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At lunch yesterday I had the pleasure of sitting next to 11 year OL Craig Wolfley who played G for the Steelers from 1980-1989 and Minnesota 1990-91. He’s now a Steelers sidelines reporter. He knows the game.
He was talking about why some players fail. He brought up Kendrell Bell as a guy with one great year. Why? He didn’t understand the Xs and Os. Freak athlete but no scheme knowledge.
Young players start out with Xs and Os. They them learn their assignment and in game focus on their assignment. As they grow their laser sight gets wider and they have the ability to branch out and learn everyone else’s assignments. That’s when the game takes shape and the players truly develop and excel. Some players understand Xs and Os, but can’t get it when it’s in 3d when the game is moving.
The most important 7 yards for the QB is the walk from the huddle to the line. He dissects safeties, then LB, then DL. When he’s calling out audilbkes, the D audibles. The guys on the lines, LB, etc get about 1.5 seconds to dissect what will happen and hit their assignment. Essentially there’s a ton of confusion to dissect.
Film study is highly important. He had a log he kept of player tendencies. He used HOF DL Randy White as an example. He knew if he was up close he’d have to punch him quick, if he was back and U shaped on the line he knew to drop back and wait for a head fake and swim move.
The same scheme will allow players to go from laser sight, to wide vision. The fact that we don’t have that consistency is why our picks won’t develop. They don’t get time to widen their focus and take in the whole scheme.
Mingo has had 3 DC. Overall we’ve changed OC 6 years in a row. It doesn’t mean the guys we picked are great, it means they aren’t getting a fighting chance. The only choice is to keep everyone on staff and let people try and develop.
Freedom!!!
Mingo had 3 DC’s. So did Haden. I don’t see you giving him any kind of pass @Soup.
Merely an example. No one’s getting a “pass” per se. He’s had 3 in 3 years and hasn’t developed at all. Just showing a potential reason why our majority of picks don’t develop
Freedom!!!
I think the majority of our picks don’t develop because they are very bad picks. If we had the same coach for 10 years it wouldn’t make Mingo a stud. 3 different coaches have told him to put on weight and add muscle. He ignored all 3 of them.
There’s no “potential reason” about it, period. Imagine how life at any job would be if you went to work only to find that your supervisor changed every year. And while the job basically remains the same, each new boss wants the job done in a completely different manner, slowing production. And just when you begin to come around to the new way of doing things…the impatient boss fires said supervisor due to not meeting quota, despite being told that it may take a few years to bring everyone on board to the new way of doing things.
Add fan and media pressure to every level wanting the change to happen immediately and…Yeah. That would suck.
I think the majority of our picks don’t develop because they are very bad picks. If we had the same coach for 10 years it wouldn’t make Mingo a stud. 3 different coaches have told him to put on weight and add muscle. He ignored all 3 of them.
Without PEDS only so much muscle and weight can be put on an adult frame. It’s genetics.
As for your theory – you need to pay closer attention.
Rookie cones in and learns HIS assignment. Laser focuses on it.
2nd year that assignment changes with a new coach, language and philosophy. Same guy laser focuses on that assignment.
Year 3 things change again, repeat.
Consistent scheme:
Year 1 rookie laser focuses on his assignments.
Year 2 players vision starts to widen and his assignments start to become 2nd nature .
Year 3 vision expands further, he understands his assignments and everyone else’s on the defense. He now plays on instinct as his assignments are ingrained in him.
Our draft picks never get to year 2, let alone year 3.
Freedom!!!
I’m not dismissing the notion that stability helps players develop. What I’m saying (and you’re not paying attention) is that a lot of the players we’ve picked are garbage and while some stability would make them slightly better garbage they would still be garbage. Since you love conjecture;
Rookie comes in and it takes him most of the year to learn his assignment. At the end of the year he better understands the defense he’s a part of but has a rough rookie year and doesn’t make an impact.
