Do We Need to START Considering a Couple Bad Boys here and there?

[Vegasdogg]

Originally Posted by Flugel

I was told by a stat buff friend of mine that our defense ended up in the top 10 in sacks, which was a vast improvement and an important one.

We doubled the amount of sacks we had, and I am pretty sure not one player had double digits.
Sacks went from 25 (2008) to 40 (2009) Almost every DB had a sack except for Wright, and even Pool, Macdonald and Poteat had sacks. Glaringly, DQ had zero as well.


Sadly we went from 23 INTS (2008) to just 10 (2009.) 16 players had sacks, which kind of illustrates why this team didn't find a ton of value in resigning Kam Wimbley, who had as many sacks (6) as two guys off the street - Roth and Benard - had combined (7). When you can get all of these players involved in bringing the pressure, than finding that stud pass rusher or two, while very important, does not become a gaping hole like the QB position.

And for better or worse, people either defend Mangini or do not like him, and some of that is media and some if it is Mangini. Personally I didn't like some of his decisions (the QB hide and seek was not a winner, nor was choosing a project LB (Veikune) on a poor defense in round 2) but I do like how he carries himself and doesn't ever deflect criticism.

People were all over him for the watter bottle and the opportunity time, blowing these two items completely out of porportion with baseless accusations. Some here were saying he should be fired because James Davis got hurt, but they were making those comments under false assumptions. Not until Braylon left did we discover he was contantly stiffing the hotels in 2008 for extras and that is why he got fined, and only later did we find out that Davis did not go up against a guy in pads and he was padless. There were more empty BS accusations thrown in his direction, yet he handled it all pretty damn well. Does he need to be a better coach? No question. Is he the guy to take the team to the Super Bowl? Hell I don't know. I don't want him here if he can't. But I like the guy and I hear he is mega-smart about both sides of the ball. His players admit the man knows his shit.

Sadly we went from 23 INTS (2008) to 10 (2009), and we still did a shitty job stuffing the run when we needed to, which is a chracteristic of Rob Ryan's D. He more often than not had his defenses ranks in the 30's stopping the run, but did have good numbers against the pass (sacks and INTs.) I hope he does a better job this season, because I am sick of teams running the ball to protect a lead, and we can't get our D off the field.

[Vegasdogg]

Originally Posted by Flugel

TE: Alex Smith, Ben Watson, Evan Moore & the Mexicutioner

That's hilarious! Estandia right? LOL.

[Vegasdogg]

Originally Posted by mz.

Winning four unnecessary games and losing out on Suh et al. answers that question. But I've said that many times already.

I don't think you got any takers on this comment last time, and I suspect you won't this time. That is just about the craziest and looniest criticism of Mangini I have read to date. You do not blame a 4 game winning streak on a coach just because it lowered your draft positiioning. That's a pussification of a locker room. One of his biggest atta boys from the national media was how he convinced the team to not pack their bags @ 1-11. He gets mad press love for winning those games, and yet you pooh pooh that into a spin on how we lost a draft pick? That is an uber ghey. I know your thinking about higher draft picks, I just don't agree a coach ever conducts himself that way, not ever.

[Vegasdogg]

I guess when people discuss quitting the last 4 games, the following quote comes to mind:

"If I were dropped out of a plane into the ocean and told the nearest land was a thousand miles away, I'd still swim. And I'd despise the one who gave up."

ABRAHAM MASLOW

[Riffer X]

Originally Posted by Vegasdogg

I don't think you got any takers on this comment last time, and I suspect you won't this time. That is just about the craziest and looniest criticism of Mangini I have read to date. You do not blame a 4 game winning streak on a coach just because it lowered your draft positiioning. That's a pussification of a locker room. One of his biggest atta boys from the national media was how he convinced the team to not pack their bags @ 1-11. He gets mad press love for winning those games, and yet you pooh pooh that into a spin on how we lost a draft pick? That is an uber ghey. I know your thinking about higher draft picks, I just don't agree a coach ever conducts himself that way, not ever.

I'll bite. That is about the whackiest shit I've heard in awhile.

What the Flying Fuck is that???????

[Shep]

Originally Posted by Riffer X

I'll bite. That is about the whackiest shit I've heard in awhile.

What the Flying Fuck is that???????

Mangini was coaching for his job. Those four wins kept him employed. Realistically, he had no other choice.

We did find some guys, like Roth, Rubin, and Moore. Plus Bowens played great and I would think he'll stay while Barton goes... a good thing.

[Vegasdogg]

Originally Posted by Shep

Mangini was coaching for his job. Those four wins kept him employed. Realistically, he had no other choice.

I don't know if it's as simple as that. Every coach is looking to keep his job every season, well most are. And there was some pretty adamant members of this board who were very confident 4 games wasn't going to save Mangini. I am not sure you ever play to draft the Suh's of the world by losing with no effort. And the way we won, by not using a passing game, do you realize how tough that is to do in today's NFL? I mean wow, they had to lunch pail it those last few weeks and eat plenty of Wheaties. And the coach HAS to have their ear. Not easy @ 1-11 and seemingly under fire every week and about to be fired. What did the players have to do but pack their bags and leave after week 16. They didn't pack it in, and that has to say more than just "he was trying to save his job."

