The Rushing Defense that Everyone is Concerned About

[Asymmetrical]

I'd expect improvement but I think they're likely to still be kinda butt against the run. Just seems sort of baked in to this defensive philosophy to concede some yards on the ground.

[Doggin94it]

1 hour ago, T0mShane said:

Nania has an article listing the five (ten?) Jets most responsible for the bad run defense lasts season, and most of them are gone (Jarrad Davis, Sherrod Neasman, etc), and the holdovers are probably gone or pushed down the depth chart at this point. The only guy who sucked and is still going to see significant time is Rankins. 

I actually expect Rankins to be cut

[undertow]

So now we are pretending the Jets had a solid run defense last year?  This place has turned into a full blown cult. lmao

[T0mShane]

1 minute ago, Doggin94it said:

I actually expect Rankins to be cut

He should, but I think that’ll depend on how well Jonathan Marshall is playing, though. Haven’t heard too much about that guy this camp.

[slats]

17 minutes ago, GangGreened said:

Don’t wanna hear this kind of stuff after seeing that defense last year. It was pretty much laughable. Ulbrich promising it “won’t happen again” after giving up 54 to the Pats, only to let opponents hang 45 in 2 of the next 3 games.

Defense needs to be better this year Rob, no excuses

I understand this. But I think the analytics discussed here are probably the same things Ulbrich was talking about last season when he said that, internally, they can see the improvements on defense and they’re staying the course. It upset people then, too. I’ve said it a lot, but last year really was a 20 game exhibition season. So yes, definitely need to see more tangible results this year.

[Jethead]

1 hour ago, section314 said:

"Guy pitched a great game, 6 innings, only 3 hits, 4 runs. But two of the hits were 2 run HR's, both after walks." ?

In 1969, Steve Carlton two-hit the Mets and lost 4-2. Both hits were 2-run HRs by Ron Swoboda. Good times.

[Drums]

14 minutes ago, T0mShane said:

Ravens followed by the Jacoby Brissett Browns is going to be a bloodbath for us unless the run defense has some secret magic they’ve yet to show

I think we can make the Browns one dimensional enough for it to be less of an issue there. How'd we do against Henry and Tenn last year? He did not run all over us and may have been the best RB we faced all year. 

Edit: With that said, Ravens are going to be very tough. I think it's a great test for Saleh/Ulbrich and with it being the 2nd year in the system, added faces on D, there are no excuses. That needs to be a close game. 

[SickJetFan]

Not to switch gears here but with the league becoming a passing league and employing more Smurf LBs I think it could be the perfect storm for a guy like Breece Hall….mc and my dark horse BAM

[T0mShane]

8 minutes ago, Drums said:

I think we can make the Browns one dimensional enough for it to be less of an issue there. How'd we do against Henry and Tenn last year? He did not run all over us and may have been the best RB we faced all year. 

Henry went 33 for 157 and was one Jason Pinnock shoestring tackle away from going over 200 yards and icing the game. Tannehill threw for 298 and a TD. What people forget about that win is that the Titans had no healthy TEs or WRs (Josh Reynolds and Nick Westbrook-Ikhine started at WR, Mycole Pruitt at TE) that week and a running back named Jeremy McNichols was their leader in targets and yards. 

[Lith]

2 hours ago, section314 said:

"Guy pitched a great game, 6 innings, only 3 hits, 4 runs. But two of the hits were 2 run HR's, both after walks." ?

But in this case, we are tallking about what a guy (or in this case a team) could do next time out.  Easier to correct the guy who made one or two mistakes than the guy who got rocked all game.

[Drums]

11 minutes ago, T0mShane said:

Henry went 33 for 157 and was one Jason Pinnock shoestring tackle away from going over 200 yards and icing the game. Tannehill threw for 298 and a TD. What people forget about that win is that the Titans had no healthy TEs or WRs (Josh Reynolds and Nick Westbrook-Ikhine started at WR, Mycole Pruitt at TE) that week and a running back named Jeremy McNichols was their leader in targets and yards. 

Ok, forgot the stats, going off of memory but did not forget about their injured WRs. Now that I look at the stats, not as great. He averaged 4.7 a carry which was higher than his season average (4.3). How can we not improve from last year?

[Lith]

16 minutes ago, Drums said:

Ok, forgot the stats, going off of memory but did not forget about their injured WRs. Now that I look at the stats, not as great. He averaged 4.7 a carry which was higher than his season average (4.3). How can we not improve from last year?

IT was a strange game for Henry.  We kept him bottled up pretty well all game, except for one sequence in the 4th quarter where he went for 18, 9 and 22 on consecutive carries.  Henry wound up with good numbers, but aside from one dominant sequence, he never took over the game.

[Smashmouth]

4 hours ago, OtherwiseHappyinLife said:

Good post Slats.  I'm not quite buying it though.  By the time the Jets were stopping the run, they were in the 4th quarter down 2 TDs.  1 dimensional game at that point desperately trying to get the ball back against teams looking to run out the clock.

