Yeah. "The Great 4-3" DO people remember that one of the great years Vilma played was the year where we "Played to win the game" the year when the team had NO offense and opponents just ran all day on the Jets - Vilma's stats were pretty though... Honestly , the guy had a decent rookie year and then a follow up year with bloated stats on a horrible team. That's all.
It's not one front, it's an entire scheme. If you run a 3-4, you can show a 4 or 5--man front out of your base personnel set, but the responsibilities remain the same or very similar as they would be in a regular 3-4.. When Mangini came in, we simply DID NOT have the personnel to run the 3-4 scheme. We did not have ONE gap-control DL. Ellis was the closest thing we had, and he's been just okay in the 3-4. We had a roaming, sideline-to-sideline, 225lb MLB in Vilma. That is a guy who is PERFECT for the 4-3, and will only be effective if kept completely clean in the 3-4. Still, a regular 3-4 scheme will limit his freedom to roam and make plays. Mangini even said when he came in, that he was going to design his schemes around the strengths of his personnel, and then went on to institute a 3-4 scheme very similar to NE's. This stubborn refusal to adjust to the strengths of the players he was given set us back 2 years, in terms of progress on defense. Now that Vilma, Robertson, Abraham and others are gone, and have been replaced, we now, finally, have players whose strengths are those desired for effective 3-4 players. So now we're back at square one- where most teams are when new HCs first arrive. And by the way, it is just plain Mangini-homerism to say we would not have been better in the 4-3. In 2004 we were one of the best defenses in the league running a 4-3. When Mangini arrived, we were missing ONE PIECE (an effective 4-3 NT to play next to and compliment Robertson) from that from 7 of the 2004 season. Our best players were all guys whose skill sets were tailor made for a 4-3 scheme. The switch set us back 2 years. Now we finally have the personnel to run the 3-4. Let's hope they can pull it together...
If he plays well, stays healthy and the Saints extend him at the end of next season (he is on the last season of his rookie contract) we apparently get a 2nd round pick in 2009. That is a pretty big crawfish. It would have been a moronic thing to keep him any longer and we should have traded him the season before. His value would only have gone further down in this scheme.
We can agree to disagree. I NEVER said the 4-3 is better......I said the 4-3 was a better defense under Herm with the players he had available, than Mangini using the 3-4 with Vilma and D-Rob in 2006. What's all this crap about D-Rob's injury and paying him big bucks?? I not defending D-Rob in the slightest..........I'm defending that he's been out of position the last 2 years and has no place in a 3-4 NT position. D-Rob may not be the answer in Denver in their 4-3, but he was a better player in the 4-3 under Herm than Mangini's 3-4.......and no one can argue that point. Also, I never said I wanted to build a defense around Vilma and D-Rob.....why are you putting words in my mouth?? Maybe if we continued with the 4-3, but not the 3-4. The Jets' defense in 2004 was outstanding with Vilma.....Vilma became a victim of circumstances with Mangini's arrival. I'm not saying Mangini is a bad coach, and I have all the faith in him in the world, but I do question his decision to play players out of position in 2006. The Jets of 2006 were sucessful mostly due to their Offense and Schott's new schemes, in spite of the defense. I understand there were some cap issues 2 years ago and the Jets didn't have the freedom to make moves like they did this offseason. IMO, Mangini needed to bring the 3-4 along at a slower pace till more pieces of the puzzle were in place.
I have the same sentiments, I loved that defense and those linebackers from that era. I also miss Vilma because he was our best Hurricane player ever, and yes I know we had Vinnie, but that national title game he threw to Penn State never endeared him to me..
Well you can't have it both ways - You don't say you wanted to build around Vilma and Drob but, you basically say Mangini is a dunce for not running the 4-3 Well, I think you run the defense you're going to run for the long haul and you don't throw your playbook out for just TWO players of that caliber. The Staff has to weigh the present Defense with the defense that will be their finished product when they are ready to compete... Would the Jets D have been better if Mangini just played a 4-3 - Maybe but, who cares if they didn't think Drob was worth locking up long term. They MUST take into account how they are going to build the defense LONG TERM!!! I also think this staff had higher hopes for Vilma in their defense.... And IMO if Vilma was the Superstar some think he is, he wouldn't have been totally nuetralized.... I personally think Mangini has been bringing the defense along just fine.... It's the offense and finding a QB that worries me tons more. I'm pretty sure they had huge debates about how slow or fast to go to the 3-4 and I don't think it really matters other than the Final product when the team is ready to compete.... getting everyone on page in the 3-4 As soon as possible could have bigger benefits in the long run and this year especially for the younger guys. ... And "Outstanding" for the 04' defense is a little overboard IMO....
