Johnson's defenses & lack of sacks

I can’t remember if I posted this rant from my friend PK, following up to the decline in sacks, so if it’s a dupe, apologies.

 

 

Hugh Douglass in the '00-'02 years was twice the defensive lineman that Freak has been, pre- or post-injury. Douglass wracked up years of 10, 12 and 15 sacks in those 3 seasons, which is a feat that no D-lineman has accomplished in recent years, none have been in double figures. (I spent some time googling and found a Yahoo sports page that had season-long stats for all recent years.)

And yes, some of Hugh's sacks were no doubt coverage sacks because Taylor and Vincent weren't just good corners, they were premier guys who played bump and run every down. (I hate this "press coverage" crap, it's bump and run, why don't we call it bump and run anymore?)

When you had guys like Taylor and Vincent completely owning other receivers, you could blitz like mad. Which Johnson did, successfully. Now, you've got Sheldon and Lito, who are nice but not dominant, and you've got LBs who simply aren't blitzers, safeties who are either older or not as good at blitzing. So if either of you Tivo'd that game and want to be a masachist, watch that last drive again. Johnson was clueless. He didn't know what to do. He called a blitz and Griese immediately dinked one underneath to the RB or TE. He faked and dropped into coverage, the D-linemen got nowhere near Griese and he meticulously waited and waited and waited to find an eventually open receiver.

All that being said, it's entirely possible Reid lost the game on 1 play. We get the ball back with 4 mins to play, immediately get a 1st down running the ball. Then run on 1st down, clock running, clock running, Bears have 1 timeout, Reid calls a 2nd down pass play that goes incomplete -- clock stops. Yes, on next play Donovan gets the 1st down by running but he goes out of bounds. Inexplicably on 1st down McNabb is throwing again but gets sacked and thankfully keeps the clock running.

But because he threw incomplete on that 2nd down earlier, it allows the Bears -- with the 1 TO and the 2-min warning -- to get the ball back shortly after the 2-min warning. If he'd run the ball, then they would have handed the ball to the Bears with about 1 min, 20 secs to go.