2nd year new coach, the player has to learn a new system. Even though it takes only one offseason for good NFL players to learn a system, this particular player needs an entire 12 months to understand his role in the defense like he’s still a rookie. He struggles with basics like shedding blocks and tackling.
3rd year another new coach. Player learns his role by week 10 of the season but by then the coaches already know that even if he gets to the right spot he’s not going to make the play because he just sucks.
Consistant scheme:
Rookie comes in and it takes most of the year for him to learn his assignment. Unfortunately rookie is a great athlete but lacks the instincts that are required of a great football player. Rookie has a rough year.
Year 2 player still knows his assignment and knows the exact right place he’s supposed to be but he can’t get there because he can’t shed a block to save his life. Teams don’t even have the RB chip him anymore because they have learned that a single blocker makes the player completely disappear.
Year 3 he knows where he’s supposed to be, why he’s supposed to be there, and the assignments of every player on defense. Once in a great while he gets to the right places at the right time. Once he gets there a real NFL player jukes him out of his shoes or blasts right through his attempts at a tackle. The player jogs up to the play just in time to help his fellow players who actually made the tackle up off the ground.
Unfortunately in both circumstances the player sucks. Coaching stability is only important if you have decent players.
You can’t judge that fully on the player until they get the real shot with stability. Again – I’m not giving free passes. Mingo was an example – remember – Dumbardi picked Mingo so no matter where he is failure would more than likely happen. The other portion of your shedding blocks comes from film study. He should know where that blocker is coming from and has to beat him to that spot. That’s where film study is so important and why I brought up the info I got directly from an NFL vet. If you link our changes all together and look at all the terrible picks – there’s a correlation there. There’s no way that many GMs could possibly pick that many sucky players. So now it’s time to delve into the real deep reason of the importance of consistency which was the point of me starting this thread.
Freedom!!!
There’s no way that many GMs could possibly pick that many sucky players.
Did you just say that with a straight face or were you using heavy sarcasm? Because knowing the history of this team and the players taken by the laundry list of GM’s, I can only assume the it’s the latter. You damn well know that it’s an absolute fact that over the years, we have indeed picked that many sucky players.
The odds of all of them failing are astronomical (which is my point with why we need consistency).
Freedom!!!
I don’t think anyone is debating the merits of consistency. Clearly, having it is tantamount to success. However, talent is also necessary as well.
Courtney Brown sucked. Gerrard Warren sucked. William Green sucked. Braylon Edwards sucked. Kam Wimbley sucked. Brady Quinn sucked. Brandon Weeden and Trent Richardson sucked. Mingo sucks. Justin Gilbert sucks. Danny Shelton and Cam Erving sure look like they suck.
Coaching can’t fix suck. Now can bad coaching stifle talent? Yes, yes it can and I’m sure that we can all agree on that as well. But we’re not talking about Jimmy Graham going to Seattle and disappearing or Demarco Murray floundering in Philly. Those guys were established, All-Pro players first. The names on the above list started out as suck, and stayed stuck on suck, and no amount of coaching was going to fix that.
Talent is always going to shine, even with bad coaching. Joe Thomas, Joe Haden, and Alex Mack prove that. The issue is that this team spends the overwhelming majority of its resources taking William Greens and Kam Wimbleys than it does taking Hadens or Thamas’s. So yes, while the odds of it happening may be astronomical as you put it, the Browns, in all of their glory, find a way to do it.
Year..
after year….
after year.
The only one that comes to mind is Buffalo. I believe they’re on an even longer playoff-less streak than we are. Not sure about the “winning season” total though. I’d have to assume they’ve had at least one or two more than us since ’99.
But yeah, other than them, we are the benchmark for futility. The Gold Standard for failure.
sigh, Go Browns.
Just looked it up. Buffalo has had 3 winning seasons since ’99, and 2 8-8 years.
So, yeah, we win!
Although their last trip to the playoffs was in ’99. We went in ’02, so their streak for that is longer.
yes, there last playoff appearance was the music city miracle. @shooter
Hue Jackson is a loser.
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