Favre bonehead INT. The very next play, jumpball TD to Olsen. That right there turned into 7 points. Their running game was non existent the entire game.

Third thing, We stop the Bears again. We're up 3 at this point, Woodson recieves punt, then fumbles and the bears punter recovers. They get one first down, and they get 3 points from Woodson's fumble.

That right there is 14 points off of turnovers and penalties. This defense is still good. But no defense can lock down a team when the offense and special teams keeps handing the ball back over to the offense like they did. As mentioned before, the defense was on the field much too often in the 2nd half. Looking at the offensive and defensive numbers alone, Chicago's 3rd down efficiency was 3-14. But as I said, not many defenses, if any defense can make up for 5 turnovers, it's near impossible.

Hell just look at the Bears. THey still have a good defense. They were ran out off the field by the Cowboys. Turnover battle? 4-1 in favor of Dalls.

They were beat by 10 against the Lions. turnover battle? 3-2 in favor of Detroit.

They lose to SD by 11, turnover battle? 4-2 in favor of SD.

Give any team a 5-1 turnover advantage. Then tack on 93 penaly yds? Ballgame.

[rilamann]

The Packers have a rock solid defense.I am suprized to see a poster like Luke23 make a thread like this after yesterdays loss.

The Packers proved they have a solid defense in the first 4 games and they proved they have a solid defense last night.

Anytime your offense commits 5 turnovers one of which in the opponets redzone not to mention commits a ton of penalties and you find yourself still in the game untill the final seconds your defense did a hell of a job to keep you in the game.

We had 5 turnovers.

A ton of penalities

one 1st down in the entire 2nd half not counting the final 2 minutes drill drive at the end.

And we still had a chance to tie the game with 1 second left.

Any defense no matter how good can only do so much when you have an offense that is turning the ball over & commiting holding penalties everyother play and cant get a first down.

If you take away Favre's INT (Urlacher) in the Bears redzone and the one big mistake the Packers defense (Nick Collins) made at the end and it was a big mistake don't get me wrong.

But you take away those two plays and you still have the other 4 turnovers and all the penalities and one 1st down in the second half the Bears only score 16 pts and despite all of those things we win the game.

And we win the obviously BEHIND THE STRENGTH OF OUR DEFENSE.

[xTitan]

The GB Packer defense is very over-rated and very vanilla....the ranking speak for themselves but players many of us thought would be making big plays (collins, Hawk, Jenkins, Kampman) have done very little in terms of making big plays and when you talk big plays that = TO's....this defense has been aweful in forcing TO's and personally that is what I base a good defense on.....GB relies on an unspectacular 4 man pass rush and has been way to conservative this year....most to's come from pressuring the QB into mistakes...other then that hard hits or stripping, GB just does not excell in any of these areas.....Griese is a TO machine yet they could put very little pressure on him....and again the play of Collins and Hawk especially has been poor.

[rilamann]

While I don't think the Packers defense is a ''dominant'' defense and its still a very young defense but I do think it is a very solid defense right now.

Sure it would be great if the Packers defense could get a few more takeaways but I think they have played very well and have made the big plays when they needed to.

We held the Eagles to 13 pts.An Eagles team that score 56 vs the Lions

We held the Giants to 13 pts.A Giants team that score 35 yesterday.

The Chargers scored 24 pts but thats not bad when you consider they are one of the better offensive teams in the leauge.Don't forget Barnett's huge INT to seal the game when the Chargers where driving to tie the game with a FG or win with a TD.

The Vikings scored 16pts but realy should have been held to 9pts if we don't go into a prevent in the final few minutes.

I admit the Bears arent exactly an offensive machine but when you have 5 turnovers 1 of which was in the Bears rezone and one 1st down in the entire 2nd half the fact the defense only held them to 27 pts despite all of that was actually a testament to how solid our defense is.

Don't forget the Hester factor either which was big because even though Hester didn't do much we gave the Bears good field postion to avoid Hester.

Even with the Jones 2 fumbles in the first half the defense held the Bears to 7 pts at halftime.

Our defense can only do so much and when the Packers commited 3 2nd half turnovers and could only get one 2nd half 1st down it didn't exaclty put our defense in a position to succeed.