Ridiculous.... The end product is what matters..... If he was going to try to appease Drob and Vilma at the expense of everyone else, who could play in either defense - some guys better in the 3-4.... Then you have to decide to stick with it for the long term and lock up DROB and Vilma..... Otherwise you run the 4-3 for 2 years and then in year 3 you present a totally new playbook..... Huh???? Wah???? So, right now the defense would be REALLY starting from scratch instead of the head start I believe they have and the forming of what I believe will be a defense many times better than that 04' defense that I think people are overrating... The Goal is a DOMINANT defense - Stats aside, I think that 04' defense was slightly above avergage. A "Nice" defense". Personally, I"M DAMN EXCITED ABOUT THIS DEFENSE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! And I'm quite happy that Mangini didn't throw out his defensive playbook and stick to a 4-3 all for DSLOB and Overrated Vilma. That's just me.... (and Mangini)
^ You think the '04 defense was "slightly above average"? That D was 4th ranked in the NFL in terms of points, and 7th in terms of yards. That's slightly above average in a 15-team league. That's top-notch in a 32 team league.... That D pitched (I believe) 8 second-half shutouts. It's pretty damn easy to win games when, every other game you're guaranteed a full-half of shut-out defense.... We were also 5th against the run- and that's the important part, as we are talking about the front 7 here (the secondary needed improving regardless of the scheme).... In addition we had 37 sacks (2.3/game).... That was an EXCELLENT defense and an even better front 7... In '05 it struggled with the loss of Barton to injury and Ferguson to Dallas. But one must not forget that Curtis Martin was all but done in '05, we were on our 3rd QB, and our Pro Bowl C went down. Our offense was abysmal, and our D often simply wore out by virtue of the fact that they were on the field the whole game... The defense that Mangini inherited was a 4-3 NT and a CB away from being that same unit from 2004. It was a 3-4 NT, a 3-4 DE, a pass-rushing OLB, a 3-4 ILB, and a CB away from being a legitimate 3-4 defense. In addition, the man who Mangini put in charge of the defense, Bob Sutton, had been the LB coach when we were running the 4-3.... Now, I'm happy with where our D is at now, and expect a much better result this season than in the first two seasons of the Mangini 3-4 (although I still think we have a lot of question marks and room to improve) but there is no question in my mind that staying with the 4-3 would have yielded much greater defensive success early in Mangini's regime...
I miss his great Tackling 5 yards in front of the line of scrimmage, play after play after play. Overrated from day 1, and jet fans convinced themselves he was the second coming before he stepped on the field. This guy underperformed his entire career to date except for a handful of games. Farewell ats_suck:
Yea... Abe (had we kept him) was drafted as a 3-4 OLB. Ellis was drafted as a 3-4 DE. We were missing a somewhat important piece in the line...a whole other DT. I really see no point in people still complaining about what defense we played in in Mangini's first season when....1. we were 10-6 2. it's now his 3rd season now and 3. they kind of ignore that we would have (and did) suck in the 4-3. 4. You guys REALLY would have been happy with a BT/???/DRob/Ellis line? 5. Did you miss 2005? And seriously...you're...mad at Mangini or...someone? for the fact that he wasn't blessed with perfect talent from the get go? How does that even work? Or is that my "Mangini homerism" at work? Dude...your logic...in my always humble and high opinion...it sucks. Labeling me a Mangini homer for suggesting the we would have sucked in the 4-3 in 2006 is laughable at best... Lemme guess, you'd rather we kept Abe and never touched one of the best young C's in the game cause it would have made us potentially better for one year...so that Mangini can get his rebuilding project going the next year...while we were in cap hell...seriously SO many things you're not even bothering to pay attention to...just label it Mangini Homerism, right? Cause God forbid fans actually like the young coach of their franchise who actually came with a plan and has executed it pretty damn swiftly...
JB....you can have the last word.........you're 100% right . I'm 100% wrong. I'm tired of someone making assumptions of my opinion and putting words in my mouth. I'm not debating with you anymore, I've moved on. You clearly need to be right. You win!! Geez.!!
If he didn't get injured, I think Vilma would still be a Jet today. I think he would have eventually figured out Mangini's defense, but his injury made him expendable.
I don't think it was a question of "figuring out Mangini's defense." Vilma was smart enough to "get it" but execution was the problem, because he was always a little light in the ass to be effective behind the lightweights in front of him. If you don't have substantial beef on the D-line in a 3-4 and opposing O-line blockers are able to shove your D-line back (and even get to the point where they're now blocking Vilma), that explains why it was so hard for him to get tackles other than 5 yards beyond the LOS. He's just not big enough to fight off blockers and make the tackle. By the time he does, the runner is 5-8 yards into our territory. Now, when David Harris arrived, he proved he COULD fight off those blockers and make those tackles, so THAT's the thing that caused suspicion to be cast on Vilma. But you're right about the injury, because I think that was the accelerant that got him traded. That and the possibility of bringing in other talent. Now that we have some substantial beef on the D-line and what would seem like a legitimate NT in Jenkins, we finally have what should look like a good 3-4 situation and it would have been interesting to see what Vilma would have done then. But alas... that was then and this is now. We needed to make the moves we did and jettisoning Vilma allowed other talent to come aboard, so from that perspective, the trade was an excellent one.
Sayonara! Watch David Harris highlights from last year and then ask yourself how much you still miss the "other LB," the one who didn't fit into the 3-4 scheme....