Much more. And do you know the last time this team had a 4 game winning streak? I think it was 20+ years ago. It's not easy when you suck. LOL. Shit I can't remember the last 3 game winning streak it has sucked for so long.

[mz.]

I never "blamed" the win streak on Mangini. That doesn't even make sense. Of course he'd want to win, with his ass being on the line and all. Those wins benefited him more than they did anyone or anything else.

What I did say was that those four wins weren't necessarily good for THE FRANCHISE. I don't buy the morale-boosting "we can build on this!" bullshit, especially considering the roster turnover a team like ours experiences each offseason. For me, those wins hurt us more in the long run more than they helped us because they kept us out of Franchise Player position in the draft with very little in return.

Not saying anyone has to agree with me, but this is how I feel.

[Flugel]

Originally Posted by Shep

Mangini was coaching for his job. Those four wins kept him employed. Realistically, he had no other choice.

We did find some guys, like Roth, Rubin, and Moore. Plus Bowens played great and I would think he'll stay while Barton goes... a good thing.

As I've said, we had 8 new offensive starters in the huddle in December and a rookie OC. I have NO clue what pisses Mz off about winning. I will say this, Mz puts some of the funniest icons on his screens. I used to hit the deck when I saw that Quinn one. I thought I could get him a little more excited about where the team is heading but I haven't budged him a millimeter. I'd freakin starve as a salesman.

I don't understand how a BIG superstar DT is the quickest route to turning around a franchise. Albert Haynesworth AND Shaun Rogers earned some pretty serious FA cake in the last 2 years for superstar statuses earned. Which one of those guys turned a losing team into a winner? Which one even made a difference? We didn't win 4 consecutive games until after Rogers went down to injury. Russell Maryland would eventually take a back seat to Danny Noonan and Tony Casillas in Dallas because he was somewhat of a disappointment. Steve Emtmann got hurt. Big Daddy Wilkenson was supposed to be can't miss superstar but he was just an average starter for a Bengals team that remained bad. Big $ Warren as a #3 overall never really justified the pick. Suh looks like a sure thing BUT we'll have to wait and see. Besides Alo or Solon, NOBODY really mentioned Suh much before 2009 so is this a steroids story sounding too good to be true?

Mangini inherited a 2008 draft that had NO day 1, only 5 selections and 2 roster keepers. In 2009, there were 4 selections scheduled that he doubled into 8 PLUS he added Bowens, Elam, Coleman, Mosely, Barton, Trusnik, Stuckey, Schaefering, Benard and Roth outside of the draft. We also added Lee Ann Womack and the dart board who started at RT. As bad as people thought St Clair was - Kevin Shaffer could NOT start at Chicago; and Chicago's running game got worse in the absence of St Clair. Might be just a coincidence but look at the difference in Matt Forte between 2008 and 2009.

Our goal of 2009 was to TURN the corner at some point and I think we witnessed that. Not only that but coaches like Bryan Cox, Rob Ryan, George Warhop and Brad Seely really did spectacular jobs once they got some degree of continuity established. The middle of our defense IMPROVED in the absence of 2 guys that grew accustomed to hearing our defense wouldn't be able to live without them. Rubin played with MUCH better leverage out of his stance and nobody could move him back. Even Corey Williams looked much improved as the season went on. ALOT of the younger players got noticably better like Alex Mack, Marcus Benard, A. Rubin, Evan Moore. AND guys playign brand new NFL positions like David Bowens (moved inside) & Mike Furrey (came to play WR and finished as a nice fillin at Safety). How about the unemployed punter we signed to pin countless opponents inside the 1 to 15 yard line.

Not for nothing, but when our QBing was sooo useless and teams knew we HAD to run the ball - they could cheat 10 guys in the box to load up vrs the run. Guess what? They still weren't stopping our running game so that tells me MORE than just Joe Thomas was blocking people.

The season ended the following way. A good player like Matt Roth was very pleasantly surprised enough to think he might want to stay longer than a quick audition for other teams. YOUNG players got excited while overpaid roster cholesterol like Shaun Smith got CUT. And while Jamal Lewis' dead legs were pissed they had a work day of 2 to 2.5 hours, Jennings and Harrison seemed to like putting in the work to make this team better. It showed on Sundays. Once Mangini had a young ambitious roster full of coachable character - the momentum swung and the team learned how to win and again and again and again. Good trend because it means the players bought in and saw what happened for doing so. Nothing ever looked so pleasing to the eye than seeing Worthlessberger flushed one way and sacked by a LBer coming in from the other side.

The last month of the season we're sacking QBs, we're running the ball down other teams' esophagii and our backup punter was pinning everyone deep while our return game finished 2nd to none. That really doesn't reflect crummy coaching. We were clearly a different team because we FINALLY had the ability to be a different team in December. We're getting there so i don't understand why some fans think we're in the middle of a Poseiden Adventure on the shores of Lake Erie.
- Tom F.