This is where stats need to be broken down further.  I'd love to see this by quarter and even opponent.

Data tells a story but can be cut so many ways to support narrative.  Disagree with Saleh if he thinks last year's running defense was anywhere close to good enough.

Winning Teams in the NFL will always have good running stats in the second half/4th Quarter when they try to run out the clock. Losing teams will always have crappy running stats unless in the rare occasion all they can do is run and try to do so by gobbling up clock keeping the game close and keep the explosive offenses off the field Like the Titans and Eagles although the Eagles with some nice trades may try to change that this season with AJ Brown and hoping Hurts can take that next step

[Drums]

3 hours ago, Lith said:

IT was a strange game for Henry.  We kept him bottled up pretty well all game, except for one sequence in the 4th quarter where he went for 18, 9 and 22 on consecutive carries.  Henry wound up with good numbers, but aside from one dominant sequence, he never took over the game.

Ok, that was more the way I remembered the game--him not being THE factor he usually is. Thanks Lith.

[derp]

4 hours ago, T0mShane said:

I’ve been curious to see what Saleh does at LB because of how central they are to that Niners defense, but it seems like a minimal priority to upgrade the personnel here despite how underwhelming our guys are. I keep reading that the Niners can’t even run their offense in camp because their LB group has been overwhelmingly disruptive, and you’d think Saleh would want to—at least—bring in some young coin-flips at the position to start rebuilding there.

I could be wrong but I genuinely believe it’s the DL that makes those linebackers look good in SF. What I listened to (think it was the athletic podcast I believe you got me rolling on) made it seem like an improvement in corner play was a big factor there too.

Warner is obviously absolutely awesome but I think the focus on DL meshes with what makes SF good.

I’m curious to see what this defense’s answer to big nickel packages is. I know Carter was a CB/S coming out but he’s not exactly a big dude.

[GreenReaper]

Whitehead is a snot knocker.  Along with kwon and Joyner(injury) they didn't play for Jets D last season.  Neither did Lawson-Martin-Huff(injury)-Soloman-Curry(injury)-JJ-Clemens-Sauce-DJ...and etc to those I left out. 

My point is...the character of this year's defense is gonna be completely different.  So why not different results?  More sacks...more TOs should happen.  So we'll see how this might effect run stoppage...and overall D.

No less dramatic is the acquisitions and changes to the offense.  The character of this offense should also be significantly different due to formidable run and pass options that didn't exist on last year's team.   And will certainly make it's impact on the game.  Less 1-2-3-punts.  Scoring more points...and getting a much better share of time of possession.   Jets D being more rested with fresh legs for that 4th Q...to close out games.  With the character of the Jets offense changing for the better...it should have a negative effect on opposing defenses.  And could do the same to opposing decision making of opposing offenses too.  Less running...more passing.  How about this novelty...Jets DL salivating...due to opponents becoming one dimensional...having to play pass happy catch-up(ketchup?)   

Maybe some of the above are factors that help prevent Saleh-CS from sleepless nights and fretting about the run D.

Again...we'll see if these team character changes to the D-O for the better...will translate in better results for the team.  As in Ws.   

I mean...can you expect 7+ wins for this team...without the D at least being much improved too?  How about if it's 6+? 

For me...I'm excited as to what this team can do.

[jetstream23]

8 hours ago, slats said:

Felt this bullet point in the latest Cimini column deserved it’s own thread: 

Leak or no leak? The Jets allowed the fourth-most rushing yards last season (2,343) and lost their best run-stopping defensive lineman (Folorunso Fatukasi, team-leading 42.9% run stop win rate in 2021) in free agency, so it's fair to question the state of the run defense. Saleh said he's not worried, claiming the numbers got skewed by long runs. He said they actually finished in the "top half of the league" from an efficiency standpoint, based on analytics.

So we checked ... and he's right. Per NFL Next Gen Stats, they Jets ranked 13th in run-stopping success rate (61.2%) -- a stat that measures success based on the down-and-distance. Now the trick is reducing the number of explosive runs, because they can be game-changers. 

Second year in the system, major talent infusion on the DL and secondary, now with Kwon in the mix at LB, and maybe this run defense isn’t as frightening (in a bad way) as some folks fear. 
 
 

[Lith]

2 hours ago, Drums said:

Ok, that was more the way I remembered the game--him not being THE factor he usually is. Thanks Lith.

I went to that game, and I remember being surprised when I saw his numbers after the game.  We have seen plenty of games these last few seasons where Henry takes over.  He had good numbers, but he never carried the team in that game.  Jonathan Taylor in the Colts game was dominant.  Henry, imo, was not.

[Drums]

58 minutes ago, Lith said:

I went to that game, and I remember being surprised when I saw his numbers after the game.  We have seen plenty of games these last few seasons where Henry takes over.  He had good numbers, but he never carried the team in that game.  Jonathan Taylor in the Colts game was dominant.  Henry, imo, was not.

Yeah Taylor broke us ?