[BuckFan25226]

The GB Packer defense is very over-rated and very vanilla....the ranking speak for themselves but players many of us thought would be making big plays (collins, Hawk, Jenkins, Kampman) have done very little in terms of making big plays and when you talk big plays that = TO's....this defense has been aweful in forcing TO's and personally that is what I base a good defense on.....GB relies on an unspectacular 4 man pass rush and has been way to conservative this year....most to's come from pressuring the QB into mistakes...other then that hard hits or stripping, GB just does not excell in any of these areas.....Griese is a TO machine yet they could put very little pressure on him....and again the play of Collins and Hawk especially has been poor.

Well I believe Green Bay was 7th in overall defense in 2005 and went 4-12. As a matter of fact, they were 1st in pass defense in 2005 as well. So go head and keep living with numbers. It certainly doesn't tell the whole story.

I'll tell you why we don't blitz frequently. Because despite what you say, we have a solid front 4 that has been putting pressure on the QB. When you have a solid front four that can can contain a running game. You can put your LB's into coverage and really utilize the good corners we have.

In Giants' ppg in the 4 games outside of the game they played Green is 27.5. What did they do against us? 13 lousy points. We let them get some yards on the ground and took away Eli and the passing game. We had pressure on him the whole game and they never got anything going.

Against Philly, we contained Wesbrook and had Mcnabb hurried the majority of the game. Our defense and special teams won that game. And we got a blessing with their brutal punt return game. Because our offense had nothing in week one. The crucial point in that game was when Favre was stripped at mid field. Philly got the ball back with great field position. What happened? Our defense stepped up and won us that game, plain and simple.

Against San Diego we were determined to stop LT, and we did. Rivers was simply awesome. He was making throws with pin point accuracy and despite the idiotic 3rd and 2 and 4th and 2 debacle in the 1st half. And despide the idiotic 4th and a yard on the goaline pass. We won that game with a huge Barnett INT.

Against Minny, favre had a very good game, despite not running the ball or even trying to run the ball. We Held them to 16 points and won the game after a Ryan Grant fumble. Defense came through by another bonehead turnover.

The Bears game, 5 turnovers, and 14 points converted off of turnovers and penalties was the story, not a reflection of the defense.

So again, keep preaching numbers. This defense is good and will only get better. Nobody is saying they are the best in the league or even the NFC. But this is a good, young, and fast defense.

[ReasonablySober]

I thought the defense played well yesterday. They were killed by being put in terrible positions and the poor play of Poppinga and the atrocious play of Collins.

[El Duderino]

Overall on the year,i've been somewhat dissapointed in the defense.It's been fairly good,but hardly anything special like i hoped it would be.

Teams for the most part have moved the ball on the defense and we haven't created turnovers,the thing they have done best is keeping teams out of the endzone and forcing field goals.

Hawk has been near invisible through five games

Collins tip that lead to the INT was the first play he's made all year

Jenkins isn't getting pressure on the QB

Bush tackles like Carter on the Badgers,the red cape treatment

I'm not hating on the defense,but i do feel their play overall this year hasn't matched the high praise and hype.

[paulpressey25]

I think for those of you that are down on the defense, it relates to expectations IMO......Everyone was salivating that we'd have a 1985 Bears or 2000 Ravens or even 2005 Bears defense that would win games.

But those were some of the greatest defenses of all-time.......our defense isn't going to single-handedly win 3, 4, 5 or 6 games for us. But our defense is good enough that it won't lose the game for us. Remember how many times the last ten years we've had the defense lose? It has been many, many times. In that sense, we've got a good D. They won't win it for us, but they won't lose it either.

[0BobLobLaw0]

Hawk has been invisible this year. And again Poppinga showed last night he is not good in coverage.

[El Duderino]

I think for those of you that are down on the defense, it relates to expectations IMO......Everyone was salivating that we'd have a 1985 Bears or 2000 Ravens or even 2005 Bears defense that would win games.

But those were some of the greatest defenses of all-time

I never thought we'd have a utterly dominant defense,just better than how it's been.Things i expected more of

1.Big plays

2.More pressure on QB's than we've seen,which might be the reason for the lack of big plays/turnovers.

3.I hoped either both or one of Collins/Hawk would break out and have a huge year.These two were the young guys with many physical gifts to become big time playmakers.So far five games in,you rarely hear Hawk's name called and when we do,it's usually for him giving up a play in the passing game.Collins up until yesterdays game had also been invisible.Against the Bears he made that nice tip which lead to an INT, he also misread the TD to Clark that won the game.I'm more frustrated with Hawk because he was the 5th overall choice and really thought he was primed to be special this season.