TBH I think we have more defensive depth this year than we've had under any RR team (except for at safety), so health may not condemn us to outside of the top 3
According to ESPN's stats, the Jets defense was 5th in total yardage, 5th in pass defense, 13th in rush defense, and 20th in scoring defense. That last ranking sounds bad until you find out that 51 of the 363 points scored against the Jets last year were scored by opposing defenses (7 TD's and a safety). Show me where the Jets defense got worse since last season, and we can have a discussion. Meanwhile, all of those elite defenses (as the article's author categorized them) have seen significant injuries and/or departures except for the 49ers. If somebody seriously suggests that the Jet Defense is not at the very least in the conversation of being elite, they are probably blaming it on Mark Sanchez and Santonio Holmes.
I have no idea how good or bad the Jet defense will be this upcoming season, but last year's wasn't nearly elite by any stretch of the imagination. Its a defense that gave up 30+ points 5 times. That kind of telling when you consider the porous Pats defense gave up 30+ points only once. You can't be an elite defense when you are 20th in scoring D (again, 5 positions BEHIND that "bad" Pats defense) The other thing I wonder about is that Jet fans seem to think that any problems the Jets had last season were all because of your safeties and that Bell and Landry are that much better
Regardless, they dont consider the Jets an elite defense When in fact there is no team in the league that I honestly think has a better chance at finishing top 3 in defense than we do. Ravens have injury problems plus their elite are getting old, Steelers are getting old. Texans were only good once so have a long way to proving themselves, and the 49ers have a VERY tough schedule outside of their 6 divisional games (last year they benefited greatly from a bit of a cupcake schedule and a little luck) All biases aside im not saying the Jets will have the #1 defense, but i truly believe they have a better chance than any team in the league of finishing top 3 next year. And with RR + the young players on this team, I cant imagine a single team in the nfl you would prefer to have defensively going foward.
Jet fans dont seem to think last years problems also had to do with losing BT for the season or having a shitty pass rush ? Plus having Leonhard go down for the year, and be replaced by Pool (who already got cut by the cowboys and their depleted secondary) doesnt help. But im interested where these Jet fans are who think that our safeties were the only porblem And if you honestly dont think that Landry/Bell/Smith/Bush/Allen is a MASSIVE upgrade over Smith/Pool(who I bet doesnt get a starting job this year)/a railroad worker Well then its gonna be hard to take your opinion too seriously. But I will say that I do agree that last years defense definitely wasnt elite, but its 3 biggest flaws (2 of which were due to season ending injury) all were addressed rather significantly.
Gave up way too many points because of turnovers. The Pats defense was very bad. Bell and Landry are former pro bowlers. Eric Smith and Jim Leonhard? Much improved from last year. Look at yardage, big difference between pats and jets.
Bell is a legit strong safety. I understand under the RR defense all safeties are hybrid FS/SS so he might have to do some coverage. But id imagine more of those duties will end up going towards our faster safeties. Not to mention when we play elite TEs, RR will make more favorable matchups (we saw last season him occasionally putting corners on them) or having Landry focus them. I dont plan on seeing Bell being assigned to man coverage on someone like Gronk all game. But Bell really is an awesome (albeit old) in the box safety, and theres a reason he was one of the best players/leading tacklers/leaders on their Fin defense for several years
I was talking to my friend who went to Jets camp and he said Bell is one huge safety, hopefully between him and Landry they can build some fear in the NFL to go along with Revis and Cro.
Didn't you hear? Playing safety in the NFL is illegal. Not go-to-jail illegal, but yellow flag illegal. That's why a third of the QBs in the league put up better numbers last season than guys like Montana, Marino, or Unitas ever did. I really expect that in a few years, we'll just have 4-5-6 CBs on the field, a couple of them lined up where safeties once stood. Maybe, when we expect a run, we'll put a fast LB out there, instead.
QFT. I've been expressing this very sentiment since last year. The value of a hard-hitting, fear-inducing Safety is essentially nil nowadays because the hits/contact from that type of Safety are often penalties in today's game. A Safety still needs to be physical and a solid tackler; but, currently, a Safety who excels in coverage is much more valuable than one who can lay the wood.
There are no elite defenses right now and the jets definitely are not elite. They are also not a top 4 defense in this league
We were top 5 in yds, I think 20th in points so we weren't a top 5 D. The D no doubt took a big step back last year but w/ Rex calling the D again, a hopefully strong draft, upgrades at safety, development of younger guys anything less than top 3 will be a big disappointment. I think this D will be better than '10.
I hate rankings by "experts" and how everyone claims disrespect blah blah blah. IMO this will be the best Defense Rex has had since he's been here.
I think it has the potential to be, but I'd like to see it prove out before I can share that opinion.
Even if its not this particular year... games are won and lost in the trenches and the Jets have solidified (hopefully) 2/3 of those spots for the foreseeable future. Pouha is great also until we get a young guy to round out the group.
We were ranked second in adjusted DVOA last season. Prety damn impressive. The offense was just so bad that it made our D look worse than it was. Opposing defenses scored 7 TD's against us? Jesus, lol.
No it didn't, our D was not very good last year. Not as bad as 20th in pts but far from what we saw in '09 or '10.
